Word: safra
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...number of questions remain unanswered, and Lily Safra's attorney, Marc Bonnant, has requested access to the police files. "We would like to have all the details of the nurse's confession," he explains. "Was it credible and complete? What exactly pushed him to do what he did? How many fires did he set? Are there any inconsistencies in his confession...
...Safra's bank last year alerted the FBI to money-laundering operations emanating from Moscow, and Safra was widely reported to have obsessive fears for his life (Bonnant denies the fears). His security guards were recruited from among veterans of Israeli army special units. The night of the fire, however, Safra's entire security force were posted at his nearby villa; Safra was said to have wanted it that way, but it seemed a glaring lapse to leave him without a single guard. According to a Republic National bank spokeswoman, security chief Shmuel Cohen rushed to the apartment after...
...decision to bring Maher into the Safra household was the biggest blunder of all. The New York Times said Maher was offered the job after he returned a camera left by a close Safra associate. Bonnant says Maher had been carefully vetted through "in-depth background checks" and a personal interview with Mrs. Safra. "The fact that Maher is unstable became apparent to us only after the accident," Bonnant told TIME. "Nothing in Maher's files showed the slightest trace of mental instability...
...Safra's people offered Maher $600 a day to care for the ailing banker. Maher, who was reportedly making $60,000 a year at Columbia-Presbyterian, leaped at the chance. He took a leave of absence from the hospital, bade farewell to his second wife Heidi and three sons and joined Safra's staff five months ago. In that short time, he learned to love his boss and, in what Maher's lawyer calls "the sad gesture of a sick man," sent him to a smoky death...
...Safra, listed in Forbes magazine as the world's 199th richest person, was scion of a banking family that built its first fortune financing the Ottoman Empire caravan trade. Safra made his mark adhering to the old-fashioned banking-business model of securing deposits and then investing them in safe, modest-yielding assets. The secretive billionaire had long been known as a generous contributor to Jewish causes around the world. Last week he was on the verge of wrapping up his life's work, the sale of Republic National and Safra Republic holdings to HSBC Holdings, Britain's largest bank...