The following article is the text that I use for the Great Business Stories podcast on this topic. To listen to the podcast, click on this link or alternatively listen to Great Business Stories on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
It might not sound thrilling, but what if I told you the world’s most feared corporate investigator got his first big break from Spider-Man? And that this same man would go on to secretly chase billions in plundered wealth across five continents—uncovering Saddam Hussein’s Parisian investment, and billions in missing gold reserves of the fallen Soviet Union? From Wall Street dealmakers, to Pulitzer-winning journalists, to governments - they all came to Jules Kroll, the man who turned private investigation into a billion-dollar business empire—and became known as “the CIA of Wall Street.” In this episode, we dive into the story of how Kroll built a global intelligence operation -and also a few of the great cases and stories that built his reputation and business- enjoy.
The Making of Wall Street’s Private Eye: Jules Kroll and the Rise of a Quiet Powerhouse (1941–1989)
Born in 1941 to a working-class family, Jules Kroll grew up watching his father, a small-time printing shop owner, struggle to stay honest in a business marred by kickbacks. “It was pretty dispiriting… It made me pretty angry,” he recalled years later. Kroll saw firsthand how “purchasing agents routinely demanded ‘gifts’ and kickbacks for contracts,” and the toll it took on someone trying to do things the right way.
So he had a hatred of graft from very early in his life and a resolve to fight it. After graduating from Cornell and then law school, he went to work on Robert Kennedy’s 1968 presidential campaign. He ran for office himself in 1971, for the New York City Council—on an anti-corruption ticket—it ended in a bruising loss. He was “thrashed” by a Democratic candidate who later landed in prison for the very corruption Kroll had warned about.
From Spider-Man to the CIA of Wall Street
In 1972, Kroll launched J. Kroll Associates with a very novel business model: help companies uncover graft in their procurement departments and take a cut of the savings instead of charging a traditional fee. His first break came from Marvel Comics. Kroll’s investigation into Marvel’s printing contracts unearthed padded bills and bribes, saving the company a fortune. The publisher canceled his commission deal and put him on a retainer instead. “Spider-Man, the Hulk – I really owe my business to those superheroes,” Kroll quipped later.
He rejected the seedy “private eye” stereotype of trench coats and divorce spying, he aimed to “legitimatize private-detective work at a different level,” elevating it into the corporate boardroom.
He was an astute marketer- He knew that to win the trust of Fortune 500 clients, his firm had to look and act like a top-tier professional services company.. So he dressed the part, his third hire was a chauffeur so he was driven around Manhattan projecting an air of confidence. There was no servility or small-time mentality about him.
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He knew the sensitive, high-stakes nature of his work (investigating on behalf of banks, corporations, governments) entitled him to a seat at the table – and he behaved accordingly. This was not mere vanity; it was strategic. By projecting integrity and confidence, Kroll made clients trust him with their secrets.
His operation was “the Rolls-Royce of private investigation firms”—pricey but polished, with law firms and corporate boards turning to him for the sensitive jobs others couldn’t handle.
If a client invited him in to solve one problem, he made sure to solve every problem he found by being able to offer additional services- sounds like a mckinsey type model- in the way that you’d hire mckinsey to do a certain task, maybe 6 months tops and 3 years ;later you’re still paying them. “Once you’ve been invited into someone’s dining room to feed them, you want to have more than salad to offer. You gain their trust, they’re going to want to try your soup and your dessert.” And so Kroll diversified into “forensic accounting, crisis management, competitor analysis” – whatever it took to comprehensively guard a client’s interests.
By the early 1980s, Kroll had turned his consulting boutique into a pioneer of corporate intelligence. As Wall Street’s deal frenzy took hold—hostile takeovers, junk bonds, LBOs—Kroll became indispensable. By now Kroll employees, included former prosecutors, academics, accountants, and ex-cops, and women.“You need at least one woman on any team. She’ll have a different view”.
By reputation Kroll became known as “ruthless and relentless, an intimidating force” in the investigative world. Those who meet him often note the contrast: how approachable he seems face-to-face - “a gracious family man and this wasn’t just a show, he remained married to the same woman and his children have spoken about how he never missed a game, how he was always there for them and was never too busy to make time for them -admirable and not something you see in many billionaires.
Kroll enforced a “no cowboys” rule – his term for mercenaries who would wiretap, bribe or break the law to get intel. Instead, Kroll’s team relied on painstaking legal methods: public records, interviews, human sources. And of course this is how it should work- the worst thing that could ever happen is that they, the investigators become the story, become the scandal by getting caught operating outside of the law.
