The Haiti earthquake has already triggered hundreds of thousands of donations to musician Wyclef Jean�s charitable foundation, which expects to raise upwards of $1 million a day in the disaster�s wake.
However, Internal Revenue Service records show the group has a lackluster history of accounting for its finances, and that the organization has paid the performer and his business partner at least $410,000 for rent, production services, and Jean�s appearance at a benefit concert.
Though the Wyclef Jean Foundation, which does business as Yele Haiti Foundation, was incorporated 12 years ago�and has been active since that time�the group only first filed tax returns in August 2009. That month, the foundation provided the IRS with returns covering calendar years 2005, 2006, and 2007�the only periods for which it has publicly provided a glimpse at its financial affairs.
In 2006, Jean�s charity reported contributions of $1 million, the bulk of which came from Peoplemagazine in exchange for the first photos of a pregnant Angelina Jolie (the actress reportedly directed that the publication�s payment go to Jean�s charity, not her personally).
As seen on the following pages from the foundation�s 2006 tax return, the group paid $31,200 in rent to Platinum Sound, a Manhattan recording studio owned by Jean and Jerry Duplessis, who, like Jean, is a foundation board member. A $31,200 rent payment was also made in 2007 to Platinum Sound.
The rent, tax returns assure, �is priced below market value.� The recording studio also was paid $100,000 in 2006 for the �musical performance services of Wyclef Jean at a benefit concert.� That six-figure payout, the tax return noted, �was substantially less than market value.� The return, of course, does not address why Jean needed to be paid to perform at his own charity�s fundraiser.
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