Sotheby’s, A&W restaurant chain owner dies at 91

Real estate mogul and Michigan billionaire A. Alfred Taubman is shown in his office in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., in this April 4, 2007 file photo. AP

BLOOMFIELD HILLS, Michigan — Real estate mogul and Michigan billionaire A. Alfred Taubman, whose business success and philanthropy was clouded by a criminal conviction late in his career, has died. He was 91.

Son Robert S. Taubman, the president and CEO of Taubman Centers, Inc., says his father died Friday night of a heart attack.

Taubman donated hundreds of millions of dollars to universities, hospitals and museums, and was a major backer of stem-cell research. His business success spanned real estate, art auction houses, and the A&W restaurant chain.

But it was his rearrangement of how people shop — parking lot in front, one-stop shopping — that left a mark on American culture.

He was convicted in 2001 in a price-fixing scandal involving his Sotheby’s auction house and served about a year in prison, but long denied involvement.