His historic donations to CCU and FAMU were shams. How an unknown Texan deceived colleges

Chauffeured in a luxury Infiniti SUV back to his comped Tallahassee hotel room – where a king-size bed and fruit and snacks from the $150 welcome basket awaited him – Gregory Gerami was on the brink of making history.

The week had already been full of excitement for the 30-year-old Texas native. He was led on guided personal tours of Florida A&M University's athletic facilities and other landmarks around campus. Catered meals with the university's top officials and distinguished alumni. All while private security officers stayed close to ensure his safety. Quite the welcome for his first visit to the university.

The following day was intended to be the highlight. The young business mogul, who grew up in foster care with severe disabilities, would be sharing his inspiring story with the university's graduating class and presenting the school with $237 million, the largest individual donation ever made to a historically Black college or university.

"And by the way, the money is in the bank," he'd proclaim, surely catapulting Gerami from relative obscurity to one of the most lauded philanthropists in the country.

He'd been close before. Four years earlier, he agreed to donate $464 million to Coastal Carolina University in South Carolina. That agreement fell apart while he remained anonymous, but this time, everyone would know his name.

What would his doubters say now? Before falling asleep ahead of the big day, he texted one of those doubters a YouTube link to a scheduled live video, advising him to tune in at 2 p.m. the next day. "I'm giving a big speech and gift tomorrow," he wrote.

But instead of silencing this one doubter, Gerami created many more. The transformational donation was a complete farce, an investigation would determine months later. The relationship actually ended up costing the university nearly $100,000.

Now several months removed from the public spectacle that preceded multiple high-ranking FAMU officials losing their jobs, and years since CCU cut ties and sought to bury any public association with Gerami — likely aiding his ability to pull a similar stunt — The Sun News is able to provide the most complete account yet of his interactions with the colleges, how he's able to convince the schools he can fund his colossal generosity, and why he does it.

Gerami has been able to use his charisma and empathetic backstory to build connections with seasoned professionals in respected industries willing to lend him credibility despite failing to ever verify his claims of massive wealth, The Sun News investigation has found. He's exposed massive holes in due diligence processes at prestigious institutions willing to overlook red flags at the prospect of securing the favor of its own golden goose.

The details of Gerami's story resemble the case of Anna Delvey, the infamous con artist who pretended to be a wealthy German heiress to ingratiate herself among the New York social elite, one fraud expert said.

Like Delvey, Gerami appears to have a "fake-it-till-you-make-it" mentality, trying to create something out of nothing in search of prestige and importance, according to Jason Zirkle, training director for the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

"We see it over and over again ... where there's some element of fake it till you make it, but there's also some element of a desperate need to be recognized and to be taken seriously and to be looked at with authority," said Zirkle, who agreed to discuss the situation surrounding Gerami while emphasizing he's not privy to every detail and can't say he's definitely a fraudster.

"That somehow makes you flip off the switch in the back of your mind that's like, 'I know I'm full of shit, so I'm going to get caught.' ... And the longer you go without getting caught, the more you're going to do it."

Origin story Gregory Gerami, initially born with the last name Kennedy, was taken in by a foster family in Arlington, Texas, west of nearby Dallas, just days after being born July 6, 1993 with fetal alcohol syndrome and other disabilities, he told The Sun News. Officially adopted into the Gerami family a couple years later, he describes his adopted single mom as a "saint" with a penchant for taking in foster children with severe special needs — raising as many as 10 at a time in a modest, 3-bedroom, 2-bath corner lot home.

"It was always crazy in our household," Gerami said, describing a childhood that involved learning to change one sibling's feeding tube and handle another's random seizures. "I don't know how our mom did it, but our mom worked super hard."

While Gregory was one of the youngest in the house, the others' disabilities left him feeling the oldest from a maturity standpoint once his oldest brother, his adopted mom's natural-born son with no disabilities, left when Gregory was 6 years old, he said.

He grew up with an affinity for classic country music — occasionally escaping the commotion of his family to record himself singing karaoke to George Strait or Johnny Cash — and politics, his social media presence shows. His grandpa loved politics, Gerami told The Sun News, and he was drawn to the idea of helping people.

That political proclivity led a 21-year-old Gerami to run for an Arlington city council position in 2015, listing his occupation as landscaper and posting on social media that he planned to raise the city's minimum wage, lower its debt and listen to the residents. He received 521 votes, the least of the four candidates vying for the position.

