Oscar-winning actor Leo DiCaprio love for the environment is not hidden from anyone, his charitable foundation “The Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation” is under the scanner for a $3 Billion scam which involved a shady Malaysian sovereign-wealth fund.
According to the report, the foundation collected more than $45 million at a celebrity-studded gala in St-Tropez, which raised questions about its transparency and accountability.
Aaron Dorfman representative of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy told The Hollywood Reporter that, “Everything might be perfectly fine, but we don’t know.”
According to the THR, the foundation’s fundraisers are “one-percenter excess ostensibly in support of saving the environment, “freewheeling bacchanals” complete with “suspiciously predisposed Slavic women in bustiers” and couples who “openly cavort in the bathroom stalls.”
THR pointed fingers to the hypocrisy of “guests helicoptering in to dine on whole sea bass after watching a short film about the dangers of overfishing.”
US Justice Department filed a series of civil fraud complaints just hours before the foundation’s recent fundraiser charges.
In a statement by Terry Tamminen, CEO of DiCaprio’s foundation, said “It had doled out more than $30 million in grants this year, and he called it “an incredibly efficient, highly effective philanthropic organization that, through its relationship with the California Community Foundation, is supporting credible organizations that are carrying out some of the most important work on the planet.”
A series of civil fraud complaints filed by the US Justice Department just hours before DiCaprio’s recent fundraiser charge that money allegedly embezzled from the 1Malaysia Development Berhad by DiCaprio pal Jho Low wound up in the foundation’s coffers and also funded an $11 million Las Vegas gambling junket in which the star took part.
The foundation was started and run by the actor’s mom Irmelin as an NGO, but in 2008 it closed down and distributed $1.6 million in charitable gifts.
