Judith Lisi, Opera Tampa’s co-founder and CEO of the David A. Straz Jr. Center for the Performing Arts, has maintained that she did not know about the Canadian arrest warrant, which was issued in February 2017, until told by a Times reporter. But she has now acknowledged that Opera Tampa bought out the final eight months on Lipton’s contract. The reason, she said, was her concern over what she had heard about his behavior toward women.