The CEO of the Chicken Kitchen restaurant chain, a luxury Miami Beach spec developer, is among the Miamians named in the Panama Papers, a massive data leak that continues to expose the shady world of foreign shell companies.
Aeternus Trust Limited, the company controlling Chicken Kitchen International, was tied to 17 offshore companies, the Miami Herald reported. Christian De Berdouaré, CEO of the fast casual chicken chain, was named in one.
De Berdouaré and his wife Jennifer Valoppi own a few homes on Miami Beach’s North Bay Road, including the now-demolished property once owned by Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. They developed 5004 North Bay Road, which hit the market last year for $35 million.
De Berdouaré told the Herald his mother set up one of the companies, which he inherited after she died last year. The others, though, he said he had nothing to do with and speculated that his mother’s attorney used Aeturnus for other clients.
Miami appears in the Panama Papers, which were leaked from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca and widely reported in April, more times than any U.S. city except New York. The Miami Herald reports that more than 50 South Floridians show up in the massive data trove, including Ella Fontanals-Cisneros, an art collector; Hollywood screenwriter Alan Trustman; and Ping Donaldson.
Donaldson, a Weston Realtor, told the newspaper she ended up with offshore companies in her name after a trip to Hong Kong. [Miami Herald] – Katherine Kallergis