Gawker: defamer, scams

Dear Anne Hathaway: If You Don't Read Your Ex-Boyfriend's Indictment You Are Going To Hell

Moe — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 13:30:00 EDT

Your "friends" are probably telling you not to read the indictment. (You know what indictment! The one charging your Ponzi sheming ex, Raffaello Follieri. Look, only 18 pages. It's not a script) And let me tell you something, Anne, and this is beside the point, but those same fucking friends avoiding the topic, telling you reading all the press will only be "painful" are also secretly ordering your light Frappuccinos REGULAR, and marking the side of the plastic cup with their own sharpies so that you THINK they're light even though they taste "deceptively" high fructose. Okay, maybe they're not, but the point is, I bet you are perceptive enough to distinguish a real Frappuccino from a Splenda-sweetened one but the man you loved held himself out to be the CFO of the Fucking Vatican and the whole time he was nothing but a uniquely shameless Italian con artist living in a $90,000 a month apartment with a $60,000 housecleaning service you NEVER KNEW THE DIFFERENCE. You, Anne, are kind of stupid; this is your intervention; most pretty girls in this country never get one so consider yourself blessed. Not that I know you, I am just speculating, not on the basis of the fact that you just likened making out with Steve Carell to a "yummy lollipop" but on the basis that you once called "charity work" such an "aphrodisiac," which would be an idiotic thing to say if your boyfriend was the Pope himself, but ha ha, no, you probably just thought he was friends with the Pope. Which brings me to my very fave part of this indictment:

You probably feel like a fool. Ohhh, poor you! How do you think fucking Ron Burkle feels about that $55 million?? Ron Burkle, a man whose name is not exactly synonymous with "integrity"! Ron Burkle, a man who spent a few hundred grand trying to sabotage the career of a fucking gossip columnist who pissed him off.

That's why I entreat you to read the indictment, Anne. Sure, some painful memories will come flooding back: the custom-made suits from Milan. The "flowers, cosmetics, clothes, wine, expensive dinners, dog walking services and orthodontist expenses." The $30,000 housecall. The Caribbean vacation in 2006. The two-story apartment in Rockefeller Center that Raffaello rented for visiting members of the clergy. The notable absence in said apartment of any visiting members of the clergy!

A wise woman once said: "A woman especially if she has the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can." Wait, does that ring a bell?? Yeah, genius it was the tagline for Becoming Jane. The thing is, it doesn't apply to women who have no actual knowledge to conceal. And I'm not trying to get you to pull an Ophelia here but did the Feds even bother trying to question you? Did you ever get deposed? Let me tell you Anne, I would love love looooove to live in a world that allowed me to believe you waited until last week to dump him because you were recording his phone conversations, "backing up" his hard drives, strategically digging through his wastebaskets and mastering his rhetorical tics in preparation for your directorial debut, an epic black comedy on the striking guilelessness of powerful, influential, successful, and thoroughly rotten people when they believe themselves to be possibly in the presence of Christ Himself. At turns subtle and madcap, stark and decadent, it could serve as a scathing cinematic indictment of …well shit, you name it: organized religion, the human condition, Money, Power, the Vatican, vanity, "Love," your idiot self, even your ex-boyfriend.

But I somehow doubt it! Which is why right now, I hate to break it to you, he may be the one going to prison, but he is also kind of "winning."

Rafaello Follieri: The Indictment [WSJ]
Earlier: Vaticonned! How Anne Hathaway's Boyfriend Got Clinton To Underwrite Their Fabulous Romance

Hollywood's Guardian Angels Tom Cruise And John Travolta Duped By Fake Heath Ledger Father

Seth — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 12:38:12 EST

In a shocking development in the Heath Ledger tragedy, the NY Post is reporting that an unidentified con man has been making calls pretending to be Heath's father. Not only did he convince the Manhattan funeral home that held Ledger's body to book him multiple rooms at the Carlysle hotel for him and his "family," he also took advantage of grieving A-list movie stars Tom Cruise and John Travolta. From their report:

By the [day after Ledger's death], a man claiming to be Kim Ledger managed to get Cruise on the phone, a source said.

Over the next few days, he "had had a couple of conversations with" Cruise, asking for emotional support, said the source. But Cruise abruptly cut him off when he learned "he was an impostor," the source said. "Heath's reps found out there was this hoaxer and they called various celebs." Sources close to Cruise confirmed the impostor contacted him.
Travolta publicist Samantha Mast said, "John spoke with the guy briefly before he realized he was an impostor. He did not make arrangements to buy him a plane ticket." But a source said Travolta, who had been "making arrangements to buy [the impostor] a plane ticket from Australia to LA and subsequently to New York."

Realizing the death of a fellow A-lister was the tragic-accident equivalent of a 28-car pileup on a rain-slicked freeway, the cruel impostor's grift was slyly calculated to take full advantage of Cruise and Travolta's lifelong pledge to good Scientological samaritanism. It's to their credit that both actors lept to his aid, erring on the side of gullibility, rather than first insisting the voice on the other end of the line be subjected to a personality test intake exam and e-meter reading, just to verify his stress-levels matched those of an authentically grieving parent.

SICKO POSES AS HEATH'S FATHER [NY Post]

Con Man Unscrupulousy Capitalizes On The Power Of The Hoff

Seth — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 18:47:43 EDT

Hollywood has always provided a fertile feeding ground for scam artists like David William Port, a Kansas City resident who bilked hundreds of thousands of dollars from gullible investors convinced they could grow their nest eggs by hitching them to the enduring bankability of Pamela Anderson prancing down the Malibu shore in a physics-defying one-piece bathing suit. From the Reuters report:

A Kansas City man bilked investors out of $360,000 by claiming he had syndication rights to U.S. television lifeguard drama "Baywatch" and help from star David Hasselhoff, prosecutors said on Tuesday.
David William Port, a 53-year-old resident originally from Britain, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court on Tuesday, according to U.S. Attorney John Wood.

The scam caught up "victim-investors" from England, Utah, New York, California and Delaware, Wood said. [...]

He also convinced them a series of "Baywatch" restaurants were planned, with the financial help of "Baywatch" star Hasselhoff, and that Hasselhoff was investing in PCG Media.

So convincing was Port's phony pitch—rumored to be a 30-minute PowerPoint presentation outlining how Baywatch Burger had four-times the growth potential of Planet Hollywood—that investors typically whipped out their checkbooks on the spot, undaunted by any negative associations the public might make between the celebrity endorser and self-destructive hamburger-consumption practices. Luckily, the con man now faces up to 50 years in a federal prison, where he'll be unable to ensnare more victims by making further phony claims about owning exclusive DVD rights to Silk Stalkings.

Investors beached in U.S. "Baywatch" scam