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oeuvre-and-out t1_j3nb711 wrote

Serious question: How is this different from the BLM Foundation (Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation) that collected millions after the George Floyd murder and then bought multiple million dollar homes with some of the money? I'm sure no donor expected their cash to be used for that purpose.

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ghostdokes t1_j3nehvv wrote

Was Black Lives Matter even a charity? Its a business through and through as far as I know, the same way Trump made money with his MAGA merch business.

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oeuvre-and-out t1_j3nfsol wrote

Yes. It's a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, non-profit corporation

> A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax. 501(c)(3) tax-exemptions apply to entities that are organized and operated exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, literary or educational purposes...

But I don't think that's relevant to my question. This couple was convicted of wire fraud. IANAL but logically any corporate entity (for profit or non-profit) could be guilty of wire fraud.

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Thanos_Stomps t1_j3nq64m wrote

First, this woman was dumb enough to attach her name to it. You incorporate and you have more protections (nonprofit entities are typically incorporated).

Second, idk all the ins and outs of this story in its entirety but there are at least two scenarios off the top of my head that would allow for the BLM org get away with it. The first is that the BLM ceo gets paid a fat salary. The irs is only going to investigate and sanction a nonprofit that is paying a ceo exorbitantly more than other CEOs of a similar sized nonprofit.

The other scenario is that the org bought the mansion and used it as a headquarters. This wouldn’t even raise any red flags since places need to have brick and mortar operations and there isn’t much difference between an expensive downtown Manhattan office and a mansion in price, but the location can be justified as it’s a grassroots movement and needs the space and to be need the suburbs.

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oeuvre-and-out t1_j3qvhfj wrote

Thanks for a good reply. Yes, the BLM case is more nuanced and their corp status allows some discretion in how the funds were/are spent. I'm not obsessed on it but general press reporting rasies questions on corp malfeasance. I think a good comparison is the current SBF (the crypto guy) investigation, just that he was dealing in billions and BLM got millions.

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