. Another mystery. He could cover himself in the short run, Hunt explained, by paying off early trading partners with the money being brought in by newer investors. Ten minutes later they were back, struggling with the weight of the trunk. Closed blinds, scan for tape recorder, tape mouth, handcuff, put gloves on, explain situation, kill dog, reads the list. Allison convinced her father, film editor Steve Weiss, to invest $20,000 in the trading fund during June 1983. Theyll never find the body.. Two weeks later, Tom May drove to the office on Third Street and removed every piece of paper with his name on it from the company files. They were never so influenced by a young man in their life. Much of Deans problem could be traced back to his parents, Joe suggested. The twins have spent much of the last year trying to break into the movie business with their version of the BBC story. What Makes the Billionaire Boys Club Story So Bizarre - E! Online She wanted to be an actress, Brooke said, but Bobby Roberts had forbidden his daughter any involvement in show business. Power, not fame, was the basic unit of measure, and the students who inspired fascination were the heirs to chief executives of RCA, Teledyne, and Home Savings, boys like young Roy Disney or, in the class just ahead of Gamskys, the aspiring ballet dancer whose father in a few short years would be elected President of the United States. Within weeks, Joe not only set up West Cars of North America, but provided the company with more than a quarter-million dollars in assets by persuading other BBC members to sign over their own cars as collateral. The records of Financial Futures and several other BBC companies disappeared at the same time. Hunt maintains that Levin's con artistry extends to having faked his own death, as no body was found in the case. [10] One witness, Nadia Ghaleb, who was acquainted with Levin, testified that she saw him getting into a car on San Vicente Boulevard in West Los Angeles; another, Ivan Werner, who worked as a funeral director at Pierce Brothers Funeral Home in Westwood, testified that he saw Levin attending a funeral.[11]. Gamsky was so avid he even spent his lunch periods in the debate room, arranging and rearranging the plastic name tags on the tab board where the squads rankings were displayed. The petition also describes Hunt's in-custody record of conduct as "exceptional" and details his founding and facilitation of a men's spiritual group at the California State Prison in Sacramento where Hunt was imprisoned until 2012. 2,448 posts. On the basis of multiple witness statements that Levin had been seen alive, and claims of ineffective assistance of counsel[10] and judicial misconduct,[13] Hunt sought to have his murder conviction overturned and get a new trial. His classmates were the sons of the wealthiest and most powerful families in southern California, students who had been sent to the Harvard School as much to introduce them to the social network of the ruling class as to take advantage of the college-level curriculum. All its going to cost me is a suit of clothes and another car.. That con job, to the L.A. County district attorneys office, was a clear motive for Hunt. Within weeks of the BBCs first meeting, Joe led a caravan of Porsches, Mercedeses, a Rolls-Royce, and a BMWWe all borrowed our parents cars, Dean rememberedto a demonstration at Gene Brownings desert plant in Hesperia. Dean would find happiness, Joe explained, only if he achieved purity of action. The starting point was an understanding that the impediments between what you had and what you wanted were external, not internal. Several observers in court remarked upon Hunts physical resemblance to a young Andy Griffith. That inmate was released last month. A story so remarkable, and such an indictment of the greed, excess materialism, it could only have happened in L.A. during the 80's. . Billionaire Boys Club - Wikipedia His eyes were piercing, one acquaintance thought, shifty, according to another, but no one who met Levin forgot the high and nasal voice that poured forth ideas, observations, promises, and propositions at a rate that left his listeners either dazzled or dumbfounded. Two days later, Cantor, Fitzgerald liquidated the accounts, leaving the trading funds of Tom May and Dean Karny some $60,000 overdrawn. Karny said Hunt told the story as he strolled through the Westside Pavilion mall, describing vividly Levins explosive gasp upon death and how they disfigured Levin with a shotgun his brain jumped out of his skull and fell on his chest before dumping his body in a remote part of Soledad Canyon. He put all his BBC guys in control, passed forty resolutions, and took all the power away from us immediately, Swartout recalled. Joe was using any name, any innuendo that he could to convince the world the BBC had power and big money behind it, Dean said. Follow. Financial Futures quarterly disbursement was due in June, and he had close to 150 investors to pay off now. Karny and Hunt rode together to the office that morning, where Joe paraded the check all around and showed all the boys, Dean recalled. [2] The "get rich quick" investments the group offered to clients added up to what was essentially one big Ponzi scheme.