[5] CINAR was founded by the husband and wife team of Micheline Charest and Ronald Weinberg in 1976 in New York City after organizing an event for a women's film festival, and later moved its operations to Montreal, Quebec.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the company saw massive success with children's programming such as Papa Beaver's Storytime, The Busy World of Richard Scarry, Are You Afraid of the Dark?, The Adventures of Paddington Bear, Wimzie's House, Caillou, Zoboomafoo and Arthur.
[citation needed] The company collapsed in 2000, when an internal audit revealed US$122 million was invested into Bahamian bank accounts without the board members' approval.
Other individuals believed to have helped with the scheme include John Xanthoudakis of Norshield Investment Group and Lino Matteo of Mount Real Corporation.
[10][11] On March 10, 2011, co-founder Ronald A. Weinberg returned to Montreal from vacationing in the Caribbean islands and was promptly arrested for securities fraud after a warrant was issued for him to be taken into custody earlier that month.
[13] On May 12, 2014, Weinberg, John Xanthoudakis of Norshield Financial Group and Lino Matteo of Mount Real Corp. were charged with 26 counts of fraud in Montreal Superior Court.
[17] The CINAR affair was described thus by The Globe and Mail: Mr. Weinberg and Ms. Charest set out to make non-violent, non-sexist children's programming because they wanted to foster socially progressive attitudes and feelings of self-worth in their own sons and a generation of kids with far too many bad TV choices.