The Fat Cat

L. Dennis Kozlowski, former CEO of Tyco Corp.

Nov. 16, 1946 Born in Newark, N.J. Though Kozlowski later claims his father was employed as a police detective in Newark, he actually worked as a private investigator and a political ward heeler.

1964 Graduates from West Side High. Classmates name him: "class politician."

1968 Receives BS in finance and accounting from Seton Hall University.

1970 Is hired as an auditor with SCM Corp in New York City.

1975 Meets Joseph Gaziano, chairman and CEO of Tyco Laboratories and is offered a job there. Gaziano is known to have a taste for the high life, with a prize collection of perks including a jet, a helicopter, and three luxury apartments.

1977 Takes night classes at Rivier College in Nashua. Completes only three classes, although he later claims to have earned an MBA.

1982 Graziano dies from cancer and is replaced by John Fort who shifts Tyco's focus from growth to profits. Under Fort, Kozlowski transforms himself from number-crunching staff man to crack operating executive, implementing the new CEO's profits-first agenda with a vengeance.

1985 Moves with his wife of 14 years, the former Angeles Suarez, and two young daughters into a $900,000 colonial-style house in North Hampton, a sylvan old-money enclave on the New Hampshire Seacoast.

1983-1994 Under Kozlowski, Grimmel, a division of Tyco, is turned into a fast-growth company by buying out its competitors one by one.

1987 Fort puts Kozlowski on Tyco's board and promotes him to President and Chief Operating Officer two years later.

1990 Kozlowski engineers Tyco's biggest acquisition yet, paying $360 million for Wormald International, a global fire-protection concern based in Australia. Wormald, however, later proves to be less than the prize it had seemed.

Early 1990s Separates from wife and takes up with Karen Lee Mayo, a statuesque waitress who looks a bit like the actress Kim Basinger.

1992 Kozlowski outmaneuvers Fort and is named new CEO by Tyco's board.

1994 Kozlowski sets out to reduce Tyco's reliance on construction and accelerate its growth by acquiring companies in noncyclical businesses. Tyco lays out nearly $1 billion to acquire Kendall International Inc., a 90-year-old maker of disposable medical supplies.

1995 Tyco's earnings nearly double to $214 million. The board rewards Kozlowski with a hefty raise to $2.1 million and a big block of stock shares.

1997 Kozlowski shifts Tyco's headquarters to Bermuda to avoid paying corporate taxes.

1997-1999 His total compensation rises from $8.8 million in 1997 to $67 million in 1998 to $170 million in 1999, ranking him second among all CEOs.

1996-2001 Kozlowski lays out $29.8 million to build a mansion in Boca Raton, FL and an additional $30.8 million to buy and furnish an apartment on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. He tops off his collection of airplanes and speedboats by shelling out $15 million for Endeavor, a rare 1930s-vintage yacht. He spends upwards of $20 million on fine art, including $3.9 million on a middling Renoir. He gives Karen $1.5 million to start a restaurant in Boca Raton, and throws her a 40th birthday party on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia that costs $2.1 million. According to Tyco, Kozlowski misappropriates $43 million in corporate funds to make philanthropic contributions in his own name, including $5 million to Seton Hall, which names its new business-school building Kozlowski Hall. 2001 He appears on cover of Business Week under headline "The Most Aggressive CEO."

June 3, 2002 Kozlowski is indicted for avoiding to pay $1.1 million (a petty amount considering his net worth) in New York sales taxes on art purchased with Tyco funds. He is accused of buying the art for his New York apartment and office, but having art gallery employees deceptively ship empty boxes to the company's offices in Exeter, NH.

June 5, 2002 With the media furor over his indictment, he resigns from Tyco stating personal reasons.

Sept 12, 2003 Kozlowski is indicted a second time along with former Tyco Chief Financial Officer Mark Swartz on charges of running a criminal enterprise within Tyco's executive suite. They are charged with 38 felony counts for pilfering $170 million directly from the company and for pocketing an additional $430 million through tainted sales of stock.

2003 Tyco admits to over-reporting its 2002 profits by nearly $400 million and that its last five years of financial reports were also inflated. The $90 billion drop in Tyco's stock exceeds Enron Corp.'s entire market value at its peak.