Theos-Talk Archives (April 1997 Message tl00218)

At 11:21 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote:
>Dr. A.M.Bain wrote:
>> 
>> In message <335D609C.4A78@sprynet.com>, Bart Lidofsky
>> <bartl@sprynet.com> writes
>> >>    One of the Trustees of K Trusts (who was a party to the litigation) is
>> >> now on the Board of TSA as well as a Trustee of Theosophical Investment
>> >> Trust which manages the Investments of TSA.
>> >
>> >       Now here's the thing. The way I work is that, if I knew the name
of the
>> >person, I would directly ask him or her what the story was.
>> 
>> A very good point. Doss has mentioned this many times on the list, but
>> although asked directly, seems unwilling to name the person whose
>> identity is so strongly hinted at.  Well, Doss???
>
>	I asked Michael Gomes about it. I will get the actual names when he can
>look up the proper spelling, but according to him, the situation was
>largely Krishnamurti vs. his business partner. The person who was
>involved with both trusts was not a trustee but in fact a lawyer, who
>was hired because of his familiarity with Theosophy. Finally, millions
>of dollars sounds like a lot of money, but remember that Krishnamurti
>was a BILLIONaire.
>
>	Bart Lidofsky
>

The situation was very simple. According to the public records, the initial
law suit was filed by the California Attorney General and some of the
Trustees of the newly created Krishnamurti Foundation Inc and the defendants
were the Krishnamurti Writings Inc. and perhaps one other Trust and the
Trustees of the Trusts. Krishnamurti himself was *not* a plaintiff in this
law suit. 

There was another lawsuit filed in Madras was by a group of leading citizens
of India - two of them were retired State Supreme Court Chief Justices, one
was a well known politician who later became the President of India, another
later became the Attorney General of India and few other well known ones
seeking to regain control of the property which was built for Krishnamurti
to use. It finally won the control back to the newly created Krishnamurti
Foundation of India so that Krishnamurti was again was able to use the
premises for him to lecture whenever he was lecturing in India. Krishnamurti
himself was not a plaintiff in this case as well. As a matter of fact the
very last lecture he delivered before he died was from that property. BTW,
it was at that location, I attended the first Krishnamurti lecture long time
ago.

All the funds that were expended in the litigation were from the Trust funds
held by the Krishnamurti Writings Inc. (the one which was sued) and
Krishnamurti Foundation Inc. These Trust funds were donated to the public
charitable 501(c)(3) tax exempt trusts by individuals to help Krishnamurti
Teach. He did not and cannot own any of these funds.

Two different set of attorneys represented each party in the litigation. No
single attorney represented both the parties. That is conflict of interest
and no attorney could do it in a litigation as it would be professional
misconduct and the attorney could lose his license.

The attorneys representing both parties were some of the best litigators and
who did not work for free. They may have been members of TSA and may have
been familiar with Theosophy. 

Again my point was that donors intent was to help Krishnamurti teach and
instead it ended up lining the pockets of these litigators, who of course
did an excellent job for their clients over a period of 18 years. These
millions spent is still a lot of money by any standard and should have gone
to spread the msg of Krishnamurti, and not in litigation. BTW, litigation in
the USA is not cheap.

It would be interesting learn what Gomez is able to discover. I will be
looking forward to hear.

Thanks for your feedback.

MKR