Gerami told The Sun News he no longer has an interest in politics — too much corruption, he said.

By all accounts up to that point, Gerami was just an average, affable young man with high political aspirations but otherwise living humbly as a small-scale independent landscaper. But just a couple years later, he'd pop up on the Birmingham, Alabama news as a Texas developer describing his plans to purchase an abandoned mall and renovate it as an indoor water park and resort with laser tag, paintball and a bowling alley for an estimated $480 million.

Making moves in Birmingham Kimberly Abbott, formerly Birmingham City Councilwoman Kimberly Rafferty, recalled redeveloping the Century Plaza mall, abandoned in her district for more than a decade, was a priority. Various outside investors had come and gone when a midwestern business wunderkind showed up as part of a team pushing a local pastor's bid to turn it into a mega-church.

"I thought he was way too young," she said, remembering her first impression of Gerami. "I felt that he was hiding something, ... (but) I always tried to give him consideration because some people are just weird like that, especially people with money."

Gerami started spending time in Alabama as a consultant to create economic opportunities in impoverished parts of the state, he told The Sun News. Abbott wasn't a popular politician at the time, he claimed, but he found her to be a kind person.

"She's a little, what is the right word? Interesting," he said. "I love her, but she's interesting."

When the pastor's project fell through, Gerami joined forces with a prominent local commercial real estate broker to formulate and pitch the entertainment complex, which never went anywhere despite the news coverage. The mall was eventually razed and turned into an Amazon warehouse .

It just wasn't a good fit, he told The Sun News.

Despite the failed venture, both Abbott and the broker, who asked not to be named, continued their relationships with Gerami for years afterward.

"I thought the money was good," the Birmingham broker told The Sun News, admitting he never saw proof his new client was wealthy. "He (told me) he liked to keep a low profile because he was so rich, which that isn't uncommon ... if you come from money."

The money was in the bank, he assured his newfound friends.

Where does his wealth come from? Gerami's wealth primarily came from a sizable inheritance and trust through his adopted mom's family, he told them, specifying a relation to the founder of Travelers Insurance, James G. Batterson . Batterson is his adopted mother's maiden name, but a Sun News review of Ancestry.com records tracing her family history back as far as 1760 found no relation to the Travelers Insurance founder. Her father did work as an international public relations executive for Dow Chemical, according to his obituary, but it's unclear how much wealth that relationship would provide Gerami.

When Gerami's adopted mom was in the hospital in 2020 fighting a battle with COVID-19, her natural-born son organized an online fundraiser through GoFundMe seeking help to pay her medical expenses . Gerami told The Sun News he wasn't involved in that fundraiser.

Gerami reiterated to The Sun News that his family is related to the Traveler's Insurance founder, but said he never told anyone that's the source of his inheritance.

There were additional stories about where large sums of money originated from, including successful business ventures.

Gerami had allegedly turned his landscaping business into a major property management company out of Chicago that he was about to sell for millions, he told the Birmingham broker. The Sun News was unable to find any record of this company or Gerami ever conducting any business in Chicago.

He did during 2016 incorporate a Texas home management firm, B&G Home Management, that he claims on one of his LinkedIn profiles was serving more than 8,500 homes nationwide, but his business partner with that company told The Sun News their joint venture never went anywhere or made any money. Gerami told The Sun News that isn't his current LinkedIn profile, and he agreed the business made no money.

Gerami went into business with the Birmingham broker, forming Batterson Southeast Capital, set up to take the money he'd earn from selling his business to become a major player in the commercial real estate development game.

"He'd start throwing me stuff to look at, so I'd analyze it, sit there, nothing would happen, so he'd send me another thing, (I'd) analyze it, nothing would happen," the broker told The Sun News, recounting the countless hours he spent working on projects for Gerami that never came to fruition. "He never spent a dime (on commercial real estate)."

Gerami disputed the broker's characterization of their joint venture — which he highlights when telling his life story. It was more of an economic consulting company, helping others with their investments, he told The Sun News.

"I would say it was successful," he said. "I thought so."

Gerami was so successful, in fact, that he had "some tax things" he needed to offset, he told The Sun News, and a charitable donation to higher education immediately appealed to him.

"I'm a businessman, so when you look at investing, and this is investing in student success, ... you want to get the most ... return on your investment," he'd later tell reporters asking about his gift to FAMU . "I think at the end of the day, the (return on investment for supporting students) is probably going to be the best (return on investment) I've ever done, and I'm pretty good at (returns on investment)."

