Speaker 1: Ridiculous Crime is a production of My Heart Radio. Yo,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Dutton, Zarain Burnett. What is up girl? Oh? Nothing?
Speaker 1: Just you know? Do you gotta second? I got a
Speaker 1: quick question? Go ahead. Do you know what's ridiculous? We do?
Speaker 1: I do? Share it with a brother. Now. You know.
Speaker 1: Normally I'm all about the food mashups. Not today, thank god?
Speaker 1: Today is it my birthday? No? Today I'm doing clothing mashups. Hey, Okay,
Speaker 1: so you know that I love the Adidas. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: I do know. I own far too many pairs of
Speaker 1: the Adidas um soda you dream about shoes? I do. Uh,
Speaker 1: this is disappointing for me. Well because I usually like
Speaker 1: pretty much anything Adidas puts out. But then they kind
Speaker 1: of missed the mark on something worse than some of
Speaker 1: the Jeremy Scott stuff. Yeah. Damn. Um. They have a
Speaker 1: crossover with the Simpsons, and you'd think that it would
Speaker 1: be all Bart Simpson like radical dude, cowabunga man, eat
Speaker 1: my shorts. No, it's um Adidas and the Simpsons shoes
Speaker 1: for International left handers Day. It's um ned Flanders Adidas
Speaker 1: and let me give you the sea let me descriptions,
Speaker 1: uh left handers rule exclamation point. These mccarton shoes pay
Speaker 1: homage to a classic and timeless Adida's trainer and honor
Speaker 1: our favorite left hander in Springfield, Ned Flanders. The packaging
Speaker 1: and poster called back to the Left Orium. They're made
Speaker 1: from smooth leather with a rubber outsol. They're ugliest, sin
Speaker 1: like no, and like they all you know, I'm intentionally
Speaker 1: supposed to be like bad, like you're supposed to look
Speaker 1: like ned Flanders shoes and they do so. But you
Speaker 1: know how like they always show they have the pictures
Speaker 1: right on the website and it's only showing the right shoe,
Speaker 1: right right. It's supposed to be for left hand, left foots,
Speaker 1: multiple foots. Oh boy, this is melting my brain. So anyway,
Speaker 1: I find this ridiculous and I concur okay, ridiculous. Well,
Speaker 1: if you got a second, I got one for you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's better. No, no, no, this one is
Speaker 1: is is strange, it's ridiculous, and it's criminal. I know,
Speaker 1: I think you would like it. Once upon a time,
Speaker 1: a Georgia inmate in state custody, he smuggled in a
Speaker 1: contraband phone, which people do, and he gets it into
Speaker 1: prison and he uses this phone to impersonate a billionaire.
Speaker 1: But that's not all, Elizabeth. He also purchased six thousand
Speaker 1: gold coins that were worth about eleven million dollars and
Speaker 1: he did this with the billionaire's investment account. That's not all, Elizabeth.
Speaker 1: I am not done yet. Next, he bottoms off a
Speaker 1: multimillion dollar house with a billionaire's money on this phone.
Speaker 1: He's still in prison. Wow, this is ridiculous. Crime of
Speaker 1: a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heist and cons.
Speaker 1: It's all murder free and ridiculous, Elizabeth, this story I'm
Speaker 1: about to tell you. To be clear, I just wanted
Speaker 1: you to know this from the get There are no
Speaker 1: heroes in this story. There aren't even anti heroes in
Speaker 1: this story. Yeah. For the record, I do not like
Speaker 1: this inmate. He's not one of my dudes. Also, I'm
Speaker 1: not rooting for the billionaire in this story. Surprised but
Speaker 1: I know. But I promise you this is one hell
Speaker 1: of a story. So buckle up, Buttercup. Before we dig
Speaker 1: into this first story, though, I kind of wanted to
Speaker 1: whet your appetite. I had an appetizer at a moose bush.