[3]. The bodyguard and alleged triggerman in Levins killing, James Pittman, pleaded guilty to accessory to murder. Brian McNamara - Age, Bio, Personal Life, Family & Stats - CelebsAges Detectives never found Levin, but they did find what prosecutors called the recipe for murder, a chilling to-do list scrawled on pages from a yellow legal pad. Those charges were dropped after jurors deadlocked on the allegation that he and others killed Hedayat Eslaminia, a wealthy Iranian-born businessman, in July 1984. Joe had found his own Wayparadox philosophy, he called itonly when he realized that it was possible to approach the same situation from an infinite number of angles. Thats all youre qualified for.. 1,014 talking about this. Tom and Dave had grown into a pair of lanky lady-killers, outrageously good-looking but regarded as not terribly bright. . Handsome and charismatic with a boyish charm, Hunt led the Billionaire Boys Club, a social and investment fraternity. As of September 2018, Hunt's family has offered a $100,000 reward for evidence of Levin's whereabouts after June 6, 1984.[12]. Investigation Discovery's Behind Mansion Walls revisited the case in the 2011 episode "Fatal Greed". All rights reserved. . The convictions of Dosti and Reza Eslaminia were overturned in 2000. Also starring Emma Roberts, Rosanna Arquette, Billie Lourd, Suki Waterhouse and Cary Elwes, surely it sounded like a good idea at the time, but sexual misconduct allegations against Spacey made in 2017 basically assured that it wouldn't be the production that brought this story to the masses. It was a sweet moment for the former class idiot and supreme geek, who had met most of the young men now gathered around him for the first time back in 1972, when they had been students together at the exclusive Harvard School in North Hollywood. Judd Nelsonand Brian McNamara were nominated forEmmys for their respective turns as Hunt and Karny in the 1987 NBC miniseriesBillionaire Boys Club. In his appeal, Hunt's defense counsel argued that key facts were withheld from jurors during his original trial for Levin's murder. And a company we took over, we took over on false pretenses. The boys had never met their natural father, and knew only that he now owned a chain of laundries in Mexico and hosted what Tom called a weekly holy-roller show on cable television. Jim and Ben went north with Reza to perform surveillance on the condo in San Mateo County. The problem, however, was that after taking the money, Ron decided he loved his car and couldnt sell it. His body would never be found, but a Santa Monica jury convicted Hunt in 1987 of murdering Levin. He wanted Michael Dows phone number so he could get a million dollars out of him. He said with that higher level of information came a very great responsibility.. In northern California, defense attorneys have subpoenaed several federal agencies, including the CIA, for evidence supporting the theory that Hedayat Eslaminia was killed either by Iranian terrorists or by drug dealers. He was bothered that Ben had stopped to wash his hands in the middle of the abduction. All of us were just amazed that this was happening, Vega recalled, but we just closed a circle on him, and then he put his hands up.. At the duplex on Peck Drive, Blanche Sturkey was just arriving for work. I had met very few investors, Mary Brown said, and I was astounded by the caliber of people who had been taken in. He told the firm not to execute Hunts orders but said Hunt needed to believe his buys and sells were real decisions. The next target would be human. Among the coils of rope and spools of tape was a brown bottle containing chloroform and a steel bucket filled with cat litter to serve as a portable toilet. For young Joe Hunt, Levin would remain a figure who not only fascinated, but also frustrated him. 166K followers. As his crisis deepened, Joe reacted not by lowering expectations but by raising them, describing his plan to expand the BBC into a