The gift-givers were DiCaprio's business associates (and friends) at Red Granite Pictures, the production house behind "Wolf of Wall Street." Now the 42-year-old actor has voluntarily handed over Brando's Academy Award (in addition to several other pricey souvenirs from the Red Granite team) to the U.S. government as part of an ongoing investigation into a $3.5-billion Malaysian money-laundering scheme.
According to last year's federal court filing, the U.S. government also believes that the laundered funds also funded "the co-conspirators' lavish lifestyles, including purchases of artwork and jewelry, the acquisition of luxury real estate and luxury yachts, the payment of gambling expenses, and the hiring of musicians and celebrities to attend parties."
The multimillion-dollar artworks in question include a Picasso painting, a photograph by Diane Arbus and a Jean-Michel Basquiat collage, which were supposedly gifted to DiCaprio by Jho Low, Red Granite's purported financier. The actor had accepted the art with the intention of auctioning off the pieces to raise money for his charitable foundation, his spokesperson said.
Red Granite co-founder Riza Aziz is suspected by the U.S. Department of Justice of helping his stepfather, Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak, embezzle $4.5 billion through a political development scheme, a sum which in part was spent on the Scorsese-directed film.