Beginning around 2019, Gerami started reaching out to various colleges and universities to see if they were interested in a multi-million dollar donation. University of Texas at Austin quickly dismissed him, while Ole Miss and Miles College in Alabama entertained him before moving on. He soon found a willing partner near the coast of South Carolina.

Overtures to CCU The Coastal Carolina University football team fell, 31-21, in mid-October 2019 on its trademark teal field to conference foe Georgia State. The Chanticleers defense couldn't stop the run and the loss was a major blow to the team's chances of qualifying for its first bowl game since moving to the NCAA's highest football subdivision.

There were still plenty of positives to take away, though. Sophomore tight end Isaiah Likely, who would go on to play in the NFL, was beginning to flash, the game drew a record crowd of 17,249 fans to the recently expanded Brooks Stadium, and university executives were in a suite successfully schmoozing a young, rich Texas hotshot, who was on the verge of pledging an astronomical donation to the Myrtle Beach-area university.

While CCU has withheld documents, including an internal investigation, related to its relationship with Gerami, The Sun News has learned certain facts from internal emails and a timeline compiled by Bryan Steros, former interim vice president for philanthropy.

Gerami first reached out to CCU's Office of Philanthropy in March 2019 to discuss a potential donation of at least $50 million directed toward the college's business school, according to the timeline compiled by Steros.

Gerami, who was married at the time, later told The Sun News the donation process began because he was dating someone associated with CCU at the time, but otherwise, he had no clear connection to the school.

CCU philanthropy staffers continued discussions with Gerami during the next several months, including flying to Texas to meet him during June 2019, while trying to research his background and determine whether this self-proclaimed entrepreneur had the financial means to fund the gift. A gift that continued climbing and expanding to support different campus causes seemingly every time they talked to him, Steros' timeline and internal emails show.

The money was in the bank, Gerami assured them, though he's a very private person, so finding any information about him, his businesses or his real estate will be difficult.

Others vouched for his wealth, convincing CCU officials Gerami had a net worth of approximately $600 million, including family inheritance, success from his investment company and real estate, with nearly $260 million in cash assets, the timeline shows. Gerami declined to tell The Sun News whether those numbers were accurate.

CCU redacted the names of those corroborating Gerami's claims, part of a concerted yearslong effort by university officials to protect his identity , even after he publicly admitted his role.

Abbott and the Birmingham broker both confirmed they spoke to CCU officials at some point during the process, but told The Sun News they never confirmed anything related to Gerami's wealth.

With CCU officials' doubts quelled and the proposed gift agreement reaching nearly $500 million, then-President David DeCenzo told his team to move forward.

CCU gift agreement Gerami, DeCenzo and the heads of CCU's athletic and educational nonprofit foundations signed the gift agreement May 7, 2020 totaling $464 million over eight years. It would represent one of the largest individual donations ever to a university and far and away the largest ever received by CCU.

The scope of programs the donation would impact was vast: $16 million to support the football and cheerleading programs, $10 million to support nursing and other healthcare programs, $125 million to construct a new science facility, $1 million for an endowed scholarship honoring the retiring DeCenzo, and tens of millions more for endowments left to the discretion of university leaders.

The first $70 million was to be provided in cash by the end of September 2020, though the entirety of the gift was contingent upon the success of a third-party entity, the agreement shows, without specifying the nature of that entity.

Gerami declined to elaborate when asked by The Sun News, though he told CCU officials early on that the money would be coming from a land lease deal in which a company was leasing land from him to harvest hemp for CBD, according to Steros' timeline.

Abbott and other former associates of Gerami said he had mentioned owning a hemp farm in Kentucky, but they never saw proof it existed, and The Sun News was unable to locate any records showing Gerami owned property in the state.

Gerami, as the donor, would remain anonymous, the agreement specifies, "until he chooses otherwise." That anonymity appeared to be a temporary plan based on other language in the agreement, including that the donor would be recognized in future university promotional materials, and $3 million from the first part of the donation would be used to construct the Greg Gerami Football Stadium Suite, located on the west side of the stadium nearest University Drive.

"I felt like if we were giving all this money, I wanted my own suite, and I wanted to pick it out the way I wanted to pick out," Gerami told The Sun News recently. "... the deal was going to be a long-term relationship with Coastal, and I'd be there a lot, so I wanted my suite."