national organization of kids close to their inheritances. Joe worked relentlessly, formalizing the BBCs structure in a nine-page document provided to all members, envisioning an organization of 2,187 individuals divided into cells, sections, and divisions, with a hierarchy of nexuses, axes, and thraxes. Several former disciples testified that they believed Hunt was still attempting to have them killed. Weiss would bring in many of Financial Futures first scores of investors, among them Hunts single largest trading partner, Woodland Hills businessman Chester Brown, who deposited $250,000. At his next appearance in court, Karny wore a bulletproof vest. Official Page of Formula DRIFT driver Dean Karnage Kearney Instagram:. Joe Hunt and Dean Karny were both real and not simply characters. . For the first time since his arrest, Zoeller noted, the suspect was at a loss for words.. He knew.. 1,746 following. Dean Karny, whose father was a . Certain that Hunt knew they had gone to the police, Tom May began carrying a pistol in his own home. Joseph Hunt made my ministry and work in prison worthwhile, Chaplain Dennis Merino wrote. They had been waiting since 7:00 A.M.: Ron had promised to take them with him on a trip to New York that morning, but there had been no answer when they rang the buzzer. Yet the school remained that rare L.A. institution where Hollywood glamour carried little cachet: the son of a studio head might be admitteda Zanuck, for examplebut among performers, only those stars who had ascended to the economic firmament, the Greg Pecks and the Chuck Hestons, got their boys onto the campus. The next morning he was back in Beverly Hills, describing what he knew of Ron Levins disappearance. Seventy-five feet down the slope, searchers found most of a human rib cage with several attached vertebrae. . Hunt also indulged Pittmans fetish for electronic surveillance equipment and exotic weapons. Tom May came by the condo one afternoon while they were practicing Levins signature, and Joe got him to give it a try: when Joe told Tom that Ron had been murdered, Tom received the news with dignity and responsibility, Dean recalled. Jim and I knocked off Ron Levin, Joe announced. Hunt and Alex Gaon were at their Quotron in Cantor, Fitzgeralds trading room every morning at 6:00, but Joe would never put more than half the money he collected into the commodities market. The beauty of the BBCs corporate structure was that Joe could endow college students with titles like president, executive vice-president, and chairman of the board. He had invested just $20,000the poor little fellow on the block, Gene Browning called himbut had proved valuable because his father, Lewis Raymond, a well-known metallurgist, had agreed to do the stress tests for Brownings Attrition Mill. I lived in the same building in Los Angeles in the early 1980s as the members of the BBC. His credit had been extended to the point where either the debt would be paid that night, Joe said, or they would both be dead men by morning. As one club member testified at trial, Hunt told nine members after Levin vanished: Dont worry. Eventually Dean Karny went to the authorities and testified against Joe Hunt in exchange for immunity. The Mays and Jeff Raymond returned to Los Angeles in early September, after more than a month in hiding at Mammoth Lake. He is also responsible as the club's second-in-command. Joe thought that it was a symbolic gesture of guilt, Dean said. Three thousand miles away, however, at the Plaza Hotel in New York City, new complications were developing. The story was recounted in a 1987 miniseries and a 2018 film. [It] was labeled At Levins, TO DO. Below were fifteen numbered items, a crude map of mountain roads, and the words Jim Digs Pit, all composed, Zoeller would learn within the next few weeks, by a young guru who taught his disciples that internal guilt was what caused criminals to fail. Yet Levin seemed affectionately oriented toward Joe, Dean thought, and both relished the adversary relationship. The two of them argued constantly about little factual questions, and would run to reference books to prove their point. He began taking us out to lunch, Dean recalled, buying us games at the video arcade. During Deans summer vacation, Joe began spending the night at the Karny estate in the Hollywood Hills. Hedayat Eslaminia had fled the country during the Ayatollah Khomeinis revolution with more than $30 million plundered from the national economy, his eldest son said, and had enlarged upon his fortune in the United States by smuggling opium. The new divisions came between the Mays, as