When SF’s organizers disavowed SantaCon in 2014 due to the chaos it brought the city every Christmas, one of the event’s organizers in NYC leaned into the chaos by forming a charity — at first to appease officials and then later to allegedly collect and divert funds for personal use.
As SFist mentioned back in December, allegations had been circulating about Stefan Pildes, one of the original organizers of New York City’s SantaCon, who was suspected of funneling money that was meant for charitable causes into his own bank account while only donating a small fraction. Ticket sales and commissions paid by bars and restaurants reportedly brought SantaCon about $2.7 million in proceeds from 2019 through 2024 — all meant for charity, and federal prosecutors suspect Plides pocketed about half of it, according to the Chronicle.
Plides was arrested in Manhattan Wednesday and charged with federal wire fraud. Prosecutors say he used more than $1 million in donations meant for SantaCon to pay for expenses such as renovations to a lakefront New Jersey property, the lease on a Manhattan apartment, and an investment at a Costa Rica resort.
Gothamist has a rundown of the origins of SantaCon and how it spread from SF and Nevada to other cities. In 1990, the Cacophony Society’s John Law organized a Christmas-themed camp at one of the first Burning Man events in Nevada, prompting annual flash mobs in SF — then called Santarchy — in 1994. Plides and others brought it to NYC a few years later.
SantaCon’s turning point came in 2014, when SF organizers disavowed the event over mounting chaos — going so far as to stage a mock funeral — while NYC organizers, under Pildes, moved to contain it by forming the nonprofit Participatory Safety, Inc. at the NYPD’s urging.
Newer organizers Tom DiBell and Judi Henderson later reshaped the SF SantaCon into a more structured, charity-focused event, emphasizing toy drives and coordinated programming that gradually won back local bars after years of bans, per SFist.
In New York, as Gothamist reports, Participatory Safety positioned SantaCon as a charitable operation, bringing in money through $15 “Santa Badges,” bar commissions, and partnerships, with proceeds advertised as supporting local charities. But filings show a large share of revenue going to expenses tied to producing the event — staffing, permits, venues, and overhead — despite the nonprofit reporting little to no fundraising costs, a practice experts say can make its charitable output appear inflated.
The group also reported losses on cryptocurrency investments and directed both grant funding and operational spending toward Burning Man-related art projects.
“He took advantage of New Yorkers’ generous holiday spirit to finance his lifestyle through personal expenses, big and small,” said U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton in a statement. “No matter how you dress it up, fraud is fraud. We are committed to protecting New Yorkers from those who exploit their enthusiasm and generosity.”
Ultimately, less than a fifth of the money raised through NYC’s SantaCon went to registered nonprofits between late 2014 and 2022.
Image: Bo Zaunders/Getty Images
