Lead Stories

The head of a private family foundation has been convicted of failing to pay federal income tax on the value of scholarships paid by the foundation for tuition for his children.  The charges were among several that caused James L. Wright to be sentenced to 33 months in prison and ordered to make restitution of $146,404.

“This is a classic case in which failed corporate governance led to distrust, dissention, and disorganization.  With all the best intentions aside, had these two nonprofit entities followed corporate principles and practices likely no lawsuit would have been filed.”

The Court of Appeals of Ohio has ruled that directors of a nonprofit trade association cannot be sued on behalf of the corporation for turning down a settlement offer in a defamation suit that would have saved the Association $43 million.  But it has also ruled that it had no jurisdiction to force the Association to indemnify the directors who successfully defended the suit, saying that could be done only by a court in Delaware, the state of the Association’s incorporation.

Hotel magnate Eugene Eppley commissioned renowned American artist Grant Wood to paint a mural for the Hotel Montrose in Cedar Rapids, IA, in 1932.  When the hotel was sold in 1957, Eppley had the mural, known as “The Fruits of Iowa,” taken down and separated into seven separate panels.  He “loaned” the paintings to Coe College, where they remained on display for nearly 20 years. 

President Donald J. Trump has been ordered to pay $2 million in damages for improperly using the charitable assets of his private foundation to intervene in the 2016 Presidential election and further his political interests.  A trial court judge has rejected a request by the New York Attorney General that he be ordered to pay double damages because he has stipulated to “a number of proactive conditions so that the conduct which engendered this petition should not occur in the future.”

In December, 2010, Ruth Stumm executed her will, leaving one-eighth of the residue of her estate to the First Presbyterian Church of Wood-Ridge, N.J., “or its successor” to establish an endowment in the name of a local resident. 

In 2015, she was declared mentally incompetent and she died in 2016.  The Wood-Ridge church had dissolved in 2014 and transferred all of its assets to the Presbytery of the Palisades, its legal successor.  Her executor asked the court for “instructions” on the rightful recipient of the residue.