Speaker 1: As you like to call them. Yes, so the headline
Speaker 1: read a starter billionaire spends thirty five million to investigate
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand dollar wine fraud. Wine fraud. Yes, spends
Speaker 1: thirty five million to investigate four hundred dollar loss. Essentially. Now, Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: you may be thinking, Sarah, I'm not the best at math,
Speaker 1: but that sounds like a waste of money. It does.
Speaker 1: You are right, Elizabeth, that is a percent of waste
Speaker 1: of money. But all depends on what you're buying, and
Speaker 1: in this case, he was buying I think peace of mind.
Speaker 1: Wait a second, which one is? What's who is it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So the billionaire in question, I'm glad you asked, is
Speaker 1: a member of the Coke family. Yes, I've seen this documentary. Yes,
Speaker 1: Bill Coke Sary's brother of Charles and David Coke. So
Speaker 1: so now this guy, he's not the failed son, the
Speaker 1: one who makes those ugly shirts. That guy is Wyatt Coke.
Speaker 1: He's the founder of Wyatt Ingraham, which is the shirt company. Um.
Speaker 1: One story I found said is a fashion line. That
Speaker 1: quote answers the question what if Tommy Baham his dad
Speaker 1: had paid for him to go to Harvard are trying
Speaker 1: to get into Harvard, I should get the quote, right.
Speaker 1: So not that Coke brother, Paper Coke, which one's a
Speaker 1: toilet picker, don't they have like the family, Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: yeah yeah, the family is big into papers. So this
Speaker 1: Coke brother, the Bill Coke, he he owns these bottles
Speaker 1: of wine, right, He's got these four bottles of wine
Speaker 1: that once belonged to Thomas Jefferson. If you've seen the documentary,
Speaker 1: you know this. He spends four dollars to get them.
Speaker 1: Come to find out they are not Thomas Jefferson wine,
Speaker 1: just normal wine put into expensive labels. That's all up
Speaker 1: in there, exactly a little boxed wine for the brothers.
Speaker 1: So Bill Coke he gets all piste right, and he's
Speaker 1: like discovers his figure. He's like what what this is outrageous? Right,
Speaker 1: So he's like, I'm an idiot. I'm going to spend
Speaker 1: a lot of money to good peace of mind. So
Speaker 1: he hires a private investigator to check out the provenance
Speaker 1: of all of his wine collection. Right, So he discovers
Speaker 1: he's been do numerous times. A billionaire gets embarrassed. He
Speaker 1: gets mad, so he pays this private dick to check
Speaker 1: all every single bottle he owns his entire collection, So
Speaker 1: a little bit. How many bottles do you think, dude have?
Speaker 1: He had four hundred, four hundred fake bottles of wine.
Speaker 1: I have vague memories of them, Like I said, I
Speaker 1: saw the documentary, but I don't remember the Oh wow,
Speaker 1: this quote, maybe you know, bring some bells for you,
Speaker 1: Bill Coke said, and I quote there is a code
Speaker 1: of silence in this business because obviously the faker doesn't
Speaker 1: want anybody to know that he's making fake wine. The
Speaker 1: auction house doesn't want to know that, and then the
Speaker 1: collector himself generally doesn't want to know that, or if
Speaker 1: he finds out, he wants to find a secret way
Speaker 1: to dump it and get his money back because he's
Speaker 1: a He's like, I'm going to drink any of this stuff, right?
Speaker 1: Oh No, sometimes they do. I mean some collectors do,
Speaker 1: most of the time. Not they will exhibit it to
Speaker 1: other wine collectors, like look at my Thomas Jefferson bottles.
Speaker 1: They will never get open. Right. So this cat he decides,
Speaker 1: I'm going to break the wheel. So he goes and
Speaker 1: he gets his private investigator, as I told you, looking
Speaker 1: at all his fraudulent bottles. The dude tracks down the
Speaker 1: guy who sold him the bottles of Thomas Jefferson fake wine,
Speaker 1: right that guy loves in Germany. Bill Coke sues him.
Speaker 1: He wins a one million dollar like just a judgment
Speaker 1: from him right now. Any lawyer will tell you this.
