Peter Adler Alberti

Peter Adler Alberti was a Danish politician and swindler, known for the Alberti scandal of 1908. He was the son of a respected liberal politician who had been a pioneer of the Danish savings bank system. He became a lawyer and a leader of Den sjællandske Bondestands Sparekasse, a savings bank for the rural population of Zealand. He also founded several other institutions, such as Sjællands Brandforsikring and Danske Landmænds Smøreksport-Forening, and gained influence and popularity among the farmers. He entered politics in 1892 as a member of the Folketing for Venstre, the liberal party. He was a close ally of J. C. Christensen, the leader of the party and the prime minister. He served as the justice minister from 1901 to 1908, where he showed himself to be an able and efficient politician, but also authoritarian and brash. He was accused of corruption, fraud, and misuse of public funds by the opposition parties, but Christensen ignored the critics as long as possible. However, in 1908, Alberti resigned from his post and turned himself in to the police for embezzlement of 18 million DKK (about 1.1 billion DKK as of 2013 ). He had been using the money from the savings bank and other institutions to finance his lavish lifestyle, his gambling addiction, and his political campaigns. He was sentenced to eight years of imprisonment at hard labor and was imprisoned from 1912 to 1917. After his release, he worked as a clerk. He died in 1932 at the age of 81.