A controversial Czech financier who had reportedly promised the administration of former Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham he would perform miracles in The Bahamas was indicted in New York Thursday on charges of stealing $182 million from 15 investment funds.
Viktor Kozeny, 39, a resident of the exclusive Lyford Cay gated community, was charged with 15 counts of first degree grand larceny and two counts of first degree criminal possession of stolen property, according to international press reports.
The investment funds that he is alleged to have stolen the money from are run by Omega Advisors, a hedge fund adviser based in New York.
Investors who lost money as a result of the alleged scam include Columbia University, which lost $15 million, and The Common Fund, a fund for universities and other not-for-profit organizations, which lost $4.5 million, according to Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau.
According to the district attorney, Kozeny used $3 million of Omega’s funds to furnish his Lyford Cay home and other homes in Aspen and Colorado.
At one point, Mr. Kozeny’s millions could have been bound to benefit the Bahamian public, according to a former senior official of the FNM government.
“He held great promise,” said the former official, who asked not to be named. “He said he was going into one of the Family Islands and would transform it.”
He said the then government was “meticulous” in its dealings with Kozeny.
“We were preparing to receive some assistance before information came to the fore which made it impossible for us to accept anything at all,” he said.
Kozeny reportedly wanted to transform one of the islands into a “mini industrial Mecca.”
“He was also one who was full of promises,” the former official recalled.
Once called the richest man in the Czech Republic he was honorary consul for Grenada to The Bahamas. Subsequently, he was found unfit by The Bahamian government to serve in that capacity, an official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Thursday.
The Grenadian government subsequently stripped him of that title.
Kozeny’s name has been linked to other multimillion-dollar fraud cases and lawsuits.
In a December 23, 1996 Fortune Magazine article, he was branded a ‘Pirate of Prague’.
According to the article, Mr. Kozeny at an early age transformed himself into one of his country’s most celebrated fund managers with a personal fortune estimated at $200 million
The Bahama Journal
