Ronnie Polaneczky | Unsuspecting cast of 'Mr. Carter Goes to Prison'
I CALLED the owner of Brickstone Landscaping yesterday to ask how it felt to be a featured player in the Philly melodrama "Mr. Carter Goes to Prison."
I CALLED the owner of Brickstone Landscaping yesterday to ask how it felt to be a featured player in the Philly melodrama "Mr. Carter Goes to Prison."
That would be John Carter, former president of the Independence Seaport Museum. The melodrama is the 54-page filing by the feds this week detailing how Carter allegedly stole more than a million dollars from the museum to pay for personal goods and services that had nothing to do with his $300,000-per-year job.
As for Brickstone Landscaping, it's a company in Middleboro, Mass., owned by a very nice man named Mike. He asked that I not use his last name in this column because, man, is he ever sick of John Carter.
"The first time I heard about him was when a detective called from Philly, asking questions," says Mike. "To be honest, I thought it was one of those scam calls, where a guy says he's doing an investigation and tries to get your personal information."
It was no scam call.
The Brickstone name appeared on 12 phony invoices Carter submitted to the Seaport Museum for $89,760 of work that was supposedly done on the museum's Spruce Street townhouse, where Carter lived for free.
Brickstone never worked on the house, says Mike, though he wasn't really shocked to learn that his company's name had been appropriated by Carter.
"Nothing surprises me anymore," he says. "When people want to embezzle money, they'll do anything."
I'll say. The feds' filing on Carter reads like a shopping addict's Fifth Step admission of all the wrongs he committed in the throes of a spending jones.
There's the $6,900 tiger-maple bed he bought for his own use with museum money. The $12,800 sprinkler system and $210,000 custom-built carriage house for his Massachusetts home. The $275,000 power boat and $100,000 sailboat. And the $1,555 buying spree at Orvis that included purchase of the "World's Coolest Shirt."
Let's hope that the "breathable, lightweight and comfortable" cotton top has prison stripes, since Carter, who's expected to plead guilty to fraud and tax evasion, could spend up to five years in a federal drink.
While he might be the only Seaport Museum official in hot water, it's clear that someone needed to dump a bucket of cold water on the heads of the museum's fiduciary overseers a long time ago.
If they'd bothered to ask for even a handful of actual receipts for the huge credit-card expenses Carter continually submitted for just one of the museum's yachts, The Enticer, they would have found, among other dubious maritime necessities:
_ A wood shed: $2,598
_ Four large-screen plasma and high-def TV's, stereo receivers and speakers, satellite radio and remote-control devices: $54,562.
_ Gourmet food, kitchen utensils and espresso machine: $4,803.
_ High-end clothing for "crew uniforms": $13,762.
_ Sailboat expenses (except that The Enticer has no sails): $500.
_ A root canal: $965.
_ And $30,601 worth of furniture, including 23 chairs, eight tables, two planters and - get this - a round circular tree set.
That's enough to outfit a Carnival cruise ship - except that the little Enticer has just three bedrooms, plus staff quarters.
And not one tree to speak of.
Alan Granby has no hard feelings about any of it. He's a Massachusetts specialist in museum-quality maritime artifacts, and his company's name figures prominently in the feds' filing.
Carter pretended that Granby's company, Hyland Granby Antiques, appraised a piece of maritime artwork at between $150,000 and $180,000. Carter used the phony appraisal to justify the invoice he submitted for $155,000, which was supposed to have paid for the art.
Instead, it paid the guy who built Carter's carriage house.
"As unfortunate as the John Carter affair is, he was always a gentleman to me," says Granby, whose book The Yachtsman's Eye was published by the museum. "I am more distressed by the recent death of the Seaport Museum's great founder, Welles Henderson."
Scandal aside, Granby feels great about the museum's future, thanks to new chairman Peter McCasland, who's responsible for bringing long-overdue scrutiny to the museum's books.
"This wonderful maritime museum," he says, "will rise again."
May calm seas prevail. *
E-mail polaner@phillynews.com or call 215-854-2217. For recent columns: