Altruistic World Online Library

WHEN LIFE IMITATES A B-MOVIE
by Paul Lieberman
L.A. Times
Jul 12, 2002
(Copyright, The Times Mirror Company; Los Angeles Times 2002 All rights reserved)

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

When Life Imitates a B-Movie; Steven Seagal's ex- partner, accused of plotting with mob figures to extort money from the star, calls their saga a 'magic carpet ride.'

When Steven Seagal first surfaced in Hollywood, as a ponytailed 6- foot-4 martial arts expert, he offered a background story full of murk and menace. He hinted in hushed tones of having done "special favors" for the CIA. Whether anyone believed him hardly mattered-- what counted was how he put over the tough-guy image in films that cast him as a lone avenger caught in ominous conspiracies.

Julius R. Nasso showed up in town as a wannabe of a different sort. He presented himself as the poor immigrant from Brooklyn who started a pharmaceutical business with $500 saved from a clerk's job- -in a church. Then he set out, like so many others, to make movies. And for him, it happened.

During a partnership that lasted more than a decade, Seagal starred in films that grossed hundreds of millions of dollars, and Nasso helped produce them. They were close, almost like brothers. Seagal bought the house next to Nasso's mansion on Staten Island and they often dressed alike, all in black, just in different sizes. Nasso was a foot shorter than the imposing actor.

Nasso also was the easy one to deal with. Like many performers, Seagal could be self-centered and moody--"a stubborn, maniacal idiot," as he once described himself. But it was hard to find anyone who didn't like Nasso. "I would go in," he said, "and clean up the mess."

Yet it was worth it, he insisted. Every minute with Seagal.

"I went on the magic carpet ride with him," Nasso explained.

He says that even as the magic carpet threatens to land him in prison.

Nasso is free on $1.5-million bail, preparing his defense against a federal indictment that depicts him as an associate of the Gambino crime family, ruled in recent years by John Gotti and his kin. Last month, prosecutors revealed that a microphone planted to get evidence of mob influence over New York-area docks had picked up a meeting in a restaurant between the 49-year-old Nasso and a local Mafia captain.

Their alleged topic of conversation? A scheme to extort hundreds of thousands of dollars from "an individual in the film industry" who was not named but whose identity was no secret: the don't-mess- with-me actor who broke noses and bones on screen.

Only a few snippets of dialogue have been released, but one has Nasso saying to the mob capo, "Tell me what I have to do and I'll do it."

It seemed like a plot turn out of the thrillers that earned Seagal and Nasso their stripes--and another chapter in the long history of mutual fascination between tough-guy actors and their real-world counterparts.

Seagal, who is expected to be a key prosecution witness against Nasso and reputed mob enforcers, is talking only through his lawyers- -who insist he had no knowledge that his partner might have had such friends.

Nasso, even while denying any wrongdoing, wonders how Seagal could profess ignorance on that point. Didn't he know the kind of people Nasso grew up around? Wasn't one of Nasso's brothers married to a Gambino?

"How could he not know?" Nasso asked.

So Nasso sat down recently to fill in what Hollywood calls the "back story" to a relationship he uses a film analogy to explain.

"It was like 'Fatal Attraction,' " Nasso said, "without the sex."

Where Did They Meet?

What attracted him first was Hollywood. He noticed right away how "anyone could walk around and say, 'I'm a producer.' " He sensed that to become a real player, "you have to do your time." He saw Seagal as his way to do it.

Nasso has often said he met Seagal in Japan, while on business for Universal Marine Medical Supplies, his Brooklyn-based company that sells pharmaceuticals and health gear to cruise lines and merchant ships. Nasso said he needed a translator and looked up Seagal, who was fluent in the language: He'd been married to a Japanese woman and had run a martial arts studio in Japan.

Nasso sometimes told people he and Seagal were distant cousins. They're not, and the whole Japan story is "puffery," Nasso now acknowledges.

He now says they met in Los Angeles in early 1987.

Nasso had been bitten by the show biz bug seven years earlier, when Italian director Sergio Leone came to Brooklyn to film the mob saga "Once Upon a Time in America." Actor Danny Aiello, who was in it, said that Nasso caught on as a translator and gofer for the director. Nasso, whose parents emigrated from Italy when he was 3, spoke Italian and English with equal ease.

After that, when Nasso came to L.A. on business, he would look up actors from his old Brooklyn neighborhood.

One was Jimmy Baio, who had gotten his break in the spoof sitcom "Soap."

Baio said Nasso was wide-eyed around anyone on TV and in the movies, and jumped at the chance to attend sitcom tapings.

Baio said he brought Nasso to a party where Seagal was a guest, and the two hit it off.

In later years, Nasso led friends to believe he "created" the star-to-be, molding everything from Seagal's squint-eyed stare to his pulled-back hairstyle.

In reality, Seagal had long-standing Hollywood dreams of his own. His first wife, Miyako Fujitani, recalls him plotting out script ideas after they met in 1974, when he was 23. "He developed a story about a foreigner becoming a dojo master, then went on to the U.S.," she said.

By the time Nasso met him, Seagal had a new Hollywood wife, actress Kelly LeBrock, and a powerful booster, "superagent" Michael Ovitz. Ovitz's agency set up a demonstration so Warner Bros. executives could see Seagal flip aside a parade of attackers. The result was his screen debut, at 37, in "Above the Law," about a former CIA operative who discovers nefarious plots in the agency.

Before it hit theaters in 1988, Seagal was profiled in a Times piece that cast a skeptical eye on his vague stories of having a "CIA godfather" in Japan. But it also found the gun-enthusiast actor a plausible rival to such reigning action kings as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, and he was: "Above the Law" brought in 2 1/2 times its $7.5-million budget.

Nasso describes himself as basically an unpaid intern on Seagal's first movies, learning what he could with one goal: "recognition."

One thing he was able to do for Seagal, friends say, was set up a dinner with Leone during a promotional trip to Italy. Nasso also invited the actor to spend time at his waterfront house, "the most beautiful home in Staten Island," Baio said. One room was filled with glass-enclosed models of the Titanic and other ships.

"He did want to impress Steven, and it worked," Baio said.

When Seagal decided to form his own production company, it became Seagal Nasso Productions.

Nasso got his first credit on Seagal's third movie, "Marked for Death," as an associate producer. He moved up to executive producer on "Out for Justice," which was filmed in 1990 on his old turf, Brooklyn.

Nasso was ready for his recognition. A New York public relations man pitched him as "a Horatio Alger character."

Three newspapers did profiles tracing his rise from humble roots, one account saying he had two doctorates, apparently not realizing that Nasso proudly counts a 1979 testimonial dinner at Fordham University as the equivalent of an honorary degree and bases his other on a membership certificate from the Connecticut Pharmaceutical Assn.

Another profile mentioned that his early jobs included pouring concrete for an "influential uncle," with no mention of how the elder Nasso's name had come up at a 1980s mob trial. According to testimony, the uncle attended a meeting with the then-head of the Gambino crime family to discuss the contract to pour concrete for the Jacob Javits Convention Center.

Later, when Spy magazine questioned such ties, Seagal filed a suit--eventually dropped--claiming false and defamatory statements, one being that he was "friends with individuals who have ties to the 'Mafia.' "

If Seagal wanted to distance himself from such associations, other actors have flaunted their hobnobbing, from early screen hoodlum George Raft, who grew up alongside the real thing in New York, to James Caan, Sonny Corleone in "The Godfather," who traced his friendships with mob luminaries to "research" for his films.

"Am I rubbing their elbows or are they rubbing mine?" asked Salvatore "Bill" Bonanno, the 69-year-old son of the late mob boss Joe Bonanno, one of many onetime wise guys who have gotten acting work.

One of his gigs: a bit part in Seagal and Nasso's "Out for Justice."

In 1992, after Seagal scored his biggest hit with "Under Siege," he and Nasso planned a mob-themed picture, "Man of Honor," about the son of a Mafia kingpin who becomes bodyguard for a beautiful informant. But their backer, a Saudi prince, stopped funding. In litigation with the prince, Seagal and Nasso presented themselves as unsophisticated about the business.

"I'm an artist," Seagal said in a deposition, adding that when the prince asked to fund the movie, "I said, 'Great. Talk to Jules.' "

View From the Studio

But studio veterans who worked with Nasso viewed him more as a talent manager--and benefactor--for Seagal than as a typical producer. Nasso later said he loaned Seagal $3.2 million over the years.

"Jules was giving him money out of his own pocket. He treated [Seagal] like he treated his own son," said Aiello, who became friends with Nasso. If Nasso sensed that Seagal was upset, he would fly to California "on a moment's notice," Aiello said.

Nasso said he believed he was assisting "the next John Wayne."

But the magic carpet began to turn downward about the time Seagal made his directing debut in 1994's "On Deadly Ground," in which he battled a corrupt oil company. While the film opened atop the box office chart, critics chided Seagal for becoming preachy, giving himself a 10-minute save-the-environment speech.

Later that year, filming of "Under Siege 2" was marred by clashes between the star and production personnel.

Nasso said Seagal became depressed on that shoot and started gaining weight after he was served with divorce papers by LeBrock, with whom he'd had three children.

In a lawsuit over the eventual breakup of their partnership, Nasso complained that Seagal soon came under "the active interference of a Buddhist spiritual advisor known as Mukara [and] a clandestine and unorthodox Tibetan sect," some of whose adherents camped in tents at Seagal's Los Angeles home.

Although a lawyer for Seagal called the allegation "absurd," the actor's religious life drew headlines in 1997, when a well- recognized Tibetan Buddhist leader named him a "tulku," a reincarnation "of the [17th century] treasure revealer Chungdrag Dorje."

Seagal heard the jokes. "They think the lamas are taking bribes," he said during a Buddhist retreat in Colorado. "Well, lamas don't have TVs and they don't know what a movie star is ... and they have said there is no doubt that I am tulku."

That year, Warner Bros. ended its exclusive production deal with Seagal and Nasso, with a studio executive saying, "This guy has been on a downhill run."

According to Nasso's subsequent suit, that provided the opening for him and Seagal to "develop, produce and market" projects on their own. He said he bought scripts and went overseas to sell $25.3 million in foreign rights to four films, "all of which stated that he [Seagal] was to be the star."

But only one was made: "Prince of Central Park," with Nasso's 13- year-old son playing an abused child who flees to the park. Harvey Keitel ended up playing the gnome who befriends him after Seagal "refused to appear," Nasso complained.

Seagal's lawyers say there was no "enforceable contract" requiring him to act in those films. New York attorney Martin L. Perschetz said there also were "solid business reasons" for Seagal to move away from his partner. Nasso had proved to be "unproductive and unprofessional ... like showing up late on the set" and was "rude and boisterous toward other people," another Seagal spokesman said.

Seagal may simply have had better offers.

Although he was nearing 50, getting on for an action hero, Warner Bros. gave him a comeback shot in "Exit Wounds," with rapper DMX. Seagal was slimmed down, and without his ponytail, for the filming in Toronto in August 2000.

Soon after, Daily Variety ran a short item reporting that Nasso was "moving away from action pics to softer fare" and forming his own company in New York. Seagal closed their L.A. office.

Federal prosecutors said that's about when the mob began conspiring to extort "a figure in the motion picture industry."

Conversation Taped

After a team of FBI agents arrived at Nasso's front door with handcuffs, at 6 a.m. on June 4, attorneys for the producer offered their own explanation of the charges: retaliation by Seagal.

In March, Nasso had filed his suit seeking $60 million in damages for the actor's failure to do the four films. "Do you think it's a coincidence that this happens after that?" asked Nasso's civil lawyer, Robert J. Hantman.

But federal prosecutors said it was coincidence--almost a fluke, in fact, that they uncovered the plot against Seagal.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Andrew Genser said a three-year investigation had targeted mob influence at the waterfront all the way up to the latest leader of the Gambino crime family, Peter Gotti, brother of the late "Dapper Don." The indictment named 17 higher-ups, soldiers and associates of the family, including members of the strong-arm crew run by Anthony "Sonny" Ciccone, a 67-year- old mob captain who allegedly called the shots at the dockworkers' union.

FBI agents monitored the phones of Ciccone's men and planted three bugs at tables at Brioso Ristorante in Staten Island, one of which recorded a man identified as Nasso speaking with the capo last year.

In a summary submitted at a bail hearing in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, prosecutors said Ciccone plotted to use the mob's muscle "to pressure the [film figure] to either pay money or include J. Nasso in the individual's film projects." He also told Nasso to "demand that the victim pay Ciccone $150,000 for each film the individual made," the document said.

Genser, the prosecutor, said in court that Ciccone was caught "admitting on tape that he's been threatening to kill this individual."

Court papers make no mention of Seagal paying extortion money, but say Ciccone "on more than one occasion" met with the intended victim.

Seagal told authorities that one such visit was in Toronto, during the making of "Exit Wounds."

Attorneys for Nasso, who is charged with conspiracy and attempted extortion, have not heard the tapes. But they have already floated another defense: that the actor knew these people on his own.

"Steven Seagal is a mob nut," criminal lawyer Barry Levin said after Nasso's arrest.

The actor's lawyers angrily accused Nasso's side of trying to smear the victim in the case.

But they acknowledge that Seagal may have met organized crime figures while interviewing "various people for authenticity" for the mob movie he and Nasso worked on.

As to whether Seagal knew of Nasso's alleged underworld connections, the Seagal camp allows that Nasso at times "acted as if" he knew mob figures but "no one believed him."

Such talk was dismissed, a Seagal spokesman said, as "people trying to get attention in Tinseltown."

Friends say they understand how Nasso could wind up at a table with Sonny Ciccone's crew.

Aiello said it was impossible not to meet "these people" in certain restaurants around New York. "If they walk over, what would you say, 'Get away'? "

When Nasso was asked how he wound up at that table, he said, "It's the neighborhood. I know them 30 years."

His lawyers would not let him talk about the restaurant conversation or those acquaintances. But Nasso went on for hours recently about his Hollywood career. Even with what's on the line-- "my freedom, my life"--he was eager to be seen as a legitimate player in that world.

Nasso has compiled a list of moments: a 1991 lunch at Le Cirque with Terry Semel, then chief executive of Warner Bros.; accompanying Donald Trump to the 1993 opening of the studio's store in Manhattan; going with Seagal to David Letterman's show to promote "On Deadly Ground." And on it goes.

He produced proclamations praising him for bringing filming to local streets, one declaring "Julius Nasso Day" on Staten Island. He reached in his wallet to show his Directors Guild card. "You don't get one of these," he says, "hanging around a cafe."

He is not the only one in his family embroiled in the criminal case. His brother Vincent, 43, is accused of paying the mob $400,000 in kickbacks in return for a three-year contract to administer a union prescription plan.

A second brother in health care, a chiropractor, was not implicated. He's the one who in 1989 married a daughter of Johnny Gambino, an imprisoned mob captain.

Nasso says he and Seagal were so close by then, "he escorted my mother up the aisle .... Steven was the star of the wedding."

Seagal's camp says that he is "still a big star," with two new films in the can and two more on deck. He also produces soothing herbal "essential oils," which are sold worldwide, on his Diamond Lotus Ranch near Mt. Shasta.

As for Nasso, he can't help worrying whether his magic carpet ride is over--with his pharmaceutical business. Since his arrest, "it's down 50%," he says.

But Hollywood? "Something like this makes you bigger out there," he said, with amazement.

How dare the prosecutor describe him in court as a "self-styled" producer?

As friend Aiello sees it, the great irony was in what Nasso did after the split from Seagal.

He made movies.

One, called "One Eyed King," is in the can. Nasso also was a producer of "Narc," shown at the Sundance Film Festival in January. That film, starring Ray Liotta, goes into nationwide release this fall. Tom Cruise signed on as an executive producer.

Nasso wouldn't miss the premiere if his life depended on it.

"Why wouldn't I go?" he asked Thursday. "The film is a Julius R. Nasso Production."

***

Times researcher Tracy Thomas in Los Angeles and staff writer Mark Magnier in Tokyo contributed to this report.

[Illustration]
Caption: PHOTO: Steven Seagal, left, and Julius R. Nasso on location in Colorado for 1995's "Under Siege 2." No longer working together, both have films in the can.; PHOTOGRAPHER: JOEL DAVID

Credit: TIMES STAFF WRITER

Steven Seagal gets Serbian citizenship
by RT.com
12 Jan, 2016

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

U.S. actor Steven Seagal © Maxim Shemetov / Reuters

American action hero Steven Seagal has been granted Serbian citizenship, the country’s official state newspaper reported on Monday.

A decree granting Seagal Serbian citizenship was signed by the country’s Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic on January 8.

Serb Republic (RS) @SerbRepublic
Today, Hollywood actor Steven Seagal was granted Serbian citizenship by Prime Minister @avucic #Serbia #RS
5:13 PM - 10 Jan 2016

The decision came after the famous actor and producer made several visits to the country over the past months, when the 63-year-old actor and martial artist met with Vucic and Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic, as well as with some other top officials.

In early December, the martial arts star was offered a job training Serbian special police forces and teaching them Aikido, as the American film star is also a 7th Dan black belt in that Japanese martial art. Seagal said earlier that he would like to establish an Aikido school in the Serbian capital of Belgrade.

RT ✔ @RT_com
Steven Seagal asked to train Serbian special forces http://on.rt.com/6y8x pic.twitter.com/oY6XNs4Sy5
9:12 AM - 2 Dec 2015

Also being a guitarist, Seagal, who has a large fan base in Serbia, took the stage for an open-air concert in Belgrade on New Year’s Eve.

Nenad @nenad_d1977
Najbolji deo. Best part, Steven Seagal #belgrade #serbia
7:55 AM - 1 Jan 2016

Seagal has praised Serbia’s government on his visits there and pledged to do “everything possible to promote Serbia” worldwide, AFP reports. The famous actor also stressed that Serbia has suffered injustice in recent history, adding that Americans harbor prejudices against Serbs as well as against their role in the Balkan conflicts in the 1990s, RIA Novosti reported.

Balkan Newsbeat @BalkanNewsbeat
#Serbia has granted Hollywood actor Steven Seagal a passport, only weeks after he entered the country: reports
5:40 AM - 10 Jan 2016

The actor is also on friendly terms with Russian President Vladimir Putin and is a frequent guest in Russia, to which he has ancestral ties. While visiting Moscow, he told RT that his grandfather was a Russian Mongol, while his father is said to be a Russian Jewish emigrant.

Clinton Dirty Trickster Faces New Charges: Private investigator Pellicano to be arraigned in celeb wiretapping case
by wnd.com
02/05/2006

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

Anthony Pellicano

A former member of President Clinton’s “Shadow Team,” a private investigator known for dirty tricks and rough tactics on behalf of celebrity clients, will face unspecified charges tomorrow in a high-profile Hollywood scandal.

Anthony Pellicano, 61, worked for many of Hollywood’s elite before and after being commissioned by Hillary Clinton during her husband’s administration to spy on their perceived “enemies.”

His celebrity clients have included Michael Jackson, Elizabeth Taylor and Sylvester Stallone.

Pellicano was released Friday from a federal prison after completing a 2-1/2-year sentence for possessing illegal weapons. He was transferred to San Bernardino County Jail, which is sometimes used by the federal prisoners. He was booked on charges that are under seal.

Before he went to prison, Pellicano said he wouldn’t cooperate in the wiretapping probe and would protect the confidentiality of his clients.

Pellicano first gained notoriety in 1977 after locating the remains of Taylor’s third husband after they were stolen from an Illinois cemetery.

He also helped automaker John DeLorean win acquittal on cocaine trafficking charges in the early 1980s. He was hired by Jackson to refute child molestation claims in 1993.

Pellicano’s legal troubles began in 2002 when prosecutors claim he hired Alexander Proctor to threaten Anita Busch, then a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, who was working on a story about actor Steven Seagal and possible links to the Mafia.

Proctor allegedly went to Busch’s home, placed a dead fish with a rose in its mouth on the windshield of her car and made a bullet-sized hole in her windshield. He also placed a sign with the word “stop” on the windshield, court documents show. The FBI later raided Pellicano’s office, found illegal explosives and seized documents and computers.

Pellicano and Proctor each face one count of making criminal threats and one count of conspiracy but neither have yet entered a plea. Proctor is serving a 10-year prison term in Illinois on unrelated drug charges.

During two terms of the Clinton administration, Pellicano was one of several private investigators used by the White House to conduct “shadow” operations. Others included Terry Lenzner, founder and chairman of the powerful Washington detective firm Investigative Group International, and San Francisco private eye Jack Palladino and his wife Sandra Sutherland.

But it was Hillary Clinton who hired the “Shadow Team” –- some believe to do work that employees of the federal government could not do.

Former congressional investigator Barbara Olson, who was killed Sept. 11, 2001, wrote that, “In the political life of the Clintons, it was she [Hillary] who pioneered the use of private detectives. It was she who brought in and cultivated the professional dirt-diggers and smear artists.”

Hillary’s detectives engaged in “a systematic campaign to intimidate, frighten, threaten, discredit and punish innocent Americans whose only misdeed is their desire to tell the truth in public,” former Clinton adviser Dick Morris charged in the New York Post of Oct. 1, 1998.

In his book, “Hillary’s Secret War,” author Richard Poe explains that Pellicano’s violent career as a private investigator reveals much about the sorts of qualifications Hillary sought in her “Shadow Team.”

In the January 1992 issue of GQ magazine, Pellicano boasted of the dirty work he had performed for his clients, including blackmail and physical assault. He claimed to have beaten one of his client’s enemies with a baseball bat.

“I’m an expert with a knife,” said Pellicano. “I can shred your face with a knife.”

FBI agents raided Pellicano’s West Hollywood office on Nov. 22, 2002, and arrested him on federal weapons charges. In his office, they found gold, jewelry, and about $200,000 in cash – most of it bundled in $10,000 wrappers – thousands of pages of transcripts of illegal wiretaps; two handguns; and various explosive devices stored in safes, including two live hand grenades and a pile of C4 plastic explosive, complete with blasting cap and detonation cord.

“The explosive could easily be used to blow up a car, and was in fact strong enough to bring down an airplane,” noted Special Agent Stanley Ornellas in a sworn affidavit.

The FBI raided Pellicano’s office after an accomplice ratted him out. Ex-convict Alexander Proctor told the FBI that Pellicano had hired him to threaten and intimidate Busch, who had been poking her nose a little too deeply into a feud between Mafia kingpins and actor Seagal. It seems that Seagal’s former friend and production partner, Julius R. Nasso, was tied to the Gambino crime family. When Seagal and Nasso quarreled, the dispute got ugly.

On the morning of June 20, 2002, reporter Busch approached her car, which was parked near her home. To her horror, she saw a bullet-hole in her windshield. A cardboard sign taped to the glass bore one word: “Stop.” A dead fish with a long-stemmed rose in its mouth lay on the hood.

Busch took the hint. She immediately went into hiding, staying in a series of hotels at her paper’s expense, while the FBI and the Los Angeles Police Deprtment’s organized-crime division investigated.

A break in the case seemed to come when ex-convict Proctor spilled the beans to an undercover FBI informant. Proctor reportedly told the informant, on tape, that it was not the Mafia harassing Busch –- it was Steven Seagal. Proctor said Seagal hired detective Anthony Pellicano to intimidate the woman into silence. Pellicano, in turn, had subcontracted Proctor to do the dirty work.

“He wanted to make it look like the Italians were putting the hit on her, so it wouldn’t reflect on Seagal,” Proctor told the informant. Proctor accused Pellicano of ordering him to “blow up” or set fire to Busch’s car to frighten her. However, Proctor said he got cold feet and merely damaged the car, leaving the dead fish and “Stop” sign as calling cards.

A federal judge sentenced Pellicano to 30 months in prison for possession of the hand grenades and C4. Later, on June 17, 2005, Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley charged him with conspiracy and making threats against Busch.

Despite the sensational coverage of the Hollywood scandals, few news organizations have included the name of Pellicano’s most famous client -– Hillary Rodham Clinton.

A detailed, 1,680-word round-up of the Pellicano case published in the New York Times on Nov. 11, 2003 –- a full year after his arrest -– made no mention of Hillary’s name, nor even hinted at Pellicano’s White House connection.

Pellicano was deeply involved in Clinton damage-control operations -– including efforts to discredit former Clinton lovers Gennifer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky.

Jenny McCarthy Details Alleged Casting Couch Experience with Steven Seagal: ‘It Just So Grossed Me Out’
by Maria Pasquini @MLSQUEENZ
November 9, 2017 AT 2:11PM EST

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

MIREYA ACIERTO/FILMMAGIC; ALLEN BEREZOVSKY/GETTY

Although Jenny McCarthy first accused Steven Seagal of sexual misconduct back in 1998, amid new allegations against the actor, McCarthy, 45, detailed her casting couch experience with Seagal, 65, on SiriusXM.

“They sent me out for Under Siege 2,” McCarthy began, describing a 1995 film Seagal starred in, adding that she “purposefully wore a muumuu to the audition so the casting people would actually look at my face and watch my work.”

When it was finally her turn to audition, McCarthy said she noticed “there was no one else in the room,” but she convinced herself that wasn’t a problem because “he’s a celebrity.”

“So I stand across from him and he plops onto a sofa that’s near a fireplace,” she continued. “And he points at the sofa cushion next to him saying to me, ‘Take a seat. Relax.’ I said, ‘No thank you! I’m just really excited to read for this part. And I have so much energy I need to stand.’”

McCarthy then detailed how the actor went “on and on about how he spent time in Asia working on missions” adding that he was “watching out of one eye to see if I take the bait.” And then McCarthy claims he told her, ‘’‘You know, this part has nudity in it. And I can’t really tell what your body looks like in that dress that you’re wearing.’”

“In my head I’m like, ‘Okay here we go. Sound the alarms, this is not a test this is the real thing, activate all defense systems,'” McCarthy continued. “But I so wanted to legitimately read for this part that I wasn’t gonna give up yet. So I told him, ‘Listen. My agent says there’s no nudity. I specifically asked her and she said no.’

McCarthy then claimed Seagal told her “there is off-camera nudity,” before asking her to lower her dress for him.

“In shock, of course I responded with, ‘Could we please read the scene,’” but she said again he asked her if she could lower her dress “so I can see your breasts.”

“I paused, I looked up at him, went from shocked to sadness, my eyes filled with water and I yelled, ‘Go buy my Playboy video — it’s on sale for $19.99’ and just took off,” she continued, adding that as she was about to open the door to her car, the actor — who she said had followed her — told her not to tell anybody, “or else.”

“So I get into my car and I just burst into tears,” she said, adding that she didn’t know what the actor meant by “or else,” but that after that encounter, she was ready “to move back to Chicago.”

“It was so disheartening,” she continued. “And I thought about like, ‘I was the last girl that day. How many girls had to take off their clothes? How many girls had to do more?’ It just so grossed me out.”

A spokesman for Seagal previously denied McCarthy’s claims to The Daily Beast. Representatives for Seagal have not responded to PEOPLE’s request for comment regarding any of the claims.

In late October, Seagal joined the list of major Hollywood figures accused of sexual misconduct in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal when Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero accused Seagal of trying to proposition her.

On Wednesday, actress Portia de Rossi tweeted about her alleged experience with Seagal saying that “her final audition for a Steven Seagal movie took place in his office” and that “he told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his pants.”

Portia de Rossi ✔@portiaderossi
My final audition for a Steven Segal movie took place in his office. He told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his leather pants. I ran out and called my agent. Unfazed, she replied, “well, I didn’t know if he was your type.”
3:49 PM - Nov 8, 2017

And last week, Julianna Margulies recalled an encounter with Seagal, whom she costarred with in the 1991 film Out for Justice. “When I was 23, a casting director, a woman, said, ‘Steven Seagal wants to go over the scene with you in his hotel room at 10 o’clock at night,’” Margulies told Jenny Hutt for SiriusXM’s Just Jenny.

Portia de Rossi Says Steven Seagal 'Unzipped His Leather Pants' During Audition
by Mike Miller
November 8, 2017 AT 8:10PM EST

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

MATT WINKELMEYER/GETTY; KRISTINA NIKISHINA/GETTY
Portia de Rossi is the latest actress to accuse Steven Seagal of sexual misconduct.

The Arrested Development star, 44, tweeted her alleged experience with Seagal, 65, on Wednesday. “My final audition for a Steven Segal movie took place in his office,” she wrote.

“He told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his leather pants,” Rossi continued. “I ran out and called my agent. Unfazed, she replied, ‘Well, I didn’t know if he was your type.’”

Portia de Rossi ✔@portiaderossi
My final audition for a Steven Segal movie took place in his office. He told me how important it was to have chemistry off-screen as he sat me down and unzipped his leather pants. I ran out and called my agent. Unfazed, she replied, “well, I didn’t know if he was your type.”
3:49 PM - Nov 8, 2017

Just last week, Julianna Margulies recalled an encounter with Seagal, whom she costarred with in the 1991 film Out for Justice. “When I was 23, a casting director, a woman, said, ‘Steven Seagal wants to go over the scene with you in his hotel room at 10 o’clock at night,’” Margulies told Jenny Hutt for SiriusXM’s Just Jenny.

“I lived in Brooklyn, and I said, ‘Oh, I don’t do that. I don’t travel. I don’t have money for a cab.’ And I didn’t. And I said, ‘And I don’t take subways late at night.’ And she says, ‘Don’t worry we’ll reimburse you. And I’m here, a woman,’” the E.R. alum recalled. “I got to the hotel at 10:40, and she wasn’t there. And he was. Alone. And he made sure that I saw his gun, which I had never seen a gun in real life. And I got out of there unscathed.”

In late October, Seagal joined the list of major Hollywood figures accused of sexual misconduct in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal. Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero’s recent accusations against Seagal came nearly a decade after Jenny McCarthy recalled an alleged incident in which he asked her to strip naked for the movie Under Siege 2 during a private audition in 1998.

A spokesman for Seagal previously denied McCarthy’s claims. Representatives for Seagal have not responded to PEOPLE’s request for comment regarding any of the claims.

Julianna Margulies Recalls Alleged Encounter With Steven Seagal: ‘I Saw His Gun’
by Karen Mizoguchi
November 4, 2017 AT 12:24AM EST

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

Julianna Margulies is adding her own experience to the ongoing conversation about sexual assault and harassment in Hollywood—and claims she had a frightening encounter with actor Steven Seagal. The Emmy-winning actress and Seagal costarred in the 1991 film Out for Justice.

A representative for Seagal did not respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment on Friday,

“When I was 23, a casting director, a woman, said, ‘Steven Seagal wants to go over the scene with you in his hotel room at 10 o’clock at night,'” Margulies told Jenny Hutt for SiriusXM’s Just Jenny on Friday.

“I lived in Brooklyn, and I said, ‘Oh, I don’t do that. I don’t travel. I don’t have money for a cab.’ And I didn’t. And I said, ‘And I don’t take subways late at night.’ And she says, ‘Don’t worry we’ll reimburse you. And I’m here, a woman,’ ” the E.R. alum recalled. “I got to the hotel at 10:40, and she wasn’t there. And he was. Alone. And he made sure that I saw his gun, which I had never seen a gun in real life. And I got out of there unscathed.”


GARY GERSHOFF/WIREIMAGE; PAUL ARCHULETA/GETTY

In late October, Seagal joined the list of major Hollywood figures accused of sexual misconduct in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal. Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero’s recent accusations against Seagal came nearly a decade after Jenny McCarthy recalled an alleged incident in which he asked her to strip naked for the movie Under Siege 2 during a private audition in 1998.

A spokesman for Seagal previously denied McCarthy’s claims. Representatives for Seagal have not responded to PEOPLE’s request for comment regarding any of the claims.

Marguiles also spoke about an alleged past incident with Weinstein.

“I have my own Harvey story, but I never was raped. And I never was harmed. And I don’t know how I got out of that hotel room,” the actress said during her SiriusXM interview. “It always starts with, ‘I’m a healer, I want to massage you’ and all. I sorta screamed my way out…But, the point is that for years, years, we all just shrug it off.”

Concluding, “And because of my experience with Steven Seagal in that room, which was horrific, I refused to meet Harvey Weinstein in his hotel room when another woman brought me, saying ‘you will absolutely get [a screen test].’“

Margulies emphasized that the discussion of sexual harassment in Hollywood should include the women who enable predatory men. “Who are these women? You know, one of the things I want to stay clear of in this dialogue, collectively with other women and men, is that it’s not always the men that are awful,” Margulies said.

Weinstein has been accused of sexual misconduct in the past couple weeks by more than 50 women, including multiple allegations of assault. (The movie mogul has denied any allegations of nonconsensual sex.)

Margulies appeared on Just Jenny along with Erin Merryn, a childhood sexual abuse survivor who is fighting for states to pass Erin’s Law, which mandates schools teach sexual abuse awareness and prevention. The issue of sexual abuse “is not to be shrugged off,” Margulies, a longtime advocate for the law, said on the show. “We have to start with our children.”

‘Take Off Your Dress’: How Men in Hollywood, From Steven Seagal to Harvey Weinstein, Treated Women for Decades
by John Walters
Newsweek
10/12/17 AT 4:20 PM

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero, who has worked as an actress since 1990, nodded knowingly when the Harvey Weinstein news broke late last week. “Nearly every woman I know in Hollywood has been ‘Weinsteined’ at some point in their careers,” says Guerrero. “If not by him, then by someone else.”

In 1996, Guerrero was a 31-year-old with a few minor roles to her credit (Matlock, Batman Returns ) when her manager, Lorraine Berglund, phoned with exciting news. “They want you to read for the female lead in a Steven Seagal film,” Berglund said, “but the audition is going to be held at his house in Beverly Hills.”

In the mid-’90s, Seagal was a box-office juggernaut, but Guerrero was wary of the offer. The casting agency offered to send a female associate, Shari Rhodes, to accompany Guerrero on the audition. “This was potentially a huge break for me,” Guerrero says, “but there was no way I was going there by myself.”

Upon arrival, Guerrero and Rhodes were greeted by Seagal, who answered the door clad only in a silk robe. He ushered them into a side room, where he sat in an oversized, ornate chair on a platform (“We called it ‘the throne,” says Guerrero) and asked Guerrero to read her scenes. When she finished, Seagal, who was also a producer on the film, Fire Down Below, said, “You’re fantastic! Tell me about yourself.”

“I drove home feeling pretty good about the audition,” Guerrero recalls, “and that same day my manager called. ‘Steven wants to offer you the lead,’ she said, ‘but you have to go back to his home for a private rehearsal tonight.’”

Guerrero declined. The lead role of Sarah Kellogg in that film went to Marg Helgenberger (of CSI fame)...

-- Marg Helgenberger

... but Guerrero was given a small part. On the day she arrived on set, she spotted Seagal talking to male crew members. From Guerrero’s perspective, it seemed like a scene out of high school. “He was looking at me and then he’d say something to them and there’d be laughter,” says Guerrero, who was listed in the film’s credits as “Blonde Beauty.” “Finally he approached me and asked, ‘Would you like to go into my dressing room?’”

Once again, Guerrero declined. She has never seen Fire Down Below and as far as she knows, her scene was cut. “When I read about Harvey Weinstein, the reports of him appearing in a robe triggered me,” she says. “That’s exactly what Steven Seagal did. I found out later that he was notorious for this.”

Bathrobes for males are so cozy and comfortable that it is no surprise that so many of Hollywood’s hottest A-list actors have been spotted wearing them. Sometimes these actors wear their robes in a film, or sometimes they lounge around in robes while relaxing on set or taking a day off. With their suave Hollywood style they always make bathrobes for men look sophisticated.

-- Tisseron Bathrobes Blog, tisseronbathrobes.com

This king’s cape, king's cloak, coronation robe was inspired by some of the beautiful and elaborate coronation robes worn by royalty throughout history. No detail was overlooked in the design and construction of this high quality masterpiece. This robe projects both the look and the feel of an authentic coronation robe.

-- alpharegalia.com

An Inside Edition report that will air Thursday evening includes multiple allegations against Seagal spanning more than two decades. One of his accusers, Jenny McCarthy, said that during a casting session she was ushered into a room with Seagal, who said, “So you were [Playboy’s] Playmate of the Year? Take off your dress.”

That’s Hollywood, says Guerrero. “As an aspiring actress you have zero leverage,” says Guerrero, who appeared in the 2011 Oscar-nominated film Moneyball. “Who was I going to go to complain about sex discrimination? He was both the star and a producer on the film.”


'Inside Edition' correspondent Lisa Guerrero tells Newsweek "nearly every woman I know in Hollywood has been ‘Weinsteined’ in their careers.

Guerrero later ventured into sports reporting, but was unable to escape the casting-couch syndrome. As an on-air reporter at Fox Sports in the early 2000s, she says that she was twice propositioned by Fox executives and twice rejected them. There were consequences. “I was supposed to provide on-site coverage for the 2002 Super Bowl in New Orleans that aired on Fox,” Guerrero says. “Before we departed, an executive—he was married—suggested that we share a hotel room.”

No way, Guerrero told him. “Then they took me off our Super Bowl coverage,” says Guerrero, who left Fox Sports in 2003 to be the sideline reporter for ABC’s Monday Night Football.

Guerrero believes that the Weinstein scandal will lead to a tidal wave of similar stories. “The only way to get [this abuse] to stop is for every woman to come forward and to tell their stories,” she says. “It’s not just about going to Human Resources any more. If the most powerful studio mogul in Hollywood could be brought down, I hope more women find the courage to come forward.

Steven Seagal Accused of Rape Following Multiple Allegations of Sexual Misconduct
by Brianne Tracy
People
January 11, 2018 08:30 PM

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

-- Regina Simons

An extra who appeared in Steven Seagal’s 1994 film On Deadly Ground has accused the actor of rape after numerous women have come forward with accounts of his sexual misconduct.

Regina Simons told TheWrap that she was 18 at the time of the alleged rape, which she claims happened after Seagal, 65, invited her to a wrap party for the movie at his Beverly Hills home in 1993.

When she arrived, she said that he was the only one there and that there were no signs of a celebration.

“He took me into this room and then just closed the door and started kissing me,” she told the site. “He then took my clothes off and before I knew it he was on top of me, raping me… I wasn’t sexually active yet. People always talk about fight-or-flight. But no one talks about the freeze.”

Simons, who is now a 43-year-old mother of two, said that she was “completely caught off guard” and notes that Seagal was “three times” her size.

“I was crying when he was on top of me,” she said. “Even now, my 43-year-old mind knows how to process this and understand what a loving relationship is and what consensual sex is. And there was none of that.”

Simons also described her alleged first encounter with Seagal, which she said was during the open casting call for the movie in which they were looking to feature Native Americans (she’s part Navajo and part Sioux) and claims that he invited her and her brother into his trailer.

After mentioning she had a headache in the trailer, Simons claims that Seagal offered to give her a massage and rubbed her hand and neck before going to set.

Simons said that she contemplated coming forward but decided against it.

-- Faviola Dadis

Dutch model Faviola Dadis told TheWrap that both she and Simons filed reports about Seagal with the LAPD in the last month, and an LAPD spokeswoman also said that the department is investigating a separate case involving Seagal from 2005.

Dadis took to Instagram in November to accuse the actor of sexually assaulting her at an audition in 2002 after being inspired by Portia de Rossi coming forward with her own accusations.

“When I was 20 I was auditioning for a movie with #StevenSeagal and was sexually assaulted by him,” she wrote. “During all our initial interactions, there was a production assistant or casting director present along with Steven. We established a relationship via text, and bonded about similar interests like Buddhism. After 2 callbacks (during the day and always with others present), I was invited for a private audition at the W Hotel late in the evening. Steven said the audition was to see my figure. I was told to wear a bikini under my clothes, and that the PA and casting director would also be there. As this is quite standard in the modeling industry, I agreed to the audition.”

Dadis continued that she was escorted to the room by Seagal’s personal assistant, but when she arrived there was no one but him and his security in the room.

“Steven asked if I would take off my clothes and walk for him in my bikini,” she said. “After doing so (he was on the couch and I was at a far enough distance to do a catwalk for him), he approached me and said he wanted to act out a romantic scene. I was hesitant and expressed this, then he started fondling my breasts and grabbing my crotch. I quickly yelled ‘This audition is over!’ and tried to run out of the room but was blocked by his security. I started making a noticeable amount of noise, and his security realized I would alert someone, and let me leave.”

In light of the allegations by #PortiadeRossi, I want to speak up about something I should have years ago. When I was around 20 I was auditioning for a movie with #StevenSeagal and was sexually assaulted by him. During all our initial interactions, there was a production assistant or casting director present along with Steven. We established a relationship via text, and bonded about similar interests like Buddhism. After 2 callbacks (during the day and always with others present), I was invited for a private audition at the W Hotel late in the evening. Steven said the audition was to see my figure. I was told to wear a bikini under my clothes, and that the PA and casting director would also be there. As this is quite standard in the modeling industry, I agreed to the audition. I was escorted to the room by Steven’s personal assistant. I assumed the PA and casting director were already in the room, but when I arrived no one was there but Steven and his security who stood blocking the door. I noted this was a bit strange, but he apologized and explained they had other obligations. Steven asked if I would take off my clothes and walk for him in my bikini. After doing so (he was on the couch and I was at a far enough distance to do a catwalk for him), he approached me and said he wanted to act out a romantic scene. I was hesitant and expressed this, then he started fondling my breasts and grabbing my crotch. I quickly yelled “This audition is over!”, and tried to run out of the room but was blocked by his security. I started making a noticeable amount of noise, and his security realized I would alert someone,and let me leave. I never reported this to anyone out of fear that someone like Steven, with such a huge amount of power, influence, and money would easily win a legal battle; and furthermore that I would damage my career. However, as others are now speaking out against Steven, I would like to do the same. This was unfortunately not the last time I experienced this type of behavior from men, and it is completely unacceptable.

-- A post shared by Faviola Dadis (@neurosciencebarbie) on Nov 9, 2017 at 2:52pm PST

Dadis also wrote that she decided not to come forward out of the fear that someone with Seagal’s amount of power, influence and money would win a legal battle.

Seagal has previously been accused of harassment and other misconduct by actresses Rossi, Julianna Margulies, Jenny McCarthy and Inside Edition correspondent Lisa Guerrero.

A spokesman for Seagal previously denied McCarthy’s claims that he asked her to strip naked during an audition for the movie Under Siege 2 to The Daily Beast.

In November, an unnamed female Hollywood executive told Page Six that Seagal lured her into his trailer for a “costume change” on the set of the 1991 movie movie Out for Justice and barged in while she was changing. She claims that Seagal then called her to invite her over to his hotel. When she said she wasn’t comfortable, she alleges that he responded, “You are not comfortable sitting on my face for an hour?”

Seagal’s lawyer at the time, Marty Singer, told The Sun, “This is totally false…It is interesting this person doesn’t give her name to give her claims legitimacy.”

PEOPLE’s attempts to reach a representative for Seagal were unsuccessful.

Seagal sued for allegedly keeping sex slaves: Former model claims actor assaulted her, kept ‘attendants’ on call
by Josh Dickey
TheWrap.com
updated 4/12/2010 10:47:24 PM
Copyright 2012 by TheWrap.com

NOTICE: THIS WORK MAY BE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT

YOU ARE REQUIRED TO READ THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AT THIS LINK BEFORE YOU READ THE FOLLOWING WORK, THAT IS AVAILABLE SOLELY FOR PRIVATE STUDY, SCHOLARSHIP OR RESEARCH PURSUANT TO 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107 AND 108. IN THE EVENT THAT THE LIBRARY DETERMINES THAT UNLAWFUL COPYING OF THIS WORK HAS OCCURRED, THE LIBRARY HAS THE RIGHT TO BLOCK THE I.P. ADDRESS AT WHICH THE UNLAWFUL COPYING APPEARED TO HAVE OCCURRED. THANK YOU FOR RESPECTING THE RIGHTS OF COPYRIGHT OWNERS.

-- Kayden Nguyen

Steven Seagal is accused of hiring young women as personal attendants whose real job was to serve his strange and sometimes violent sexual desires, according to a civil lawsuit filed Monday in Los Angeles by a 23-year-old former model who describes her experience in harrowing detail.

The plaintiff, Kayden Nguyen, said she met the action star in February through an ad on Craigslist seeking an executive assistant and, after three interviews, was told to pack for a trip to New Orleans, where the A&E show "Steven Seagal Lawman" was taping.

When she arrived, the lawsuit says, she discovered that Seagal had been keeping two young female Russian "attendants" who were essentially on-call for sex — 24-seven.

On that first night, Nguyen was ushered to a secluded house where Seagal was staying with his wife and the two young women. He then proceeded to treat Nguyen as his "sex toy" despite her complaints, the lawsuit says.

She complained the following morning to some of the other employees, assuming that they would deliver the message to Seagal. Hours later, the lawsuit says he assaulted her again, this time forcing her to consume "illegal pills."

The following morning, when she confronted Seagal herself, he told her there had been a "misunderstanding"; but hours later, he assaulted her a third time, an attack that stopped only when she ran away, according to the lawsuit.

The ordeal carried on for several days, and it wasn't until Feb. 28 — the following Sunday — that she was able to escape the situation, the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit says Nguyen told Seagal that she had to leave to meet with family members who would be suspicious if she didn't show up. Nonetheless, he told her not to leave the house and followed her with a gun equipped with a flashlight as she went out to a waiting cab, which sped away as she jumped in the front seat.

A message left by TheWrap with the action star's attorney, Stuart Rosenthal, was not immediately returned Monday. Messages left with A&E were also not immediately returned.

It was not clear why Kayden Nguyen chose to file a civil lawsuit instead of a criminal complaint. Messages left with her lawyers were not immediately returned Monday.

Nguyen's lawsuit claims that even after she got away, Seagal and his employees tried desperately to persuade her to return. When she escaped, she left behind "everything of value she owned," including car keys, her laptop, clothes, and "hundreds of dollars worth of makeup." She was told she would not get the items back until she signed an agreement stating she would not report the sexual attacks.

The lawsuit says Nguyen had accepted the job on Feb. 22, a Monday, and was sped in a limo to a waiting private jet. Her first indication that something was awry was when Seagal told her, as the plane was taking off, that his wife "wouldn't mind if we had a sexual relationship."

Nguyen's lawsuit said she could identify a "unique physiological reaction" that Seagal has to sexual arousal, which could be corroborated by the other "attendants." The suit did not specify what that reaction is.

The lawsuit alleges sexual harassment in violation of federal labor laws; illegal sex trafficking; retaliation; wrongful termination; and false representations about employment. Each of the six counts seeks in excess of $1 million in damages.

Penor Rinpoche's Terrible Tulku, Steven Seagal
by Charles Carreon
6/13/19

There is a lesson for everyone in Penor Rinpoche's recognition of Steven Seagal as "Chundrag Dorje," a Nyingma terton who discovered ritual objects, sacred pigments, and hidden teachings over a hundred years ago, and remains a revered saint in the Palyul Nyingma pantheon of which Penor Rinpoche is the head. First, it casts into doubt the validity of a holy man's "feelings" that someone has a head-start on sanctity. Penor’s statement says:

Penor: When I first met him, I felt he had the special qualities of a tulku within him. According to the Great Vehicle (Mahayana) of the Buddhist tradition, all beings have within them the potential for becoming Buddhas. With Steven Seagal I perceived this potential to be particularly strong as accords with being a tulku.

Second, it shows that someone dispensing a credential like “incarnate Bodhisattva” should not rely on the candidate’s own claims about his resume – for example, by believing Seagal’s claims that he has studied Buddhism intensively, which is the only basis on which he could be compared to a 51 year old Palyul teacher:

Penor: Kalsang Yeshe Rinpoche, a monk originally from the Palyul branch monastery of Shibo in Tibet and later at Namdroling Monastery in India, was recognized and enthroned in 1983 at the age of 51. He too had spent his life studying Buddhism and meditating before he was recognized as a tulku. Because he had cultivated his potential through many years of diligent study and meditation, he was able to become a teacher and is currently the head of our Palyul Center in Singapore.

Third, it shows how misleading it is for the lamas to embellish the credentials of tulku-candidates by referring to the virtuous acts of their alleged prior incarnations, as Penor did with respect to Seagal:

Penor: As a tertön, Chungdrag Dorje rediscovered teachings and sacred objects hidden by Padmasambhava in the eighth century. Such treasures (terma) were concealed with the intention that they would be discovered and revealed at a later date when the circumstances were such that they would be of particular benefit to sentient beings.

Fourth, it shows how a long explanation that addresses straw-man objections can provide the impression of a response to criticism, while actually simply evading it, as Penor did by addressing the gap between Chungdrag Dorje’s last incarnation and Seagal’s twentieth century provenance, implying in the process, that Seagal had spent the last 130 years in a Pure Land:

Penor: Seagal … was born centuries after the death of Chungdrag Dorje *** these gaps come about [because they are] reborn in other world systems where they continue their compassionate activities, returning only later to this world system.

Fifth, it shows how lamas can make inconvenient facts disappear by branding them “conventional details,” that “do not relate to what is real and important,” like the unreal, unimportant detail that Seagal has made a fortune teaching people that brutal violence is the best way to solve problems:

Penor: Some people think that because Steven Seagal is always acting in violent movies, how can he be a true Buddhist? Such movies are for temporary entertainment and do not relate to what is real and important. It is the view of the Great Vehicle of Buddhism that compassionate beings take rebirth in all walks of life to help others. Any life condition can be used to serve beings and thus, from this point of view, it is possible to be both a popular movie star and a tulku.

Sixth, it shows how lamas use their “compassionate intention” to gild all of their actions with the veneer of infallibility:

Penor: My concern in seeking to nurture these tulkus, khenpos, monks, as well as sincere lay people, has been to benefit all sentient beings. It is out of this intention that I have recognized tulkus in the past and will continue to recognize them in the future as appropriate.

