Florida Donor Sues to Recover $3.6-Million Gift to Seminary

A Florida philanthropist and technology-company executive is asking a court in Tampa to return a $3.6-million donation that he made last year to a seminary in Charlotte, N.C.

John Sykes, chief executive of Sykes Enterprises, in Tampa, is alleging in a lawsuit filed in Hillsborough County Circuit Court that the Southern Evangelical Seminary, an interdenominational institution with 200 students, violated the terms of his donation.

The gift was earmarked to pay for land and a new building for a seminary expansion project, according to the suit.

A key issue in the suit is an alleged agreement between Mr. Sykes and the seminary that the new building would be named after Ross Rhoads, a co-founder of the seminary who is also a friend and former pastor of Mr. Sykes. After a dispute arose among board members over the donation, Mr. Rhoads refused to have his name on the building, making it impossible to carry out the terms of the donation agreement, according to the suit. Mr. Rhoads could not be reached for comment.

In an interview, Norman Geisler, the president of the seminary, disputed key points in the suit, including the contention that naming the building for Mr. Rhoads was a condition of Mr. Sykes’ gift. “There was no such stated condition in any document of the donor,” he said.

Mr. Geisler said the seminary had decided to name the building for Mr. Rhoads four months before Mr. Sykes made his donation and that it still plans to put Mr. Rhoads’ name on the structure.

Mr. Sykes and his wife, Susan, recently made gifts totaling $38-million to the University of Tampa and $10.1-million to Queens College, in New York.