User:Hans Adler/World Vision Austria donation scandal

Martina Taurer-Krones (born 1960 or 1961) was president and ... of World Vision Austria from 1995 till 1998. Her husband Wolfgang Krones was a project manager for the same organization, and also president?director? of Paneurope Austria.

In May/June 1998, World Vision noticed that the Austrian branch had insufficient documentation for the disposition of roughly 1 million Euros of donations. This became public in November 1998. [Accounting at World Vision Austria was generally in a very bad state, large cash payments without receipts being standard practice.] According to the prosecution, part of the money was used for several issues of a royalist magazine.
 * 8,600 Euros for a Concorde flight to New York.
 * 13,000 Euros for family vacations in Corfou, Venice and Paris.
 * Traffic tickets.
 * Fake project in Romania, fake signature. Building does not exist.
 * Possibly similar projects in Bulgaria and Macedonia.
 * Over 50,000 Euros in total for private travels.
 * Staff could routinely take their partners with them for free when travelling.
 * >30,000 Euros Printing and postage costs for Paneurope (= royalist magazine?) (claim: in return for access to their address list)
 * 55 per cent of transactions not traceable according to a World Vision vice president.

Total damage 650,000 Euros according to verdict.

The World Vision criminal case was opened in November 2003 and ended in September 2004. 3 years for Taurer-Krones, 2 years on probation for her husband. Due to confusion at the court after retirement of a judge, the order to commence the prison sentence was delayed until June 2005. She failed to appear, resulting in an arrest in August 2005. During this time she worked as a private asset manager. As early as January 2006 she began receiving day pass based on the assumption that she would serve only half the sentence (as is common, especially for women).

July 2003 caught at attempted cheque fraud to the amount of 1.2 million Euros in Germany. Six weeks earlier attempted 5.5 million Euro cheque fraud. Main offenders convicted in Germany.

The scandal damaged Karl Habsburg-Lothringen's political career a European Parliament member for ÖVP, since part of the money went into his election campaign. The situation was exacerbated when his father tried to come to his defence, saying: "Karl wird angegriffen, weil er den gewissen gelben Stern trägt, den Namen Habsburg. Die armen Juden haben ja Entsetzliches mitgemacht. Ich denke oft an sie in diesem Zusammenhang."

1999 Karl Habsburg-Lothringen no longer nominated as ÖVP candidate for European Parliament. 2004 Karl Habsburg-Lothringen pays 37,000 Euros to World Vision Austria successor as reimbursement for money supposed to have been redirected to his election campaign.