Gerami-CCU Gift Agreement by David Weissman on Scribd

Shortly after the gift agreement was signed, Gerami sent Steros a document explaining that CCU's educational foundation was the beneficiary of $95 million in his will, representing a planned gift, the timeline shows. University officials decided they would only publicize the planned gift "in order to reduce risk to the university." Officials were concerned about the optics of announcing such a large donation at the same time they were making job cuts due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the timeline and internal emails.

DeCenzo advised the communications team to avoid language implying the agreement exists because it would then invite a public records request.

"That's one thing we all wanted to avoid," he wrote in an email to Steros.

CCU distributed the press release on July 27, 2020, announcing that they'd secured a transformational $95 million planned gift from an anonymous donor who "describes himself as an African American entrepreneur and philanthropist under 30-years-old living in Alabama with a background in financial services and agriculture."

Excited and congratulatory messages immediately came pouring in from alumni and faculty, internal emails show.

"This is amazing!," a physics professor wrote to Steros and DeCenzo. "Please let the donor know of my thanks, and if I may be bold, the thanks of the faculty."

"... so the 'real' gift will be announced when we get the check?," Michael Roberts, then-dean of CCU's college of science, wrote to Steros after the press release was sent.

Connections in Conway Roberts was one of the few on campus outside the philanthropy office to know about the $464 million gift. Gerami told The Sun News he met Roberts while visiting campus during October 2019, and the two developed a friendship. The gift agreement included $2 million for 5thT Innovation Group, Roberts' fledgling nonprofit aimed at creating economic development through new technology and local entrepreneurship.

That funding never came, according to the nonprofit's IRS filings, and the group appears to have shuttered shortly after the donation was announced, last filing a tax return in 2021. Roberts retired from CCU in 2022.

Gerami also made a connection during that time with distinguished CCU alumna Barbara Blain-Bellamy, the mayor of Conway, the city where the university is located. Blain-Bellamy couldn't remember how she was first introduced to him, but he told her he was interested in creating a sort of "community garden on steroids" in Conway that would create jobs and provide healthy food to residents.

Blain-Bellamy fully believed Gerami's claims of wealth initially, but the more they spoke, the more skeptical she became of his "outer worldly" stories, she said.

"The young man is personable and pretty easy to like, but when you have a conversation (with him), I've always sort of been left with more questions than answers," Blain-Bellamy said.

The entire facade shattered, she recalled, the first time she met him in person — a chance encounter while she was visiting her granddaughter about three years ago in San Antonio, Texas. Gerami called and offered to take them to get some barbecue. He met them at her hotel driving a "rickety old pickup truck," she said.

"I hate to use the word distrust, but I was almost afraid to follow him to the restaurant in a public place because all these bigger-than-life stories of affluence and authority and power had quickly and immediately been reduced to a little boy who looked like he hadn't seen a dentist in 10 years and was driving this old pickup truck that I wasn't sure would make it to the restaurant," Blain-Bellamy said.

She's answered fewer and fewer calls from Gerami since then, she told The Sun News. His relationship appears to have continued with Roberts, though. Roberts has informed Gerami each time a Sun News reporter has tried to reach him for an interview.

Relationship with CCU terminated Just days after CCU distributed the press release about the anonymous donor's gift, university officials became concerned they'd made a mistake, directing the captain of their public safety department to investigate Gerami, internal emails show.

Neither the cause, nor the findings of that internal investigation have been made public, but on Nov. 3, 2020, CCU sent out another press release announcing they'd ended their relationship with its anonymous donor .

Gerami wasn't prepared for that press release, he told The Sun News.

"I will say I was kinda ticked at that moment, but I'm a religious person (and) I believe everything happens for a reason," he said.

About a month after Gerami was supposed to provide the first $70 million, per their agreement, the press release stated that the donor "has not fulfilled an early expectation of the arrangement."

Gerami told The Sun News on multiple occasions that he ended the gift agreement before presenting the planned gift — which is still pledged to CCU in his will — but that's in contrast to internal university communications, and Gerami had no proof he ended the agreement. The business deals he had in place to fund the gift fell through due to COVID-19, so he wouldn't have been able to make the donation, he added.

Around the same time the relationship imploded, many officials within the university's philanthropy office lost their jobs and the office was renamed. A CCU spokesman denied that those changes were related to the anonymous donor situation and asserted that staff cuts were due to the pandemic.