Sherlock Holmes with an MBA
A defining moment came in 1982. After Drexel Burnham Lambert, the American multinational investment bank nearly underwrote a scam charter-flight company, its CEO asked the law firm Skadden Arps for a list of recommended investigators. The tongue-in-cheek reply: “Dick Tracy, Sherlock Holmes, Charlie Chan, and Jules Kroll.” From then on, Drexel wouldn’t fund a deal without Kroll’s input. This was his big opening into Wall Street.
Soon, “to Kroll” became a verb on Wall Street, as in we need to kroll him or that to kroll that company. In 1986, the firm expanded globally, opening offices in London, Tokyo, Singapore, and Paris. Kroll was now a global intelligence operation.
Takeovers, Traitors, and the Hall of Slime
As corporate raiders circled Fortune 500 firms, Kroll became the defense team’s secret weapon. By 1988, the firm had handled “hundreds of takeover battles.” They’d quietly dig into the raider’s past, hoping to find something explosive—or at least leverage for settlement. Oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens hated Kroll the most. He accused them of keeping a two-foot-thick dossier on him and charging companies up to $500,000 for it.
When the magazine Business Week suspected that traders were accessing its stock tips column before publication, it turned to Kroll. Investigators staked out the California printing plant that printed the magazine and found the employee who was leaking the information.
One of Kroll's most controversial episodes came in 1987–88, during the SEC’s pursuit of Drexel and their star employee, junk bond king Michael Milken. Kroll’s team – on behalf of Drexel – gathered information on Ivan Boesky, the hugely successful trader who had turned informant against Milken (interesting aside note: Boesky is credited with having uttered the immortal lines Greed is Good- or words to that affect-which Oliver Stone then used in the movie Wall Street) . But Kroll went 1 step further and also started investigating the SEC staff and prosecutors involved in the case. The SEC got wind of this and was alarmed enough to ask a judge to force Drexel to turn over records of Kroll’s investigations.
By all accounts, Kroll’s findings were meant to intimidate or impeach the government’s efforts – a bold defense tactic. In the end, Drexel settled with regulators in 1989, and Milken himself pleaded guilty in 1990 and went to jail (Drexel itself was forced into bankruptcy in 1990), but Kroll’s behind-the-scenes role in the defense was a striking example of corporate intrigue, and it didn’t damage Kroll’s reputation at all.
The Mastermind Behind the Curtain
By the close of the 1980s, Kroll Associates were handling over 1,100 cases a year. The firm charged steep fees—$50,000 upfront for a basic takeover job—but clients considered it money well spent.
Because what clients got in return wasn’t just information—it was certainty. He legitimized private detective work at a corporate level, blending integrity, discretion, and results.
The Heroin Trail
Then came “The Heroin Trail” case in 1987. This cemented Kroll's reputation as being able to find a needle in a haystack
In the spring of 1987, the $30 million libel case of Karaduman v. Newsday was unraveling before the defense’s eyes. At its core was Newsday’s Pulitzer-winning exposé, The Heroin Trail, which named Turkish nightclub owner Mahmut Karaduman as a major heroin smuggler. Floyd Abrams, the renowned First Amendment attorney defending the paper, had built his case on the testimony of two retired Turkish narcotics officials. But in a stunning courtroom reversal, both witnesses recanted — they denied ever implicating Karaduman or even meeting the reporters. Abrams was stunned: “My last two witnesses recanted everything… we were left without a leg to stand on.”
Enter Jules Kroll.
Abrams placed an emergency call to the private investigator, asking if Kroll’s global network could identify anyone who had firsthand knowledge of Karaduman’s drug deals. Within two weeks, Kroll delivered. His team located a former low-level operative in Karaduman’s smuggling ring, now living quietly in Los Angeles. Kroll’s investigators persuaded him to testify, ensured his safety, and vetted his claims.
His testimony turned the tide.
The jury ultimately found that Newsday was not liable — ruling the journalists had not acted irresponsibly. Abrams later credited Kroll with salvaging the case: “Kroll came through... I was stunned.”
“Thug Busters” for the Global Elite
In the late ’80s, Kroll’s reach extended beyond Wall Street- Kroll Inc became the firm of choice when it came to investigating corrupt leaders and officials, earning the nickname “the CIA of Wall Street.”
