By Michael Hooper
Whatever happened to David Wittig?
David Wittig is the former president and CEO of Westar Energy, 1998-2002. He served four years in prison for an illegal loan with a bank president in the early 2000s.
Wittig also was charged with "looting" Westar Energy, but after several years of trials and appeals, the charges against him were eventually dropped in 2010. In July 2011, Wittig settled a dispute with Westar Energy for back compensation; he received $36 million in cash, $3.1 million for legal fees, and $2.7 million in stock compensation.
In Topeka, Wittig purchased and renovated the Landon Mansion, 521 SW Westchester Road. In 2017, he sold the property for $2.3 million to Michael and Kathryn Franklin.
Around 2014, Wittig became interested in Greece with encouragement from a New York priest, according to an article published in October 2024 in Greece Is. After a visit to Greece, Wittig invested in Euroconsultants.
Wittig, now living in Athens, acquired 20% of Euroconsultants, which is a publicly-traded company on the Athens Stock Exchange. The company recently changed its name to European Innovation Solutions. He also owns Symposium Sellers.
Wittig's son Davis encouraged his father to invest in the wine business. This led to the creation of Neoma Winery, located in the lake region of Amyntaio, Greece.
According to Noema's web site, Noema started operations in March 2021, with some first, experimental efforts. As a result, the winery has now placed two wine labels on the market; Eruption, a 100% Xinomavro rose, and Invicta, a red wine with eight months maturation in the barrel.
When I was a reporter at The Topeka Capital-Journal, Jim McLean and I covered David Wittig and Westar Energy. Wittig was so incensed with our coverage that he hired a big shot law firm to write a letter to us that was intended to frighten us and keep us from doing our reporting. We never backed down.
I found Wittig to be pompous and egotistical; he liked to spend money, sometimes at the expense of the balance sheet. For example, he spent a fortune creating an opulent office in the Westar Energy headquarters that was unnecessary and never used by his successor. He also used the corporate jet quite frequently, often flying to Europe, sometimes his reason for going there seemed more personal than professional.
Wittig was trying to run a publicly-traded utility like a hedge fund buying and selling securities in various industries, including the home security business. He made money, he lost money, but he should not have been selected by the board of directors to run a highly regulated utility. He was almost always in conflict with the Kansas Corporation Commission.
Wittig had come to Topeka after working on Wall Street. I think he saw in Westar an opportunity to enrich himself with millions. He worked out compensation agreements with the board that were outrageously excessive.
For him to walk away with over $36 million in compensation was egregious and unfair to the shareholders, employees and customers of this utility. Greedy corporate raider wins again.
Would I want his life? Absolutely not. Wittig spent four years in jail and millions of dollars with attorneys to clear his name with Westar Energy, but his name is not clear. The Greece Is article about the winery said nothing about Wittig growing up in Prairie Village, Kansas, nor about his time in Topeka. But you can't hide your roots; his name is all over the internet.
Do I begrudge him for starting a winery in Greece? No; good luck with that. It takes many years to get a winery going. The website for the winery suggests the land and climate for growing grapes there is excellent.
Greece is a beautiful country. I lived there in 1990, I worked at a hotel for a while. I remember Athens as a catch-all for all kinds of people from all walks of life, some of them running away from something.
Wittig may be running from his past, but Kansans have not forgotten how much he sucked out of the state's largest utility.
Westar Energy later merged in 2018 with Kansas City Power & Light, now called Evergy. It's interesting, around 1999, Wittig, while at Westar actually tried to take over KCPL in some hostile takeover but the deal never went anywhere.
His corporate raider personality was too brash, bold and inappropriate for people in Kansas. Maybe Greece is a better fit for him.
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