Seventh, it shows that sacred credentials like “tulku” are reduced to meaningless status-trinkets by awarding them to people who clearly lack basic qualities of humility, decency, and kindness, by making spiritual maturity an optional characteristic:

Penor: Being recognized as a tulku is an acknowledgment of one's potential to help others. Such recognition does not mean that one is already a realized teacher. The degree to which tulkus have been able to actualize and utilize their potential depends upon how they have been able to use their past circumstances and how they currently use their present circumstances to develop their potential. Each tulku must work to develop themselves to the best of their ability.

As we now know, Seagal has been accused by many women of sexual assault and rape, using methods exactly like Henry Weinstein:

Newsweek: Upon arrival, Guerrero and Rhodes were greeted by Seagal, who answered the door clad only in a silk robe. He ushered them into a side room, where he sat in an oversized, ornate chair on a platform (“We called it ‘the throne,” says Guerrero) and asked Guerrero to read her scenes. When she finished, Seagal, who was also a producer on the film, Fire Down Below, said, “You're fantastic! Tell me about yourself.”

“I drove home feeling pretty good about the audition,” Guerrero recalls, “and that same day my manager called. ‘Steven wants to offer you the lead,' she said, ‘but you have to go back to his home for a private rehearsal tonight.'”

Guerrero declined. The lead role of Sarah Kellogg in that film went to Marg Helgenberger (of CSI fame), but Guerrero was given a small part. On the day she arrived on set, she spotted Seagal talking to male crew members. From Guerrero's perspective, it seemed like a scene out of high school. “He was looking at me and then he'd say something to them and there'd be laughter,” says Guerrero, who was listed in the film's credits as “Blonde Beauty.” “Finally he approached me and asked, ‘Would you like to go into my dressing room?'”

Once again, Guerrero declined. She has never seen Fire Down Below and as far as she knows, her scene was cut. “When I read about Harvey Weinstein, the reports of him appearing in a robe triggered me,” she says. “That's exactly what Steven Seagal did. I found out later that he was notorious for this.”

‘TAKE OFF YOUR DRESS’: HOW MEN IN HOLLYWOOD, FROM STEVEN SEAGAL TO HARVEY WEINSTEIN, TREATED WOMEN FOR DECADES

It may have been the bathrobe that triggered Ms. Guerrero, but it’s “the throne” that should trigger Buddhists. This photograph shows the celebrity rapist sitting on a throne of equal height with the presiding lama at the enthronement of the new Dilgo Khentse Rinpoche:



And this photograph shows him sitting next to Penor Rinpoche on his own throne, receiving obeisance from devotees:



As we know, a number of putative tulkus have been accused of using their Buddhist credentials to seduce, assault, and silence women. Steven Seagal’s “seduction” methods include using bodyguards to hold women against their will, and on at least one occasion while serving as a Deputy Sheriff in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, using a gun and his police authority to hold a woman prisoner for six days:

Washington Post: Nguyen claims she was kept against her will for six days at a secluded Louisiana home where Seagal and his family were allegedly staying. When she finally escaped, she claims Seagal chased after her with a “flashlight with a gun attached to it.”

Nguyen’s lawyer, William Waldo, told CBS News’ Crimesider that Nguyen did not call police because she believed they would listen only to Seagal.

“Mr. Seagal is the police,” he said. “She is in a remote area of Jefferson Parish. It is in the middle of nowhere and he is the police.”

Seagal's status as "the police" was the result of his ability to create a sick blend of entertainment and law enforcement in his reality show "Lawman," in which he practiced the manly art of chasing down black people accused of crimes:



The secret behind Seagal's effectiveness as a show-biz lawman? Sanctity! Dragging the Dharma in the mud by using it to legitimize police machismo? Thank Penor Rinpoche for this new spiritual low:



After Ms. Nguyen sued (click here to read original complaint), Jefferson County allowed Seagal to retire from “service” as a deputy, and didn’t open an investigation on the incident.

The list of Seagal’s female victims is extensive:

Washington Post: In fact, Seagal has been accused of similar behavior by too many women to count. He was sued for sexual harassment by another of his assistants in 2001. Multiple women have also accused him of inappropriately asking for or offering sexual massages (sound familiar?), including Blair Robinson, granddaughter of Ray Charles. Robinson was hired as Seagal’s assistant, then quit after her first day when she said it became clear that sexual favors would be part of the job. Another woman accused him of putting his hand down her pants, then refusing to remove it until she screamed. During the filming of Seagal’s movie “Out for Justice,” four female staffers quit after alleging sexual harassment, including one “sexual attack.”

After the blowup in Jefferson County resulted in the cancellation of Seagal’s reality-show “Lawman,” that featured him breaking into houses to arrest black people, Seagal moved his home-invasion activities to Phoenix, Arizona, where convicted-felon-pardoned-by-Trump ex-Sheriff Joe Arpaio welcomed him to ride in a tank that crashed through the wall of a man’s house to arrest him for “cockfighting” when all he was doing was raising chickens:



Violence against women, violence against minorities, hobnobbing with fascists? It’s all in a day’s work for a Tibetan Tulku, whose international reach took him to the Phillipines in 2017, where Seagal praised murderous dictator Rodrigo Duterte, after Duterte praised his plan to make a movie in the island nation about – of course – killing drug dealers:

Duterte told Seagal that “movies are a reflection of life” and “reiterated his strong stance against illegal drugs because it enslaves people to a form of synthetic chemical.”

Duterte has been involved in a deadly drug war since taking office last June, and on Wednesday ordered that all drug operations be left to the drug enforcement agency, amid unprecedented scrutiny of police conduct in the brutal crackdown that has left thousands of Filipinos dead.

Earlier this week, Seagal said at a news conference in Manila that he didn’t think the Philippines was “a dangerous place.”
“It’s a place that’s up and coming with the new leadership,” the Philippine Star reported him as saying.

Seagal and Putin are also friends, and Seagal put their friendship on a firm footing back in 2014 by appearing onstage with violent Russian biker gang that gave him a trophy of a man with a gun.

Think Progress: Long considered an amusing, if slightly troubling, carnival sideshow to Russian politics, the Night Wolves are a motorcycle gang known for their outlandish historical reconstructions and fervent devotion to President Vladimir Putin.
https://thinkprogress.org/wtf-happened-to-steven-seagal-0d5409d080e1/

We’re familiar of course with how gurus who behave badly often escape to their home country, like the Sakyong fled to Nepal after the Buddhist Sunshine Project cast an unwelcome ray of light into his corrupt lifestyle, and Sogyal fled France for parts unknown after his key students outed him for being a gluttonous rapist with an insatiable appetite. Well, thanks to Seagal’s close friendship with Vladimir Putin, Seagal now enjoys dual citizenship in Russia.

.

Seagal, like his stage persona, is a multi-faceted man. He put out a blues record with a cut entitled “Alligator Ass” (don’t ask me why – I didn’t listen past the first forty seconds), and in 2017 published a novel entitled “The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State and the Hijacking of America,” with an introduction by Joe Arpaio. The novel was ghost-written by an eighty-year old who won the mayorship of Payson, Arizona by 325 votes, so when this pair writes about world politics, you know they’re speaking from a place of authority. A review on Vulture attempts a plot summary, that involves a self-projection of Seagal as the novel’s protagonist, “John Gode,” a Native-American lawman who gets kissed by wolves, pulls guns on ghosts and runs with “the Shadow Wolves,” a federal law enforcement unit of Indian officers who track smugglers here south of Tucson, and discovers the dreaded security hole in our southern border:

Vulture: Gode discovers a different kind of “bad hombre” coming over the border: OTMs, or “other than Mexicans,” who are actually Middle Eastern people in a terrorist caravan (reminder: this was written two years ago). Gode cracks the case using his preternatural connection to the spirit world as well as just finding a shit-ton of Korans all over the desert.

Everything Wrong With Trump’s America Was in Steven Seagal’s Only Novel

Reviewer Kathryn Doyle wraps up her review with some thoughts that might have been helpful to Penor Rinpoche before he made this violence-loving, sex-obsessed, fascist-worshipping shitbag into a bogus Bodhisattva:

Kathryn Dole: It’s difficult to say for sure what really happens in this book or how it ends. It is a poorly written story from a deluded mind. *** What Seagal has done here is take the next step in the evolution of the written word, and define a new era of art in general. *** He gives us something beyond the unreliable narrator: an unreliable author. He has never asked himself, “What is real?” and doesn’t feel the need to start now. He accepts a world that doesn’t make sense and creates a fictional space by breaking rules he doesn’t even see. It’s a lovely kind of self-hypnosis: to create your own truth and believe it utterly. *** To lie to yourself without realizing it.

