Wash. Post Article Interviewing Walt Anderson in DC Jail
FYI,
"Tax Case Defendant Says Money Was to Do Good
- Telecom Investor Held in D.C. Jail"
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5506-2005Mar3.html
: Jailed and held without bond in the nation's largest alleged
: personal tax-evasion scheme, telecom investor Walter Anderson says
: the federal government has got it all wrong.
: He isn't a tax cheat, he said Wednesday night in a conference room
: at the D.C. jail. Sending millions of dollars to offshore havens
: -- which the government alleges he did to evade around $200 million
: in taxes -- was part of a legitimate and long-standing plan.
: He was going to use the money to change the world. To fight for
: arms control and human rights. To promote family planning and space
: exploration. He was going to give the money away, starting next
: year.
: "I don't need to steal money from the U.S. government to be
: successful," Anderson said in a wide-ranging 2 1/2-hour interview.
: "I don't want their money."
: Yesterday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Kay ordered Anderson held at
: the D.C. jail until a March 11 hearing. He decided Anderson posed
: too high a risk of fleeing the country.
: "You have the means -- and the interest -- in avoiding trial," the
: judge said.
: Anderson angrily stood up during the hearing to complain about the
: prosecution. "The government's allegations are inflammatory," he
: said. "I'm trying to run legitimate businesses, and I don't intend
: to let the government ruin my credibility."
: The restrictions smacked of "government interference in people's
: private affairs," he told a judge.
: In the interview Wednesday, arranged through a friend, Anderson
: rebutted the charges against him and mocked some of the more
: sensational evidence the government has marshaled in arguing that
: he is a flight risk. Describing himself as press-shy, Anderson
: added his comments to the emerging portrait of a man who quietly
: amassed hundreds of millions of dollars -- by his own account,
: almost entirely for the betterment of humanity.
: At times referring to notes scribbled on the back of his indictment,
: Anderson said the assets the government claims he hid belong to the
: Smaller World Foundation, which he controls and endowed with full
: ownership of various companies he runs, such as Space Inc. and
: Iceberg Transport SA. The plan was for the foundation to begin
: giving money away in 2006, after the assets had had time to grow,
: he said. Anderson said he lost any personal interest in money some
: time ago, as long as he had a place to live and enough to buy
: dinner.
: He said he registered his Smaller World Foundation and holding
: companies in offshore havens for legitimate tax savings and privacy,
: partly to avoid being inundated with solicitations for
: contributions. He said he made a good-faith effort to file tax
: returns on time and accurately, and added, "I am not a tax
: resister."
: After investigating him for five years, during which he said
: heavily armed, flak-jacketed agents raided his home and carted off
: his records, the government "would have to indict -- if only to
: intimidate me into a plea bargain," he said.
: He said he was nonetheless surprised to be arrested at Dulles
: International Airport on Saturday as he stepped off a plane from
: London.
: "It's the worst moment in my life," he said. "After 51 years of
: trying to do the right thing, to be inside a prison is not a happy
: thing."
: He said he never graduated from college -- and didn't stop hearing
: about it from his mother until his first company went public.
: "I tried various colleges" -- the University of Richmond, Northern
: Virginia Community College, George Mason University -- and "didn't
: find any of them suited me," he said. "I should have been at MIT,
: but I couldn't get in."
: He began his telecommunications career with MCI Communications
: Corp. in 1979, when the upstart long-distance phone company was
: helping to usher in a new era of entrepreneurship in
: telecommunications. Anderson said he worked in a low-level sales
: job.
: In the 1980s and 1990s, he helped found or fund a series of
: telecommunications companies, including Mid Atlantic Telecom Inc.,
: Esprit Telecom Group PLC and Telco Communication Group Inc., which
: were sold at huge gains. According to a biography provided by his
: office, he was also an investor and board member of Erols Internet
: Inc. before the service was sold in 1998.
: Anderson was one of the driving forces behind MirCorp, which sought
: to privatize Russia's decrepit Mir space station and arranged for
: an American financier to take an excursion in space. MirCorp's
: ambitions were dashed with the station's demise.
: But Anderson has remained passionate about space. "I want to build
: my own space station since we lost the Mir," he said. "I want to
: have a moon base."
: In 1997, Anderson created FINDS, the Foundation for the
: International Non-governmental Development of Space, and endowed it
: with millions of dollars. The organization's Web site says it "is
: in the process of applying" for status as a not-for-profit under
: IRS rules.
: The site says FINDS has issued grants to support such causes as the
: search for extraterrestrial intelligence, the tracking of near-
: earth asteroids, plans for a human outpost on the moon and "beamed
: energy propulsion."
: "He's an exceptionally charitable man," said Bob Werb, a real
: estate developer who has served with Anderson on the Space Frontier
: Foundation board. "He's part of the American tradition of people
: who wanted to make money so they could give it away for charitable
: purposes."
: "Like many businessmen, he's fairly vocal about wishing the
: government would leave him alone and let him do his business," Werb
: said.
: The government alleges that Anderson generated approximately
: $450 million for his offshore holding companies from 1995 to 1999.
: Anderson said the value of the foundation's assets has declined to
: $30 million to $50 million, while his personal net worth has
: plunged into negative territory. One of his primary holding
: companies in the British Virgin Islands, Gold & Appel Transfer, has
: been forced into liquidation, he said. U.S. District Court in
: Alexandria has issued a multimillion-dollar judgment against him
: for allegedly defaulting on a loan from a former business partner.
: Friends say Anderson was a man who lived modestly, especially in
: recent years. He spent many of his lunch hours at Rumors bar and
: restaurant on 19th Street NW, eating a hamburger and drinking iced
: tea.
: Jeffrey Manber, whom Anderson hired to run the Mir venture, said he
: remembers being taken aback when Anderson met him in Amsterdam for
: a business meeting and suggested they go to McDonald's.
: In the interview, Anderson said he liked to walk down the street,
: go in a nice restaurant, "and have nobody know who I am, even
: though I may be more successful than anyone else in the restaurant
: in terms of what I've done."
: Friends said he openly derided the government's investigation of
: him and spoke of his belief that it was really a snooping exercise
: and invasion of his privacy. He learned of the investigation in
: March 2002, when his home was raided, and has long expected to be
: indicted.
: "I think he felt this was his private affair, these funds and his
: foundation," Manber said.
: "I said to him, 'Why don't you strike a deal? You're spending more
: on legal fees.' He said, 'It's not their right to know what I do.' "
--
Mark Reiff <markreiff@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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