Forbes: Billionaire Scandals of 2012
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Thor Batista In March, Brazilian playboy Thor Batista, son of Eike Batista, the 7th richest person in the world with a $30 billion mining fortune was driving his Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren sports car in a Rio de Janeiro suburb when he hit and killed a cyclist. A 30-year-old laborer, Wanderson Pereira dos Santos, died instantly. In May, a judge decided Thor would stand trial for manslaughter, but the 21-year-old has yet to have his day in court. In September, he was named to the board of his father's EBX Group.
(Forbes Image)
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Stewart Rahr's S... November wasn't a great month for the self-styled "No.1 king of all fun", pharmacy billionaire Stewart Rahr. First, he got thrown out of pricey New York sushi hotspot Nobu when he allegedly threatened to kill the restaurant's manager (someone was sitting at his table, apparently). Things took a more serious turn days later when police seized two guns from the philanthropist. The New York Times reported that his weapons were revoked after an altercation in a Trump Tower elevator. In early December, Rahr announced that he and his wife of 43 years would be divorcing. He told Forbes the decision was amicable.
(Getty Images North America)
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Rausing Family T... This year's most bizarre billionaire story is also the saddest. In July, Hans Kristian Rausing, 49-year-old scion of a Swedish milk carton fortune, was arrested on suspicion of drug possession in South London. Police then searched his five-story mansion in the city’s pricey Cadogan Place and found the body of his American-born wife Eva. The couple had struggled with addiction for years; Eva had once been arrested trying to smuggle heroin and crack into a party at London's U.S. Embassy. It emerged during police investigations that Hans had been living alongside Eva's corpse for some weeks. He was charged with "preventing the lawful and decent burial" of his late wife, who was subsequently found to have died of a cocaine overdose.
(AP)
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Christoffel Wies... In June, South African supermarket mogul Christoffel Wiese faced perhaps the most unusual billionaire legal fight of the year: recovering over $1 million confiscated by customs officers because he was traveling with that huge sum in cold, hard cash bundled up in rubber bands in his luggage. As the U.K.’s Daily Mail reported from London’s High Court, the billionaire tried to board a flight from England to Luxembourg in 2009 with two checked suitcases and one carry-on bag stuffed with a combined £674,920 — just over $1 million — in bills. The U.K. justice system apparently didn't buy Wiese's explanation that the money came from diamond deals in South Africa in the 80s and 90s, and had been kept in a safety deposit box in the Ritz hotel because of foreign exchange restrictions in his homeland. His lawyer tried to lend some perspective to proceedings, reminding the court that for a billionaire like Wiese, $1 million counts for "less than two weeks’ income and a minute fraction of his assets.”
(Courtesy of Pepkor)
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Donald Trump's V... Days before the presidential election, Donald Trump set eyeballs rolling the world over by posting a YouTube video making President Obama an offer he wouldn't be able to refuse, to use a cliche not far removed from the real estate mogul’s own words. The billionaire birther gave the President a week to produce his college records and passport applications in return for a $5 million donation to the charity of Obama’s choice. His move derided in the press as, at best, a ploy for attention -- and needless to say,the President didn't bite. At the time, Trump told Forbes he'd had positive feedback from the video.
(David Becker/ZUMAPRESS.com/Newscom)
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Koch Brothers' "... America's richest brothers Charles (pictured) and David Koch are rarely out of the headlines, but October's accusations were more serious than the usual implications of secret electioneering. Shortly before the presidential election, liberal political magazine In These Times obtained and published a packet of voting information sent to 45,000 employees of Koch Industries paper subsidiary Georgia-Pacific. The materials included a list of Koch-endorsed candidates — those who “have received support from a Koch company or Koch PAC”, the company’s political action committee. For Oregon staffers, that list was comprised solely of Republicans: 14 of them at state level, plus the Romney/Ryan presidential ticket. Koch Industries denied any partisanship, but said the company supported "market-based policies and economic freedom."
(Bo Rader/Wichita Eagle/MCT/Newscom)
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Pinault's Baby M... French fashion tycoon Francois-Henri Pinault comes from a family worth some $13 billion. His great wealth was at the crux of a nasty court case involving his one-time girlfriend, supermodel Linda Evangelista, who claimed the billionaire heir hadn't paid a cent (or euro, as the case may be) in child support for the son he fathered five years earlier. Since then, Pinault has married another beauty, actress Salma Hayek (pictured with the Gucci mogul and their daughter). Pinault implied in court that he thought Evangelista may have gotten pregnant on purpose during their brief relationship. Lawyers for the cover girl countered that he'd lavished money and attention on his child with Hayek while ignoring his son Augie. The couple settled for an undisclosed amount in May.
(Getty)
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Chick-Fil-A's "C... This past summer, fried chicken purveyors Chick-fil-A became an unexpected totem for the religious right -- and the object of derision (and some lampooning) from equality advocates for its increasingly public stance against gay marriage. The fast food chain’s in-your-face Christian values aren’t exactly news. Forbes ran a story on The Cult of Chick-fil-A in 2007, and its stores close on Sunday to allow workers to attend church. Rather, it was company president Dan Cathy’s reaffirmation of his firm’s same-sex marriage stance that set off the most recent wave of protest.In an interview with the Baptist Press in July, Cathy said he was “guilty as charged” in his support of what he describes as traditional marriage. “We know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles,” Cathy said. Pictured is his father Truett, co-founder and chairman of the family company.
(NATHAN FOWLER/PR NEWSWIRE/Newscom)
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5-Hour Energy: D... Manoj Bhargava, the one-time monk turned energy shot entrepreneur, made his debut on the 2012 Forbes World's Billionaires list thanks to 5-Hour Energy, his two-ounce cocktail of caffeine and B vitamins that flies off she shelves at Wal-Marts and bodegas nationwide. In November, the FDA announced it was investigating Bhargava's product in relation to 13 deaths, calling the safety of energy supplements into question. The billionaire took to YouTube in December to defend 5-Hour Energy -- a rare foray into the public eye for the quiet entrepreneur.
(Eric Eggley)
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Cohen's "insider... In early December, citing information from anonymous sources, Reuters reported that federal authorities are investigating billionaire Steven A. Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors for “possible insider trading” in Weight Watchers International stock early in 2011. If indeed there is a probe ongoing, it would add to the government’s growing caseload from the Stamford, Conn., hedge fund, where seven current or former associates have been charged or implicated with insider trading.
(REUTERS/Steve Marcus)
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Full List: Biggest Billionaire Scandals Of 2012
America's Richest Billionaires
The World's Most Powerful People
The opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Comcast. -
See the Full Lis... Click here to see which other billionaires made the list.