After the 1986 ousters of Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines and Baby Doc Duvalier in Haiti, both new governments hired Kroll to track their stolen fortunes.
Kroll’s international reputation was boosted significantly in 1991 when the Kuwaiti government-in-exile hired Kroll Inc. to trace Saddam Hussein’s hidden fortune in the aftermath of the Gulf War.
The firm’s elite team of ex-detectives and analysts tracked down more than $6 billion in Iraqi oil wealth parked in foreign accounts. Among the more controversial revelations was that Saddam had secretly become a shareholder in Hachette — a huge publisher in France — they published Elle magazine among others. The scandal erupted in Paris, where Kroll’s actions were suspected to be little more than a CIA proxy mission. But of course it wasn’t — this charge has been levelled at Kroll down through the years by corrupt politicians and their lackies as we shall see in the next case. This was their investigation into post-Soviet kleptocracy.
The Red Gold Hunt
In the aftermath of the Soviet Union’s collapse in late 1991, rumors swirled of a vast Communist Party “gold reserve” siphoned abroad. Soviet press reports spoke of anywhere from $12 billion to $100 billion in today's money in hard currency and assets secretly stashed in foreign bank accounts.
The Communist Party’s longtime business manager fell to his death from a Moscow window in August 1991 — his death (officially ruled a suicide) fueled suspicions that he “knew too much” about hidden party funds.
Indeed, Soviet bank insiders alleged that in the months before the USSR’s collapse, billions in party money were quietly transferred overseas. One report claimed nearly 10% of the USSR’s gold reserves (some 200 tons) had been spirited to Switzerland.
By the end of 1991, the new Russian Federation under President Boris Yeltsin faced a dire truth: the state’s coffers were nearly empty, yet huge sums of public wealth had vanished.
In March 1992, the Yeltsin government contracted Kroll to identify where all this wealth had disappeared to and who had stolen.
From the outset, the political risks were grave. By hiring foreigners to hunt down communist-era thieves, Yeltsin’s government was implicitly accusing elements of the Red Army and KGB of grand larceny.
This wasn’t one dictator’s bank account they were chasing (as with Marcos or Baby Doc or Saddam) — it was hundreds of accounts across dozens of countries and implicating a number of very high ranking officials, many of whom were either still in positions of power or had access or control over people in key positions.
As a result, the kroll team who were on the ground in Moscow had to keep a very low profile- they literally had to watch their backs.
By May 1992, only weeks into the job, Kroll’s investigators began scoring early breakthroughs. Jules Kroll, in a rare public update, revealed that his team had already uncovered tangible assets abroad: “apartment buildings, hotels, ships, art collections” — all purchased with Soviet public money siphoned off by officials.
The mood within Kroll's investigating team alternated between zeal (as each new discovery buoyed the team) and gnawing anxiety (as they wondered how the powerful figures they were exposing might retaliate).
The investigation identified several high-ranking figures believed to be architects of the looting. While their names were not announced to the media, sources indicate Kroll zeroed in on a close knit group of ex-communist officials: former KGB generals, communist industrial managers, and even propagandists-turned-businessmen.
But by mid-1992, there were signs of pushback. Inside the Russian government, not everyone was happy with the aggressive treasure hunt. Nationalist and communist hardliners in Russia’s parliament began denouncing the reformers for “airing dirty laundry” to foreigners. Some intimated that inviting Kroll in was an affront to Russian sovereignty, or even a spy operation in disguise.
Moreover, behind the scenes, some of the very agencies that were supposed to help Kroll were dragging their feet. Kroll got very little support from Russian authorities.
Given that Russia was seeing a surge in organized crime and contract killings by the early 90s, there were fears for the safety of the investigators.
Kroll discreetly approached Western intelligence agencies for help tracing hidden funds. In Washington, the request sparked internal debate. While the CIA and NSA had the tools to follow the money, aiding a private probe into Russian corruption sat in a murky policy zone. The request for assistance was turned down by the National Security Council. Concerns ranged from exposing sources to a bizarre argument that the stolen Soviet money might help Russia, as some of the money would eventually find its way back into Russia and therefore help it revive its economy. Spurious reasoning.
Ultimately it would appear that the US government was getting pushback from the Russian authorities and so there wasn’t the political will to help Kroll with their investigations.