The donor, who was no longer a donor, would remain anonymous, the university added in its release.

Zirkle, training director for the fraud examiners association, said it's common for people and institutions that are duped by scammers or con artists to avoid talking about it because they're embarrassed, but that just makes it easier for that scammer to keep getting away with it.

He explained the idea of differential reinforcement theory, which states that the longer someone does something they know they're not supposed to do while avoiding consequences and gaining reward, the more they're going to keep doing it.

"They just start to become overconfident in their abilities, and they push off this (attitude of) 'I'm not gonna get caught, I'm not gonna get caught, not gonna get caught,'" Zirkle said.

"The whole fact that he had donated money to Coastal Carolina, and it fell through, but it sounds like there weren't any serious repercussions, he's like well, 'I can just do that again.'"

CCU hides its relationship Despite CCU's best efforts to keep Gerami anonymous, denying several public records requests for documents related to the donation, including the gift agreement, and redacting information in documents provided about the gift, The Sun News was able to identify him when the university accidentally left his name unredacted within an email attachment.

The Sun News disagrees with CCU's use of an exemption in state law allowing it to withhold information related to the identity of the "maker of a gift" who requests anonymity, and the newspaper is in active litigation with the university over the issue.

The Sun News published its story identifying Gerami as the anonymous donor in June 2023, but with CCU officials trying to obscure the former relationship, the primarily focused on Gerami's point of view, including an email he sent alleging racism and disrespect by certain officials shortly before the agreement was terminated.

He dismissed rumors the gift fell apart because he didn't have the money.

"We could write the check if we wanted to write the check," Gerami told The Sun News. "... In the business I'm in, it's not like I'm a poor person, so it would be hard for (CCU) to come back and say something now with the PR I'm already getting in my current business."

Gerami was now thriving in the hemp business, he claimed, with some recent press to bolster that image.

If CCU had been upfront about its failed partnership with Gerami, could it have prevented what happened next?

Gerami moves on, starts a hemp company About a year after the CCU relationship fell apart, Gerami moved on to his next venture, registering Batterson Farms Corp in Texas in Sept. 2021 and procuring a Texas hemp producers license in Dec. 2022.

Before having the necessary permit to place a hemp seed in the ground, Gerami in April 2023 led a television reporter in west Texas around his recently purchased 114-acre property with seven warehouses. He planned to spend $2 million to renovate the land into the area's largest hydroponic hemp farm, which would create up to 600 jobs.

But Gerami never purchased the property, real estate records show.

He never told the news station he did, Gerami later told The Sun News, though he did briefly have it under contract. He decided against it due to a railroad easement infringing on one of the warehouses.

Then a regional hemp business trade magazine published a 2-page feature titled "From humble beginnings to agricultural innovation: The Gregory Gerami journey," documenting his rise from a foster home to becoming the youngest African American hemp producer and seed seller in the state.

Batterson Farms did briefly hold a permit to sell seeds, but never sold any. That permit was revoked for failing to submit its required quarterly reports, according to Texas Department of Agriculture records.

After the CCU donation failure, Gerami had continued occasionally reaching out to universities about making a donation — as many as 15 different institutions, he estimated.

Saint Leo University in Florida, and HBCUs Oakwood University in Alabama and Wiley University in Texas were among those solicited, The Sun News has confirmed.

But armed with these new stories lending legitimacy to his outward portrayal as a wealthy businessman — regardless of the inaccuracies within them — Gerami was able to attract the attention of one of the largest HBCUs in the country.

Finding a willing donation recipient Gerami called Audrey Simmons-Smith, Florida A&M's foundation director of development, on Sept. 20, 2023 to discuss potentially making a "substantial" donation.

"Here is some info on me also," Gerami wrote in an email to her shortly after that conversation, providing links to the stories on his hemp business.

Those stories seemed to offer enough to prevent FAMU officials from running any background checks on their rich new potential benefactor, despite no previous connection to the school, the university's investigation found. Gerami was used to facing constant skepticism and questions surrounding his mysterious wealth, but conversations with FAMU focused solely on which programs he would support.

Still, he had to assure them that the money was in the bank.

Gerami sent Simmons-Smith an unsolicited email Feb. 5, 2024 with a letter from his Raymond James financial advisor confirming he had at least $80 million in his account, FAMU investigators wrote. Gerami denied that the email was unsolicited.

