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learned that Weaver agreed to share with Lisle and Ballard any
payments that KWJ Corp. might receive under the Hyatt/KWJ
agreement, and Kanter was offered a share of these payments in
exchange for structuring the receipt and disbursement of the
payments to the participants in a manner that would conceal
Lisle’s and Ballard’s involvement in the matter. In particular,
Kanter arranged IRA’s purchase of KWJ Corp., the liquidation of
KWJ Corp., and the formation of KWJ Partnership.
The transfer of KWJ Corp. to IRA was facilitated under the
cover of an open-ended option (with no apparent independent
value) that Weaver granted to IRA in 1976 to purchase KWJ Corp.
for $150,000. Kanter’s testimony that Weaver entered into this
option agreement because he needed the money is wholly
discredited by the fact that Weaver received nothing under the
option agreement until mid-1980-–4 years later.
Although there was some initial discord between Hyatt Corp.
and Weaver regarding the payments that KWJ Corp. would receive
under the Hyatt/KWJ agreement, we attribute this development to
the Pritzkers’ reputation as aggressive negotiators who wanted to
pay as little as possible to KWJ Corp. Nevertheless, Hyatt Corp.
did pay substantial sums to KWJ Corp. pursuant to the Hyatt/KWJ
agreement, and, as described in the flow-of-funds analysis below,
approximately 70 percent of those payments were transferred
through IRA to KWJ Partnership and on to Carlco, TMT, and BWK in
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