Bacardi accused of blocking payout to poor children

Bacardi, the family-owned drinks giant, has been accused of "cynical" corporate greed after it launched a legal action to stop the payment of nearly $800 million to help underprivileged children in poor countries. The spirits company has launched a lawsuit to stop the estate of an American philanthropist spending $755 million on educating thousands of poor children in Africa, the Caribbean and elsewhere. The legal battle is likely to sour the image of Bacardi, which spends more than $150 million a year marketing its products as fun drinks for hedonistic youth. Its advertisements typically feature swim-suited models cavorting on palm-fringed beaches. Based in the offshore tax haven of Bermuda, Bacardi is the largest rum company in the world, selling more than 24 million cases in 170 countries. Its other popular products include Bacardi Breezers, Bombay Sapphire gin, Martini and Dewar's Scotch whisky. It owns five distilleries in Scotland. The Bacardi family has instructed its lawyers to file an injunction which effectively blocks the pay-out from the will of Martin Crowley, an American businessman. The sum is more than twice the amount raised by Bob Geldof for poor children in the 1985 Band Aid concerts. The drinks firm is in conflict with the charity that has been granted the money from the estate. The international web of court actions stretches from the Privy Council in London to the High Court in Anguilla and the probate court in California. The trustees of the charity have hired Geoffrey Robertson QC, the British human rights lawyer. At issue is the bequest of Crowley, an eccentric hippie entrepreneur who described himself as "a child of the world." He made his fortune after 1989 when he invented Patron Tequila, regarded by some experts as the best tequila in the world. Crowley died on the Caribbean island of Anguilla in 2003. Divorced and childless, he left his entire estate to an American charitable organization called the Windsong Trust. It provides educational assistance to underprivileged children. His interest in Patron Tequila is held through his 50% holding in CDC, a Caribbean drinks firm. Crowley's executors agreed in January that his former business partner John Paul de Joria, who already owned the other 50%, would pay the estate $755 million to settle a long-standing dispute over de Joria's right to buy the shares. The settlement has since been blocked by Bacardi, which states in court papers that it has a prior agreement from 2004 with the executors to buy the stake for $175 million. The claim, if successful, would leave the children's trust almost $600m short. Greg Rovenger, a lawyer for the estates' trustees, said the charity was desperate to start spending the money on books, computers for classrooms in Africa and projects to build schools across the developing world. But its efforts had been "frustrated" by Bacardi's decision to launch the legal claim. "Because Bacardi are tying us down in litigation we haven't spent a single dollar yet," he said. Mark Stephens, a British lawyer advising the trustees of the estate, said: "It's a cynical move by Bacardi. Martin's big rallying cry was educating children." Bacardi's lawyers have said in court: "The trustees made a very good deal" with Bacardi in 2004. "Now they want to... accept an even better offer."