Weeks later, FAMU's communications director suggested Gerami present his transformational gift — which had jumped from $25 million to $200 million — at spring commencement.

That plan appeared to be in jeopardy when a Raymond James Financial Services executive emailed FAMU officials April 12, 2024 revoking previous assurances about the value of assets in Gerami's account.

But Gerami eased any concerns FAMU officials may have had about the ominous letter by claiming the financial institution had racist motives — mirroring his claims against CCU — and didn't want an HBCU to receive so much money. That explanation was accepted without scrutiny, according to FAMU investigators.

Gerami initially denied asserting Raymond James had racist intent before admitting to The Sun News he might have said something along those lines.

"I did reiterate (to FAMU officials) that I was told (by Raymond James representatives) it was too much for FAMU to handle," he said. "I don't know why they thought that, but ... there might have been a discussion ... that I may have said, 'Maybe they're racist.' I don't know."

So the show would go on, and FAMU officials prepared for the public relations blitz that would follow the big commencement announcement.

The commencement speaker Graduating students were confused when FAMU quietly posted Gerami as their commencement speaker , they told The Sun News, and even more disoriented as the slender man with his orange collar poking above his black robe approached the podium, a white face mask covering his mouth but pulled below his nose.

"I'm not trying to judge a book by its cover, but he doesn't look like he should be giving a commencement speech," Alexis Rejouis, Class of 2024, recalled thinking.

"He just didn't look the part, and he had a mask on," she said. "It's post-covid, so people wear masks, but it was a little off because covid isn't as big as an issue right now. Me and my friends in the crowd were trying not to judge but still judging."

Jordan Forbes, Class of 2024, drifted in and out of listening to Gerami's speech, but her ears perked up when someone mentioned he had a surprise announcement.

Maybe he'll pay off remaining debts for graduating students or something like that, the first-generation college graduate thought.

Charlie Wilson's "I'm Blessed" blared over the speakers as shock and gasps filtered through the audience when the giant check was brought on stage.

"Two hundred thirty seven million dollars!," Gerami exclaimed into the mic to reassure those in disbelief of the number, briefly pausing to allow the cheers to wash over him. "And by the way, the money is in the bank."

Once the excitement dwindled, Forbes' phone started buzzing incessantly, all text messages in her family's group chat wondering, "Who is this man?" and "How did he get all this money?" He's not worth all that, her uncle wrote after looking him up online.

Skeptics dig up dirt, fallout is swift Doubt quickly permeated the FAMU network and HBCU community in the following days as reporters and amateur internet sleuths exposed the details of a man whose public profile displayed no legitimate signs of wealth.

They found the GoFundMe fundraisers set up for his immediate family members. They discovered the messy divorce filing, documenting allegations of physical abuse that led to a misdemeanor arrest. They reposted The Sun News story identifying him as the anonymous donor whose generous gift to Coastal Carolina fell through years earlier. They questioned the dearth of information available on his hemp business outside of a generic-looking website and a news story about him buying a plot of land he didn't actually buy. The Texas Hemp Farmers Association told reporters they'd never heard of him, and the woman he'd listed as his co-CEO denied ever holding that position .

Also, it turned out Gerami's claim at graduation of the money being in the bank was misleading at best, with that exorbitant figure tied to 15 million private equity shares in his hemp farming company that he valued himself before transferring it to the university's foundation.

FAMU officials initially pushed back on the criticism, ensuring others they'd done their due diligence on Gerami. But when the school's board members started raising questions and calling special meetings , emphasizing that they were finding out about this donation at the same time as the general public, the college was ready to distance itself from the suspicious benefactor.

In an instant, the gift that should've made FAMU a beacon of hope for the oft-underfunded HBCU community had turned the Tallahassee college into a national laughingstock. "Has FAMU become SCAMU???" a popular HBCU-focused YouTube personality posted, while other critics called for resignations from those involved in this debacle.

The resignations did come . First was Shawnta Friday-Stroud, vice president for university advancement and foundation director. Then President Robinson . His replacement quickly demanded resignations from four more , including Athletic Director Tiffani-Dawn Sykes and Communications Director Keith Miles, who first suggested Gerami be commencement speaker.

The resignations are "unfortunate," Gerami said, and he's sure the gift played a role in some, but stopped short of saying he regretted anything he'd done that may have contributed to them.

