A LIVERPOOL lawyer is embroiled in a court case in the USA that alleges he was an accomplice in a multi-million pound Wall Street fraud.

Peter Rigby, of Liverpool-based JST Lawyers, has been dragged into an action being brought by a group of international investors against American investment fund Montague Morgan Slade (MMS).

The case is primarily against Michael Brown, Gordon Spedding and convicted fraudster Anthony Heald, from Sunderland, who were involved in the running of MMS.

The class action alleges that Mr Rigby, who previously acted as Mr Healds lawyer, crossed the line from legal advisor to accomplice in the MMS enterprise.

Mr Rigby totally denies the allegations and he is currently fighting to have the case against him thrown out by the Supreme Court in New York.

His current law firm JST Lawyers, and former firm Keith Park Solicitors, of St Helens, are also named as defendants in the case mainly because Mr Rigby worked for them at the time.

In all there are 19 defendants. The case against MMS and the various defendants is set out across hundreds of pages of documents filed in New York.

In essence the international investors allege that MMS claimed to manage funds from an office in Wall Street but it was nothing more than a Ponzi scheme that cheated at least 50 investors out of approximately $16.6m (s10.7m).

John Lundin, of New York law firm Schlam Stone, is handling the case for the investors.

In documents submitted to the court by Mr Lundins firm it is alleged that: Rigby has played a role in several events that appear to have been designed to delay and frustrate investor redemptions.

Rigby knowingly made false factual representations regarding MMS that he intended investors to rely upon and on which they relied in delaying redeeming their investments and initiating civil and/or criminal actions against MMS for stealing their investments.

Mr Rigby is being represented by Chris Stanton, of Hill Dickinson, and New York lawyers have also been instructed.

They have applied to the New York court to throw out the case saying that it should not fall under their jurisdiction as none of the parties involved in the case live in New York.