Here We Go Again...

by Gary Snyder

An affiliate with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallup, (NM) mostly survives on donations. St. Bonaventure Indian Mission and School saw more than $9 million in donations flow in over a four-year period. But almost none of the money went to the mission. Instead, school officials acknowledge that the mission owes more than $5 million to Quadriga Art. St. Bonaventure signed a contract with Quadriga Art in 2008, according to internal financial statements.

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee is raising questions about how Quadriga officials raised money for the Disabled Veterans National Foundation in which it raised nearly $70 million in donations since 2007 and little of the proceeds went to the charity. 

In another instance, a Los Angeles-based charity called Help the Children raised roughly $800,000 in donations by the Quadriga campaign and charity kept about $32,000: less than 5%.

In addition to raising funds and keeping them, Quadriga's internal financial documents show that at least 11 charities now owe the company millions of dollars, a result of direct mail campaigns failing to bring in enough money from donations to cover the cost of the campaigns themselves.

Federal and state regulators are all over this matter, but only as a result of CNN's dogged investigations.




Nonprofit Imperative gathers its information principally from public documents...some of which are directly quoted. Virtually all cited are in some phase of criminal proceedings; some have not been charged, however. Cites in various media: Featured in print, broadcast, and online media outlets, including: Vermont Public Radio, Miami Herald, National Public Radio, Huffington Post, The Sun News, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Wall Street Journal (Profile, News and Photos), FOX2, ABC Spotlight on the News, WWJ Radio, Ethics World, Aspen Philanthropy Newsletter, Harvard Business Review, Current Affairs, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, St. Petersburg Times, B, USA Today Topics, Newsweek.com, Responsive Philanthropy Magazine, New York Times...and many more Nonprofits: On the Brink (2006) Silence: The Impending Threat to the Charitable Sector (2011)

Minister Enjoys Parishioner's Generosity

He raked in over $10 million from his parishioners and filled his pockets.

Donors poured $2.5 million into the minister's charity to help 9/11 victims. Donors had other opportunities to raise relief money with at least another $2.3 million collected for efforts along the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast, in the poorest corners of West Virginia and Tennessee, and even in remote African villages. Tens of millions more flowed through his fingers from the sale of church properties. 

He enjoyed the fruits of his charity work.

According to financial records, internal correspondence and interviews with former employees conducted by The Associated Press:

• Rev. Carl Keyes of the Urban Life Ministries and Aid for the World diverted large sums donated for 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina into his cash-starved church, then used charity and church money to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal credit card bills and other debts, documents show. 
• He failed for years to file required federal and state reports showing how much money his charities received and spent.
• He used large church donations from a wealthy supporter to pay his sons' private college tuition.
• The minister used a big donation meant for one of his charities to clear a mortgage on his family's house, according to an accountant who told Keyes he was quitting, in part because of the transaction.
• And, when his congregation sold its 19th-century church in midtown Manhattan for $31 million, he and his friends benefited.

For example, $950,000 of the proceeds was used to buy his family a country home near the Delaware River in New Jersey. Another $1 million went to support one of his charities, which spent more on failed, lavish fundraisers than on promised programs in Africa.

After paying large debts and buying a building to convert into a new church, the congregation had $13.8 million in cash, according to a February 2008 financial document obtained by the AP. Three years later, it told a court it had to sell that building because only $180,486 remained in its bank account.

Once the AP expanded its investigation into the minister's operation, the New York attorney general's office opened its own probe.

Keyes and his lawyer say all payments by his church and charities were proper.


Nonprofit Imperative gathers its information principally from public documents...some of which are directly quoted. Virtually all cited are in some phase of criminal proceedings; some have not been charged, however. Cites in various media: Featured in print, broadcast, and online media outlets, including: Vermont Public Radio, Miami Herald, National Public Radio, Huffington Post, The Sun News, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Wall Street Journal (Profile, News and Photos), FOX2, ABC Spotlight on the News, WWJ Radio, Ethics World, Aspen Philanthropy Newsletter, Harvard Business Review, Current Affairs, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, St. Petersburg Times, B, USA Today Topics, Newsweek.com, Responsive Philanthropy Magazine, New York Times...and many more Nonprofits: On the Brink (2006) Silence: The Impending Threat to the Charitable Sector (2011)

Deceiving the Donors...So What's New?

This article pretty much underscores my preachings for the better part of a decade. Why is anyone surprise? This deception has been readily apparent for years. No interest by charity leadership, regulators or other decision makers. A shame!

..."The American Cancer Society actually lost money on the program (in 2010), according to its filings. ...the telemarketing firm got to keep 100 percent of the $5.3 million in funds it raised, plus $113,006 in fees from the society, government filings show."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-12/charities-deceive-donors-unaware-money-goes-to-a-telemarketer.html



Nonprofit Imperative gathers its information principally from public documents...some of which are directly quoted. Virtually all cited are in some phase of criminal proceedings; some have not been charged, however. Cites in various media: Featured in print, broadcast, and online media outlets, including: Vermont Public Radio, Miami Herald, National Public Radio, Huffington Post, The Sun News, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Wall Street Journal (Profile, News and Photos), FOX2, ABC Spotlight on the News, WWJ Radio, Ethics World, Aspen Philanthropy Newsletter, Harvard Business Review, Current Affairs, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, St. Petersburg Times, B, USA Today Topics, Newsweek.com, Responsive Philanthropy Magazine, New York Times...and many more Nonprofits: On the Brink (2006) Silence: The Impending Threat to the Charitable Sector (2011)

Finally: After $7 million in Charity Fraud

by Gary Snyder

The behind-the-scenes orchestrator of four fake Orange County (CA) charities has pleaded guilty to charity fraud. A felon and disbarred lawyer, Joe Shambaugh, took more than $7 million via three groups — the Association of Disabled Firefighters, the Coalition of Police and Sheriffs and the American Veterans Relief Foundation. For example, in 2004 telemarketers raised $1.45 million for the American Veterans Relief Foundation. After SR-1 and the telemarketers got their share, the foundation got just $12,725. That’s a little under a penny on the dollar.

He was also involved with a fourth group not named in the plea deal, the Disabled Firefighters Foundation. All are now out of business.Telemarketers for the charities told donors, in scripts penned by Shambaugh, that their donations would help disabled cops, firefighters and veterans. In fact less than a penny on the dollar actually went to services, according to the charities’ federal tax filings and the plea deal. Under his plea deal he will serve a maximum of 60 months in federal prison.

Shambaugh spent six years in federal prison in the late 1980s and early ’90s for a bungled attempt to hire a hit man to kill a former business partner and his own father. The “hit man” was an undercover FBI agent. The boat where Shambaugh arranged the hit was wired for video.

Nonprofit Imperative gathers its information principally from public documents...some of which are directly quoted. Virtually all cited are in some phase of criminal proceedings; some have not been charged, however. Cites in various media: Featured in print, broadcast, and online media outlets, including: Vermont Public Radio, Miami Herald, National Public Radio, Huffington Post, The Sun News, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Wall Street Journal (Profile, News and Photos), FOX2, ABC Spotlight on the News, WWJ Radio, Ethics World, Aspen Philanthropy Newsletter, Harvard Business Review, Current Affairs, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, St. Petersburg Times, B, USA Today Topics, Newsweek.com, Responsive Philanthropy Magazine, New York Times...and many more Nonprofits: On the Brink (2006) Silence: The Impending Threat to the Charitable Sector (2011)