Felix Sater and the Trump Tower in Fort Lauderdale
The promoter of the failed Trump International Tower in Fort Lauderdale, Felix Sater, is accused of swindling the project out of millions, while allegedly paying $1.5 million to an associate with ties to the mafia, according to the Miami Herald. When Sater joined the Trump project he had already been charged in a securities scam with New York mob figures worth $40 million. However, Trump investors never knew about Sater’s criminal background because prosecutors successfully hid his records from the public after he became an FBI informant.
The Trump Tower sold for $100 million at auction in March. “Do you honestly think they [Trump investors] are going to invest in a project when you tell them that one of the people happens to have been involved with the mob? That’s insane,” said Joseph Altschul, a lawyer representing the Trump Tower investors. Sater was also charged and imprisoned in the 1990s for allegedly stabbing another broker in the face with the stem of a shattered margarita glass during a bar fight. [Miami Herald]
