Of all the adjectives used to describe him, Robert Vesco - who has died at 72 - was happiest with "financier". For the son of an Italian immigrant carworker in Detroit, the word had an exotic ring and he did not like to be called a crook, conman, fugitive, mobster, swindler or international drug dealer.

At his peak in the 1970s, he was worth several hundred million pounds (the equivalent of a few billion today), sailed the Caribbean in a Roman Abramovich-style yacht and flew around the world in a private Boeing 707 complete with discotheque, sauna and stewardesses who were particularly attentive to his needs. He named the aircraft the Silver Phyllis although it was not silver and he had no relatives called Phyllis. Apparently, the fact that it sounded like a venereal disease amused him.