Donor fights back Through the whole post-commencement process, despite appeals by FAMU officials to lay low, Gerami continued talking to reporters, insisting the gift and his wealth were real, fighting back against any claim to the contrary, and only occasionally ceding mistakes were made when backed into a corner.

He threatened to sue the school for defamation, he told The Sun News, a threat he regularly makes to those who question him, according to his former business associates. Gerami threatened to sue a Sun News reporter last year after the newspaper contacted former CCU science dean Michael Roberts, who was serving on Gerami's hemp company board.

"I'm going to make a statement and I'm going to treat this as racism, harassment and you coming and publicizing things about a 30-year-old self-made person who came from disabilities on the way up," he said. "And I'm going to paint that in a very good story. Then I'm going to call our lawyers, then I'm going sue you for emotional distress. And I promise you this, no court would not give me my money with my story and where I came from."

Gerami backed off the litigation route, but announced he was withdrawing his gift to FAMU shortly before a third-party investigation initiated by the school was published, deeming the entire gift fraudulent. FAMU hired an out-of-state law firm to conduct the investigation.

The investigator's report detailed university officials' alarming lack of due diligence, blatant disregard of flashing red flags and how the would-be largest donation in HBCU history wasn't just worthless. It actually cost the school: $2,700 in airfare for Gerami and his guest, $1,800 for his hotel stay, $9,000 for his private security detail, and an incalculable cost of wasting countless hours of public employees' time and the reputational damage to FAMU's brand. Oh, and nearly $78,000 for that investigation exposing it all.

What's the motivation? Could he face repercussions? The report from FAMU also theorized on Gerami's motivation for the fraudulent gift — he told investigators he was after the tax benefits associated with charitable contributions.

"Mr. Gerami's actions suggested a calculated effort to defraud the investors and partners (in his hemp company) by presenting ambitious but ultimately unverified business ventures," investigators wrote. "The involvement of universities served to lend an air of legitimacy to the schemes, making the investors and partners more likely to invest."

Those that have dealt with him for years disagree.

"I think it's all personal," said Abbott, the former Birmingham council member who later joined Gerami's hemp company board. "He never came across as greedy. He just wants attention, that's all he wants. He wants acclimation. He wants self-worth on a grandiose scale."

Zirkle, the fraud expert, said he regularly gets asked about fraudsters' motivations, but everybody's motivations are different. He speculated that Gerami may be after the prestige, similar to the case of Anna Delvey.

"He's interested in making himself feel important," Zirkle suggested. "He wants to hobnob in the right circle."

But while Delvey and other fraudsters are clearly stealing money from the people and institutions they're swindling, there's minimal proof that's Gerami's intention. He's never faced any criminal charges or civil lawsuits related to alleged fraudulent actions.

Zirkle, whose background is in law enforcement as a former fraud analyst, said Gerami appears to be operating in a sort of legal "gray area," where he hasn't financially benefited enough to justify a prosecutor coming after him, but alleged victims of his behavior aren't interested in pursuing civil charges because they now believe he doesn't have enough money to make a lawsuit worthwhile.

If Gerami has been defrauding investors, as the investigative report suggested was his aim, those individuals would have to come forward and be able to prove exactly what he misrepresented in order to get a conviction, Zirkle said.

What's next for Gerami? Since the report was released, Gerami has been consumed with casting doubt on its findings, identifying a few details within the report he could poke holes in and hammering those issues in conversations with reporters for months.

For example, the report's assertion that Gerami incorrectly transferred the stocks to FAMU appears wrong, based on conversations and emails with representatives of the transferring platform he provided to The Sun News. That platform, Carta, terminated his contract to use their services shortly after the donation was publicized.

The CEO of a Wyoming-based hemp company told investigators he had terminated a contract he signed with Gerami's company. But Gerami provided documentation showing the contract could not be terminated without his consent.

The report failed to adequately address the third-party valuation Gerami conducted on his company, listing its worth as exceeding $1.4 billion. But when The Sun News contacted the firm that conducted that valuation, its president emphasized their work on it was not for the purpose of valuing a charitable gift, and they were voiding it due to his misrepresentations.

So what's next for Gerami? Is another multi-million dollar promise to a college or university still a consideration despite all the drama he's faced recently?

"Heck no, you think I'm crazy? No," he said, continuing in the same breath, "I might. In the future, I may just cut a straight check, not stock or anything like that, and just cut a straight check. But I wouldn't want to be in the limelight though."