Let's not leave ourselves open to charges of unfairness to this putative tulku, though. We can let him have the last word. Check out his response to a BBC interviewer when she asks him about what he has to say about the allegations of sexual assault against him:

Statement by H.H. Penor Rinpoche Regarding the Recognition of Steven Seagal as a Reincarnation of the Treasure Revealer Chungdrag Dorje of Palyul Monastery
by Penor Rinpoche
1999

In February of 1997 I recognized my student, Steven Seagal, as a reincarnation (tulku) of the treasure revealer Chungdrag Dorje. Since there has been some confusion and uncertainty as to what this means, I am writing to clarify this situation.

Traditionally a tulku is considered to be a reincarnation of a Buddhist master who, out of his or her compassion for the suffering of sentient beings, has vowed to take rebirth to help all beings attain enlightenment. To fulfill this aspiration, a tulku will generally need to go through the complete process of recognition, enthronement and training.

Formal recognition generally occurs soon after a tulku has been identified, but only after other important lineage masters have been consulted. The newly identified tulku does not take on any formal responsibilities at the time of recognition.

The next step of enthronement may or may not occur for a tulku, depending on the circumstances. Enthronement formally invests the tulku with the responsibility of furthering the activities associated with their particular tulku lineage. Thus, if there are specific teachings and practice traditions associated with their lineage, and if there are perhaps monks, nuns, monasteries, retreat centers, lay communities and so forth for which the tulku traditionally takes responsibility, then the tulku is formally vested with those responsibilities at the time of enthronement. In the event that an enthronement ceremony is conducted, it may take place soon after recognition or some years later. If the tulku is too young to assume their responsibilities upon enthronement, others may be entrusted to take on those responsibilities until the tulku is ready.

Finally, a tulku needs to complete a formal course of training which includes years of study and meditation. This training reawakens the tulku's powers of insight and compassion and develops their skillful means for helping others. It is only after such training that a tulku is ready to take on the role of a teacher.

In the case of Steven Seagal, he has been formally recognized as a tulku, but has not been officially enthroned. He has also not undergone the lengthy process of study and practice necessary to fully realize what I view as his potential for helping others. When I first met him, I felt he had the special qualities of a tulku within him. According to the Great Vehicle (Mahayana) of the Buddhist tradition, all beings have within them the potential for becoming Buddhas. With Steven Seagal I perceived this potential to be particularly strong as accords with being a tulku. In the past, whenever I have met someone that I feel is a tulku, I have always consulted with other masters of the Nyingma lineage such as Dudjom Rinpoche, Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche and other senior lineage holders. Similarly, after my experience of meeting Steven Seagal, I consulted with another important Nyingma master and with his concurrence, recognized Steven Seagal as a tulku.

With regard to the particular circumstances of Steven Seagal's recognition, while it is generally the case that tulkus are recognized young in life, this is not always so. For example, the great master Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö remained unrecognized for many years while he was an ordained monk at Kathok Monastery. He was over 30 years old, perhaps 35, and had completed his monastic education when he was recognized and enthroned as the first reincarnation of Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Wangpo. In his case, he had devoted his life to study and practice and was thus prepared for taking on the full responsibilities of being a tulku at the time of his recognition.

Prior to my recognition of Steven Seagal I myself recognized another tulku late in his life. Kalsang Yeshe Rinpoche, a monk originally from the Palyul branch monastery of Shibo in Tibet and later at Namdroling Monastery in India, was recognized and enthroned in 1983 at the age of 51. He too had spent his life studying Buddhism and meditating before he was recognized as a tulku. Because he had cultivated his potential through many years of diligent study and meditation, he was able to become a teacher and is currently the head of our Palyul Center in Singapore. So, in short, in the Tibetan tradition there is nothing unusual about recognizing a tulku late in their life. In fact, the recognition of a tulku who has been born in the West is especially likely to occur later in their lifetime because it will generally take much longer for all the conditions that are necessary for such a recognition to come together.

Steven Seagal has been recognized as a reincarnation of the 17th century hidden treasure revealer (tertön) Chungdrag Dorje (khyung brag rdo rje) of Palyul Monastery. Chungdrag Dorje founded a small monastery called Gegön Gompa near his native village of Phene in the Kutse area of Derge in Eastern Tibet. Though there are no monks there now, the small monastery building still exists and is well known in the area for its beautiful religious wall paintings.

As a tertön, Chungdrag Dorje rediscovered teachings and sacred objects hidden by Padmasambhava in the eighth century. Such treasures (terma) were concealed with the intention that they would be discovered and revealed at a later date when the circumstances were such that they would be of particular benefit to sentient beings. Texts of the teachings discovered by Chungdrag Dorje have apparently not survived the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Sacred objects discovered by Chungdrag Dorje include an unusually shaped bell, a phurba (ritual dagger), the syllable 'A' carved in stone and pigments used to create the sacred wall paintings in his monastery mentioned above. Several of these objects have been preserved and are still kept at Palyul Monastery today.

In the Nyingma tradition it is said that there are a hundred main treasure revealers and an even greater number of secondary treasure revealers. Among the latter it is not uncommon for the line of their teachings to eventually lapse. Though they were beneficial during the time they flourished, for various reasons some tertön teaching lineages have ceased. This would seem to be the case with Chungdrag Dorje.

Now with regard to Steven Seagal, he was born centuries after the death of Chungdrag Dorje. It is not uncommon for there to be a lengthy span of time between the death of a master and the appearance of his or her subsequent reincarnation. My own tulku lineage is an example of this. There was a 130 years hiatus between the death of the First Pema Norbu in 1757 and the birth of the Second Pema Norbu in 1887. This is common in all the traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. As for how these gaps come about, while tulkus are understood to have vowed to be continually reborn to help beings, it is not necessary for them to take rebirth in a continuous sequence of lives in this world. It is believed that they can be reborn in other world systems where they continue their compassionate activities, returning only later to this world system. This is how such lapses in tulku lineages are understood in Tibet.

As for Steven Seagal's movie career, my concern is with the qualities I experienced within him which relate to his potential for benefiting others and not with the conventional details of his life which are wholly secondary. Some people think that because Steven Seagal is always acting in violent movies, how can he be a true Buddhist? Such movies are for temporary entertainment and do not relate to what is real and important. It is the view of the Great Vehicle of Buddhism that compassionate beings take rebirth in all walks of life to help others. Any life condition can be used to serve beings and thus, from this point of view, it is possible to be both a popular movie star and a tulku. There is no inherent contradiction in this possibility.

As the head of the Palyul lineage of the Nyingma School and more recently as the Head of the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, I have had the responsibility of recognizing numerous tulkus. The first time I recognized a tulku, I was ten years old. This tulku was the incarnation of the great Khenpo Ngaga. He is still living in Eastern Tibet and continues to strive, to this day, to promote the welfare of others. Since that time until now I have recognized over one hundred tulkus. In addition I have overseen the training and enthronement of over thirty khenpos (learned scholars) and I am responsible for the welfare of the many thousands of monks belonging to the Palyul tradition. My concern in seeking to nurture these tulkus, khenpos, monks, as well as sincere lay people, has been to benefit all sentient beings. It is out of this intention that I have recognized tulkus in the past and will continue to recognize them in the future as appropriate.

In the case of my student Steven Seagal, I initiated the decision to recognize him as a tulku based on my own feelings about him. Neither I nor any of my monasteries have received or sought any sort of substantial donation from him. What is important to me are the qualities I have seen in my student. For this reason I feel confident that recognizing him as a tulku will be of benefit to others as well as to the Buddha dharma.

Whenever there is a new incarnation born or recognized, I personally feel very happy because it is like you have one more brother or sister. I take delight in such occasions as they seek to further compassionate activity for others. Being recognized as a tulku is an acknowledgment of one's potential to help others. Such recognition does not mean that one is already a realized teacher. The degree to which tulkus have been able to actualize and utilize their potential depends upon how they have been able to use their past circumstances and how they currently use their present circumstances to develop their potential. Each tulku must work to develop themselves to the best of their ability. The essential point is that a tulku should strive to help others in whatever life situation they find themselves. It is out of such an aspiration to help all sentient beings that I have recognized many tulkus in my life and it is with this motivation that I recognized Steven Seagal as a tulku. If all beings seek to have this motivation, what need will there be for controversies and confusion over the motivations of others?