V. Posner, 83; Tycoon and Corporate Raider

MIAMI -- Former corporate raider Victor Posner, who once owned Arby’s, Royal Crown Cola and Sharon Steel, died Monday of pneumonia at the Miami Heart Institute. He was 83.

Posner, a Miami Beach financier and industrialist, was a fearsome corporate takeover artist in the 1960s, ‘70s and ‘80s whose empire was once valued at $4 billion. He was named the nation’s top-paid chief executive by Business Week in 1985.

But legal troubles befell Posner in 1987, when he pleaded no contest to tax evasion and was ordered to give $3 million to the homeless and serve meals in a Miami shelter.

In 1994, a judge found Posner and his son, Steven, guilty of violating federal securities law by failing to disclose a fraudulent takeover scheme involving them and Wall Street investment tycoons Michael Milken and Ivan Boesky.

The judge barred the Posners from serving as officers or directors of any publicly held company and ordered them to repay about $4 million they had received from Fischbach Corp., the New York electrical company targeted in the scheme.

Born in Baltimore and the son of Russian emigres, Posner dropped out of high school at 13 to work in a grocery store owned by his parents. By 21, he had earned his first million dollars in Baltimore real estate and continued building homes in Maryland until moving to Miami Beach in 1954.

Milton Ferrell, Posner’s lawyer and friend, described the businessman as “remarkably intelligent, very warm and engaging, strong-willed.”

Posner continued his philanthropy despite his legal troubles. The Victor Posner Center for Communicative Disorders at the University of Miami Ear Institute is named in his honor.

He also gave to Mount Sinai, Jackson and Miami Children’s hospitals in the Miami area.

Posner’s survivors include four children, seven grandchildren, one brother and one sister.

Funeral services will be private.