June 9, 2005 | Read Time: 3 minutes
Many nonprofit groups are coming to terms with the likelihood that donations promised by Alberto Vilar — a financier who pledged millions to arts, health, and educational institutions — will never materialize, following his arrest last month on fraud charges.
Mr. Vilar’s lawyers, in several news reports, have denied the charges.
A complaint filed by the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan accused Mr. Vilar of using $5-million from a client of his investment company as his own “personal piggy bank to pay personal expenses and make charitable contributions.”
Among the gifts to charity that had been paid with a client’s money, the government said: a $540,000 check to Washington & Jefferson College, where Mr. Vilar has pledged $18.1-million for a new technology center. According to the complaint the client, who was not named by the government, had given the money to Mr. Vilar for a new investment venture and did not authorize its use for personal or business expenses.
Mr. Vilar’s business partner was also arrested on fraud charges, and the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating their company, Amerindo Investment Advisors, which focuses on Internet stocks and has its headquarters in New York.
Outstanding Pledges
Mr. Vilar still owes money on several major pledges, including $50-million promised to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, in Washington.
The Kennedy Center had said last month that Mr. Vilar was on schedule with his payments on the gift (The Chronicle, May 26). But after Mr. Vilar’s arrest, Tiki Davies, a center spokeswoman, said in an e-mail message that the Kennedy Center had only received one payment, which was made soon after he announced in 2001 that he planned to pay off the gift over 10 years. She declined to specify the amount. The $50-million was to be used to train arts leaders and to sponsor performances; now the center will try to raise the money from other sources.
Mr. Vilar has slipped in payments to other groups as well, including gifts to the Metropolitan Opera, in New York, and the Washington National Opera.
Some charity officials are hopeful that Mr. Vilar will still be able to fulfill his promises. Lynn I. Barger, a spokeswoman for Washington & Jefferson College, in Washington, Pa., declined to say how much the college is still owed on Mr.Vilar’s $18.1-million pledge. “There is a presumption of innocence and it’s premature for the college to discuss any hypothetical questions about what we might do in the future,” she said.
Other nonprofit leaders said that with or without Mr. Vilar’s largess, they would be able to proceed with their work.
“Certainly Mr. Vilar has done a lot from a cultural standpoint for this valley,” said John Dakin, a spokesman for the Vail Valley Foundation, in Colorado, which manages an outdoor theater that Mr. Vilar had promised to help renovate.
Of Mr. Vilar’s $3.5-million pledge, Mr. Dakin said his organization has received $2-million. “It’s not as if everything is going to shut down now,” he said.
