Still aged just 19, in 1972 he stepped straight into the top position at the Nashua Humane Society (NHS), making him the youngest person ever to head a major humane society. He landed the position on the strength of a personal recommendation from Hoyt and a fictitious resume.
At NHS, Wills won a reputation as an aggressive fundraiser. In one of his last deeds there, in 1978, he moved to put a franchisee of a pet store chain on the NHS’s board, and began sending people who came to the shelter looking for purebreds to the store instead. When a local dog breeder objected, she obtained a letter from Hoyt admitting that putting a pet store owner on the board of an animal shelter might constitute a conflict of interests.
Wills left the NHS in 1978, and soon thereafter was threatened with a statutory rape charge. Also following his departure, NHS money turned out to be missing, with estimates ranging from $10,000 to $2 million.
Crooked Lawyer
In 1979, again with Hoyt’s endorsement, Wills became executive director of the Michigan Humane Society (MHS) in Detroit. There he became close friends with Deday LaRene, a lawyer who would later be imprisoned for tax evasion along with his Mafia kingpin client, Vito Giacalone. In May 1994, at LaRene’s sentencing hearing, Wills would testify: “To see him put away for a year where he cannot use his brain for the betterment of society is an egregious miscarriage of justice.” On his release from prison, LaRene immediately entered community service with HSUS.
In 1987, Wills and Hoyt proposed a merger of MHS and HSUS so the latter could gain hands-on experience in shelter operation that might have aided fundraising. But the merger was shelved in 1988, about the time dubious financial transactions involving Hoyt and HSUS president Paul Irwin were exposed by syndicated columnist Jack Anderson.
In June 1989, Wills resigned from MHS when the board became aware of a deficit eventually estimated at $1.6 million. A bookkeeper was subsequently charged with embezzlement and eventually convicted for pocketing $60,000, but the bulk of the money was never found. It was during the trial of the bookkeeper, in which Wills testified, that the media learned of his fictitious resume and a conviction for breaking and entering.
Dubious Associations
In August 1989, Wills set up the National Society for Animal Protection (NSAP) with a start-up gift of $10,000 from Hoyt, who was also on the board.
Though Wills had escaped the rap over the missing MHS funds, it was during this period that the spotlight began to expose his dubious associations and maverick approach to others’ money.
Shortly after his resignation from MHS, the Teamsters Union made an unsuccessful attempt to organize at the shelter. Two of Wills’s alleged associates were involved in the Teamsters: John Burge, a nephew of Jimmy Hoffa, who was convicted in 1991 of taking kickbacks from trucking companies; and Rolland McMaster, Hoffa’s longtime aide and former jailbird. Burge was also president of Atlantic Western Personnel Leasing Corp., an employee leasing firm in which McMaster and another Wills associate, Dean Turner, were executives.
When Atlantic Western went bankrupt in March 1990, Wills intimated to then-NSAP volunteer Sandra LeBost that he had lost an investment in the company of $40,000. In June 1995, LeBost won a mediation judgement of $42,000 in settlement of unrepaid loans to Wills of $28,311 and her father’s gold watch, with a claimed worth of $10,000, but has not yet received the money.
In a parallel case, mediators have recommended that Wills pay $15,000 to plaintiffs William and Judith McBride who allegedly made loans to Wills in 1991 that were not repaid. Wills has conveyed his intention to contest this case, saying the McBrides entrusted him with funds as investors, not as lenders.
Turner’s mother, TV personality Marilyn Turner, was questioned about the Atlantic Western case by a Michigan grand jury. She and her husband, John Kelly, served on the board of MHS, resigning when Wills did and joining him on the board of NSAP. Kelly would also subsequently serve on the board of HSUS after NSAP was absorbed by HSUS in 1991 and Wills moved there to become Staff Vice President for Investigations.
Embezzlement
While with the HSUS, Wills often traveled abroad on undercover assignments, and handled cash payments to informants who helped expose animal cruelty. As informants rarely give receipts, Wills would have to be someone the HSUS could trust.
But HSUS’s trust appears to have been misplaced. Last August, Wills was put on “administrative leave” following allegations by employees of sexual harassment and embezzlement. Others claimed he had used HSUS funds to pay for his wedding and to cover his personal debts, and that he had attended imaginary meetings to falsify expense accounts. In September, formal charges were filed against Wills by two of his female aides alleging sexual harassment, while another aide stated that she had “strong evidence of the embezzlement” of at least $16,500 in 1995 alone. She also claims there were other “questionable” expenditures by Wills, including “large cash sums,” allegedly used for informers.
Suit and Countersuit
In October Wills was fired, and the HSUS decided to sue.
In November, Wills addressed the National Press Club at which he claimed his contract was “abruptly terminated for my ‘failure to cooperate’ in responding to a series of malicious and false allegations against me. ... HSUS is doing everything in its power to silence me, including filing a civil lawsuit against me. I was even advised by my health insurance company that HSUS had tried to cancel health insurance for myself and my nine-year-old son with asthma. Make no mistake: when it comes to the treatment of people, the word ‘humane’ does not apply to HSUS.”
Wills then announced his intention to countersue.
“I am ... preparing a defense and countersuit in several forums that I assure you will reach the highest levels of the Humane Society’s management. I am confident that I will be vindicated in the courts, but in that process many of the confidential informants who have assisted my investigations into animal rights abuses may be compromised or their lives endangered.”
The last Harpoon heard, Wills had abandoned the “humane” movement altogether, and was working as a consultant for an organisation representing the biomedical industry. It is believed that his inside knowledge of how the HSUS works will be useful in combatting HSUS’s campaigns against vivisection.