Tom, anxious to be declared a Shading, moved closer to Joe, while Dave, always skeptical, increasingly became the object of Hunts lectures on Norminess. Eventually, the twins stopped speaking to each other. Bobby Roberts disapproved vehemently of his daughters relationship with Joe Hunt, but at the Manning, Brooke went to almost any length to capture her young mans affection. He was told later that the bank had received his message at the very moment the $127,000 was being counted out for Ben and Reza. Ironically, officially Hunt called his company the BBC, afterthe Bombay Bicycle Club restaurant he liked in Chicago, but he did insist to his buddies, including fellow Harvard School alum Dean Karny, they would all beactual billionaires one dayand the acronym was at the ready. D61863 quickly rattles off half a dozen names of people who claimed to have seen Levin after the con mans disappearance. The Billionaire Boys Club was an investing and social club organized in 1983 by Joseph Henry Hunt (born Joseph Henry Gamsky)[1] in Southern California. After Karny, the only other person with whom Joe discussed the murder was the third Shading, Ben Dosti. A few days later, however, at a meeting with Hunt, Pittman, and Dosti in Bens office, Dean suggested telling the others. Dean Karny Profiles - Facebook "They dismissed itso it would be like double jeopardy to try me twice.". Ah, the 1980s, when shoulder pads, hair and egos ran sky high. After a meeting at the Hard Rock Cafe, the twins gave Joe Hunt $160,000 they had inherited from their Uncle Wilbur and announced to their adopted father that they had been appointed to the board of directors at a new corporation, BBC Consolidated of North America. Reza and his associates were seen in Belmont often during the following week. As they moved their load into the U-Haul, Dean heard pounding on the lid of the trunk, then a muffled voice: Please, sir, please let me out.. 13-56207 (9th Cir. A thrax is a fantastic beast with nine heads and an eye in the center of each, Joe wrote. Even Dean and Ben contributed, putting in their combined savings of $12,000, and by the time Joe set up shop in Chicago, he had a trading fund in the neighborhood of half a million dollars. It looked like Ron had been killed for nothing, Dean said. Perhaps the most stunning came on Halloween Day, 1983, when he went to San Juan Capistrano to address the stockholders of an energy company called Cogenco Systems. Joe called that one correctly: through Bens mother, Dean said, they learned from a reporter at the Los Angeles Times that the Beverly Hills Police Department had not even bothered to send a detective to the missing mans house. Richard Winton is an investigative crime writer for the Los Angeles Times and part of the team that won the Pulitzer Prize for public service in 2011. Whatever it was, Joe was like this rock.". Three days after the June 24 meeting, Browning said, he had met Hunt for breakfast in Westwood. Vegas units caught the gentleman in front of the Palm Court, Vega said, but it had taken all five of them to subdue him. He had come to California early in 1983 with a fifty-two-inch chest and the idea that there would be people out west who would appreciate his special talents. Hunt was first portrayed by Judd Nelson in the 1987 NBC miniseries on the Billionaire Boys Club, later by Ansel Elgort in a 2018 film adaptation. A credit check revealed that he had registered with an American Express card showing thousands of dollars in past-due charges. Ben Dosti, aka Lansing Lee Potter, was apprehended by the FBI the same day in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The trials for the murder of Hedayat Eslaminia were held in Northern California. Authorities found bones in the spot Karny led them to, and the remains were identified via dental records. Brown was fascinated by the young mans facility with figures, recalled his wife Mary, and watched him add, subtract, multiply, and divide whole columns of five- and six-digit numbers in his head. Already over six feet tall, Gamsky was a comical figure, a stalk-skinny boy with a pale face, a Prince Valiant hairdo, and a trickle of beauty marks along the right corner of his mouth. In the center of the room sat two navy-blue trunks, each big enough for an adult human being, Dean said. Twenty-four-year-old Dean Karny, on summer vacation from law school and still wearing the gray business suit he had put on in Los Angeles that morning, climbed into the back of the truck and. He wanted to film the trading process as it happened, Levin explained, and the documentary should have a dramatic feel.