Despite this, Kroll’s findings were staggering. The firm estimated $14 billion (in today's money) had already been laundered into Western banks by August 1991 — and projected that as much as $50 billion was stolen. The Russian parliament even passed a law to recover stolen money as a direct result. But as you’d expect with Russia, politics then got in the way. Only a paltry amount was actually recovered. Politicians who had supported Kroll's investigation were replaced.
Inside Kroll, there was a sober recognition that the political winds had shifted.
“We found good stuff, but it turned out they didn’t want it,” said Kroll.
The Russian government stonewalled — the fees that they owed Kroll went unpaid. And in 2006, Russia retaliated with an investigation into whether Kroll had operated illegally on Russian soil. So typically Russian isn’t it.
Collor, Calvi, and the Canon of Detectives
Another really interesting case that Kroll was involved with was in the early ’90s in a case that had stumped police: the suspicious death of Italian financier Roberto Calvi.
Calvi was chairman of Banco Ambrosiano, Italy's second-largest private bank. His close financial ties with the Vatican earned him the moniker "God's Banker." Under his leadership, Banco Ambrosiano became entangled in a web of illicit activities, including money laundering for the Mafia, and various financial shenanigans with the Vatican.
The bank's collapse in 1982 exposed a labyrinth of financial malpractice and corruption. On June 18, 1982, Calvi was found hanged beneath London's Blackfriars Bridge, his pockets weighted with bricks and carrying a falsified passport- it’s such a dramatic, dark image, like something out of The Godfather. Initially it was deemed a suicide, until Kroll was hired by the family nearly a decade later. Reconstructing the scaffolding and analyzing Calvi’s pristine shoes, Kroll investigators proved he hadn’t climbed the bridge alone. It was murder. British authorities reclassified the death accordingly.
In 2005, Italian prosecutors charged five individuals with Calvi's murder: After a protracted trial, all five defendants were acquitted in 2007 due to insufficient evidence. The court acknowledged that Calvi had been murdered but could not conclusively determine who did it. The case remains one of the most enigmatic and controversial episodes in modern financial history
Institutional Muscle and the AIG Deal
On the business front, in 1993 Kroll sold 22% of the firm to insurance giant AIG. The capital infusion funded Kroll’s rapid international expansion. Kroll merged with Ohio-based O’Gara Security in 1997, a firm known for armored cars and bodyguards. The idea was full-spectrum security: cyber, physical, financial. The merged Kroll-O’Gara went public on NASDAQ. Revenue tripled to over $200 million and in 1999 Blackstone Capital bought the company for $475 million- I could find out how much Kroll made from that deal, but he was still left with almost 10% of the new operation.
Simultaneously, Jules Kroll began planning for succession. By 2001, at the age of 60 Kroll stepped down from the role of CEO and day-to-day operations to become executive chairman.
Kroll Goes Corporate
In July 2004, Marsh & McLennan acquired Kroll for $1.9 billion in cash. Jules Kroll and his family reportedly walked away with $117 million—By then, Kroll was a 5,500-person juggernaut generating nearly $1 billion in annual revenue.
Though Kroll stayed on, the cultural fit was uneasy. In 2008, Kroll left quietly.
Since then Kroll went through various mergers and acquisitions under the ownership of different private equity companies and as of 2025, the company spans cybersecurity, valuation, governance, asset recovery, due diligence, and investigations employing 6,500 people in 32 countries.
Though he briefly considered buying the firm back, Jules Kroll ultimately launched what is now called K2 Integrity with his son Jeremy, - it’s a financial crimes, risk, and regulatory advisory firm with 340 employees and he also founded the Kroll Bond Rating Agency which has over 600 employees in offices across America and Europe- so an amazing entrprenuer. Kroll is 84 years old at the time of recording and he’s stepped back from the day-to-day running of these businesses and with a net worth of about $2 billion.
I have to admire Jules Kroll singular ability to take the business of private investigations out of the low time, kind of sleazy image it had and elevate it, professionalising it- making it a vital resource for Wall Street but also for governments and countries plagued by corruption.
But what I love most are the individual stories of corruption, finding out how greedy nakedly corrupt the Russian officials were, the dramatic court cases, the theft of national wealth and resources by leaders like Marcos, DuValier and Sadam and all of this was brought to light by the man whose guiding philosophy was “Sunlight is a wonderful antiseptic.”
and that's why this is such a great business story.I hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as I have, and remember if you have any comments, any corrections or any story that you’d like us to cover, email us at: info@gbspod.com
All the best folks