Ted Maher - A Privileged Witness: The Truth About Billionaire Edmond Safras Death

Copyright 2015 by Ted Maher with Bill Hayes and Jennifer Thomas

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever, including electronic, mechanical or any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted in the 1976 Copyright Act or in writing from the publisher.

Requests for permission should be addressed to:

New Horizon Press

P. O. Box 669

Far Hills, NJ 07931

Ted Maher with Bill Hayes and Jennifer Thomas

Foreword by Michael Griffith, Esq.

A Privileged Witness:

The Truth About Billionaire Edmond Safras Death

Cover design: Wendy Bass

Interior design: Scribe Inc.

Back flap photo of Ted Maher Angel Chevrestt/ZUMA Press

Back flap photo of Bill Hayes and Jennifer Thomas by Joanna Laznicka.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014957547

ISBN-13 (eBook): 978-0-88282-500-7

New Horizon Press

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This book is dedicated to my mother and my sister, who have stood by me through everything.

Thank you for always remembering who I am and what I stand for, and for never believing an untrue word spoken about me.

Ted Maher

On December 3, 1999, billionaire Edmond Safra died in his Monaco penthouse under mysterious circumstances.

When asked if Safras nurse, Ted Maher, was a suspect, Monegasque prosecutor Daniel Serdet replied: He is a privileged witness.

Table of Contents

by Michael Griffith

T his casein which Ted Maher was arrested in Monaco for the 1999 murder of world banking icon Edmond Safrais without question the most perplexing and puzzling Ive ever been involved in.

I am an international criminal defense lawyer. For the last thirty-five years, I have represented Americans imprisoned and beleaguered in foreign countries all over the globe. My work has taken me behind the unforgiving walls and into the cold no-mans-land of prisiones, cezaevleri and maisons de arrest in over two dozen countries. From defending U.S. soldiers in the Okinawan rape case to exposing corruption in Ecuador, Ive been involved in actions and litigations that run the gamut of kidnappings, robberies, murders and moreall occurring on some pretty shaky ground.

The complex circumstances in the chain of events that led to Ted Mahers trial for Edmond Safras death are unprecedented. And they are indisputably compellingespecially to those of us with a mindset and hunger for truth!

The cast of characters alone is far beyond what even the best fiction mystery writer could come up with: Green Beretturnedneonatal nurse Ted Maher; wealthy, world-renowned couple Edmond and Lily Safra; the Safras staff and their security team born from the Israeli Mossad; the inexperienced French and Monegasque legal team; the judicial group that ruled Teds trials in Monaco; the police and firefighters there and essentially every other individual who placed a fingerprint on this case.

Even more compelling is how that cast of characters was thrown into this doomed drama which, as it climaxed, resulted in the needless deaths of two innocent victims and the collateral destruction of Ted Maher.

I continue to be haunted by the Safra case and especially the trial. Moreover, much of the public around the world remains in shock and confusion. When Safra died, the media went crazy. Headlines around the world screamed about the death of one of the worlds wealthiest men and the tangled mystery that scorched every aspect of his murder.

It is a saga that appears to have no end, unless and until the truth and nothing but the truth is finally known.

by Bill Hayes

S ixty-seven-year-old Edmond J. Safra was listed by Forbes magazine in 1999 as one of the two hundred wealthiest individuals in the world. With assets in the billions, Safra was high-profile in the international banking community and beyond for his wealth and business acumen.

Safra owned controlling stakes in both Safra Republic and Republic New York Corporation (RNB)banks he founded and often referred to as his children.

His personal life was also one of heavy interest and scrutiny. As Parkinsons disease brought Safras declining health increasingly into question, attention to his huge inheritance also increasedby family members and outsiders alike.

She got all three.

But her marriage to Edmond in 1976 didnt exactly merge Lily and the Safra clan into one big, happy family. Several years earlier, Edmonds brother had tried to talk Safra out of marrying Lily. That caused more than a little interand intrafamily friction.

But in the end, Edmond wed Lily.

The years that followed saw the Safras soar to social status summits that included owning two of the worlds most opulent dwellings: the history-dripping multi-acre Villa La Leopolda on the Cte dAzur and the 17,500-square-foot palace of a penthouse known as the worlds costliest flat, atop Monacos La Belle poque building. This gilded lifestyle, powered by Safras relentless banking and business dealings, rose above legendaryit defined extravagance.

In late 1999, in a transaction of mega-proportions, Safra made the final arrangements to sell his banks to the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC Holdings) for three billion dollars. He also changed his will to leave the bulk of his fortune to Lily. Safras siblings and the rest of his extended family were left out in the kind of cold seldom felt in Monaco.

And the decision was final.

Not too long after, in the early hours of December 3, 1999, Safra was killedsuddenly and mysteriouslyin a bizarre blaze that ripped through La Belle poques top floor residence. Safra had barricaded himself in his bunker-like bathroom with one of his nurses. It became their tomb.

Safras fiery death in his fortified flat generated a heated controversy felt across the globe. Its lack of resolution and ensuing cover-up continue to boil over today. And in the middle of the whole firestorm was Ted Maher.

Ted, a former Green Beret, is a man with incredible toughness. But he is also a street-level, working American, born from pure red, white and blue Maine stock and raised in upstate New York.

Through a series of circumstances that swelled into a perfect storm with countless imperfect twists, Ted rapidly became one of Safras most appreciated personal nurses, achieving an elite position on the bankers staff in the high-ender heaven that is Monte Carlo. He also became the scapegoat for Safras death.

The chronicle of Teds journey has more levels of intrigue and seduction than the six-story fortress of Monacos La Belle poque Buildingdescribed by Newsweek as an impregnable haven for the rich and reclusive where Edmond Safra lived and died. Its also where Ted Mahers freedom was choked out by a different kind of thick smokescreen.

This book is the only examination of Safras deathand Teds sacrificial skeweringseen truly and exclusively through the tortured eyes of the man who was accused of it.