Re: Charles Carreon, The Arizona Kid
Posted: Fri Oct 04, 2013 12:10 am
OLD PIRATE IN THE BRIG: STEVE COHEN IN LA METRO, by Charles Carreon
10:57pm, October 27, 2005
My thanks to Hal Meyer for calling my attention to this article in the LA Times. Gary called a little while ago to tell me the news. This has got to be Cohen's worst nightmare. Locked in a cell with Judge Ware holding the key, and a record of defying the courts by flinging his unwelcome briefs into the courts from his fugitive perch in Tijuana, worldwide center of culture, drug money and mayhem against women.
How long can the judge hold him in? Well, if Gary has his say, until he has disgorged every last piece of silver from his ample gullet. A little abdominal massage with a baseball bat might assist in the disgorgement. Who knows if Gary will get his wish? Certainly Judge Ware would have little reason to trust Cohen, who has been a fugitive for nearly five years, to appear at future court proceedings. No doubt both the INS and Gary Kremen will demand his appearance at such future proceedings. Thus, I would think that things do not look good in the short term for Cohen. Will he pull a Houdini?
The arrest coincided with some seizures of Cohen's remaining Stateside property. Gary says he seized a "little money, a couple hundred thousand dollars," from accounts held by Cohen's Mexican lawyer Gustavo Cortez. Well, it may not be much to Gary, but for Cohen it might be the difference between the best representation money can buy and the Federal Public Defender.
10:57pm, October 27, 2005
My thanks to Hal Meyer for calling my attention to this article in the LA Times. Gary called a little while ago to tell me the news. This has got to be Cohen's worst nightmare. Locked in a cell with Judge Ware holding the key, and a record of defying the courts by flinging his unwelcome briefs into the courts from his fugitive perch in Tijuana, worldwide center of culture, drug money and mayhem against women.
How long can the judge hold him in? Well, if Gary has his say, until he has disgorged every last piece of silver from his ample gullet. A little abdominal massage with a baseball bat might assist in the disgorgement. Who knows if Gary will get his wish? Certainly Judge Ware would have little reason to trust Cohen, who has been a fugitive for nearly five years, to appear at future court proceedings. No doubt both the INS and Gary Kremen will demand his appearance at such future proceedings. Thus, I would think that things do not look good in the short term for Cohen. Will he pull a Houdini?
The arrest coincided with some seizures of Cohen's remaining Stateside property. Gary says he seized a "little money, a couple hundred thousand dollars," from accounts held by Cohen's Mexican lawyer Gustavo Cortez. Well, it may not be much to Gary, but for Cohen it might be the difference between the best representation money can buy and the Federal Public Defender.
By Richard Marosi and Joseph Menn for LA Times wrote:
Fugitive Online Porn Mogul Is Handed Over to U.S. Agents
7:18 PM PDT, October 27, 2005
SAN DIEGO — Four years after dodging a $65 million court judgment by fleeing the country, former online-porn mogul Stephen Michael Cohen was arrested by Mexican authorities in Tijuana on an immigration violation and handed over Thursday to U.S. agents.
Cohen, a multiple felon and longtime con man, had been on the run since before 2001, when a judge ordered him to pay a San Francisco entrepreneur for hijacking the Internet address Sex.com. In 1995, Cohen forged a letter to Internet authorities to gain control of the address, which he transformed into a highly profitable site for pornography ads.
Cohen, who had been living in a Tijuana mansion, was being held without bail at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown San Diego. His apprehension was the latest twist in one of the most bizarre and longest-running feuds of the dot-com explosion.
The contest pitted Cohen against Gary Kremen, a San Francisco engineer and investor who had the foresight to register the Web address in 1994, when names were doled out for free to the first person who asked.
While Kremen was busy with other things, including the company that grew into the online dating site Match.com, he did nothing with Sex.com. But Cohen, fresh off a federal prison term for fraud and forgery, saw the domain's potential.
In 1995, Cohen presented a forged letter to Network Solutions, ostensibly from Kremen's company, that said Kremen had been fired and that Cohen should get control of Sex.com. Network Solutions handed over the site.
When Kremen discovered what had happened, he was told by Network Solutions that they couldn't help him. They suggested he sue Cohen.. But Cohen was raking in what grew to be tens of millions of dollars by selling ads on Sex.com, and he and his lawyers put up a fight — so ferociously that the federal judge on the case ordered Cohen arrested for contempt of court.
But Cohen was unavailable. During the years of litigation, he moved his millions overseas and left the country, occasionally calling Kremen to taunt him. Kremen got Sex.com back in late 2000 and the next year was awarded $65 million — an amount that has since grown to $82 million, with interest. Kremen has collected some property from Cohen, but has yet to break even on his legal fees.
"I'm excited, and I'm happy to prepare for the next stage of justice," Kremen said Thursday.
An attorney for Cohen did not respond to a message seeking comment. Cohan was turned over to agents of the U.S. Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Marshals Service, according to Deputy Marshal Tania Tyler.