Leonardo DiCaprio's Eco-Charity Linked To Donations From Money Laundering Scam
Leonardo DiCaprio’s eco-charity the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, has been linked to donations from a Malaysian playboy embroiled in a vast money-laundering scam, it has emerged.
Millions of dollars in donations are said to have been made to the foundation by businessman Jho Low, who is among those at the centre of a scandal involving the embezzlement of $3 billion from a Malaysian wealth fund called 1MDB.
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It’s said that 35-year-old Low, a friend of DiCaprio, used some of the stolen money from the fund at lavish LDF galas thrown by the star, like one in St. Tropez in July, which saw guests flown in via helicopter.
According to reports, it’s alleged that Low spent as much as $3 million on marked-up bottles of champagne at an event in 2013, and bought artworks the likes of Ed Ruscha and Mark Ryden being sold at auction for $1.1 million at another.
Among those attending the party in July were Russian oligarchs, supermodels like Naomi Campbell and A-list celebs including Bono, Charlize Theron, Tobey Maguire, Robert De Niro, Scarlett Johansson, Jonah Hill, Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, DiCaprio’s galas are described as ‘freewheeling bacchanals’ by those in attendance, ‘in which wives feel outnumbered by suspiciously predisposed Slavic women in bustiers and couples openly cavort in the bathroom stalls’.
Tickets for the St. Tropez gala cost €10,500, with around 500 people in attendance.
Because of the way the LDF is set up, as a ‘donor-advised fund’ and not a non-profit organisation, it is not obliged to disclose details of its accounts publicly.
Though DiCaprio is not implicated in any wrongdoing, he is cited in a complaint by the US Department of Justice to the US courts and is referred to as ‘Hollywood Actor 1’.
The scandal is also linked to DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese’s movie ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’, which was part funded by a company called Red Granite Pictures.
Red Granite was set up by Riza Aziz, the stepson of the Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, who is also at the centre of the embezzlement inquiry.
Image credits: Getty/Rex Features