Speaker 1: Your mother's a lawyer, she'll tell you this. He's not
Speaker 1: going to see that money. Yeah, that's just not happening.
Speaker 1: So he's like, Nope, it doesn't matter. I'm rich already.
Speaker 1: I'm not doing it for the money. I want peace
Speaker 1: of mind. So he starts going again. He pays lawyers
Speaker 1: to go after people. He's suing everyone he can, and
Speaker 1: like some Cape crusader, he decides he's going to protect
Speaker 1: all the other dumb, ultra rich people like him. And
Speaker 1: he's like, I gotta protect us, so his private investigator
Speaker 1: keeps working. The private dick finds that the bulk of
Speaker 1: the fraudulent wine that he has purchased all came from
Speaker 1: the same con man in Los Angeles. And this is
Speaker 1: the guy who would take literally Fronsia common just wine
Speaker 1: poured into expensive bottles and selitude foolish ultra wealthy people
Speaker 1: this wine labeled conment. He gets tried, convicted, and sentence
Speaker 1: So Bill Coke once again gets his some more justice.
Speaker 1: But he's not done, Elizabeth. Bill Coke is on it.
Speaker 1: He gets on his batman cow and he goes to
Speaker 1: after the auction house. The auction house is like, oh man,
Speaker 1: sorry about selling you the fig timas Jefferson Wine. He's
Speaker 1: like all right, and they're like, oh yeah, here's read.
Speaker 1: This is called the statute of limitations. Now blow. So
Speaker 1: the auction house is in the clear because statue limitations
Speaker 1: are up. Dudes, not done though, He's like, who else
Speaker 1: can I go after? So Bill Coke says, and I quote,
Speaker 1: I spent over thirty five million doing all that. I
Speaker 1: was a dog on a bone. I wasn't going to
Speaker 1: give up. Remember this, he's doing this to protect rich idiots.
Speaker 1: And he said, yeah, he's spent four thousand. He's out there,
Speaker 1: no million out Some people have too much money, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: Take the L dude, right, is a cheaper L. But
Speaker 1: he's like, wants peace of mind. So when you have
Speaker 1: that kind of money, this is what you can do
Speaker 1: with it. This is the foolishness. And this is like
Speaker 1: this multi year wine investigation. This is the kind of
Speaker 1: behavior you can expect from billionaires. So I want you
Speaker 1: to keep that in mind as I tell you this story.
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking of, like, we got teachers working second
Speaker 1: and third jobs, and then this dude's like my wines
Speaker 1: fake totally throws the further class materials out of their
Speaker 1: own pocket. I mean yeah, and this guy's like million
Speaker 1: to make me happy. Anyway, enough of Bill Coke. You
Speaker 1: ready for one of the biggest heist ever pulled off
Speaker 1: from inside an American prison? Yes? Please, Elizabeth. I don't
Speaker 1: want to like bust you out on this, but you
Speaker 1: once taught in a prison. I did at a federal facility. Yes,
Speaker 1: college English classes right right. So when you were doing that,
Speaker 1: you had to go through all the prison security. It
Speaker 1: was they would check everything. Even I think you once
Speaker 1: told me an underwire bra was something they would check. Well,
Speaker 1: it depends on what part of the prison you're going into.
Speaker 1: So the yard, what you would is like the traditional
Speaker 1: big prison. Yeah, that's like I couldn't have bobby pins
Speaker 1: in my hair, the head couldn't wear an underwire bra. Um.
Speaker 1: The camp, which is like where the trustees are um,
Speaker 1: they didn't have. I mean I was supposed to go
Speaker 1: through it, but it was just I just would show
Speaker 1: up a much more trust and yeah, so I on
Speaker 1: those days, like I could have, you know, bobby pins
Speaker 1: in my hair and an underwear a brown. Let's say
Speaker 1: one of your students when you were in the yard
Speaker 1: asked you to smuggle on the phone so that I'll
Speaker 1: give you ten grand. How difficult would it be to
Speaker 1: smuggle a phone in? It would be pretty rough, I think, Like,
Speaker 1: I don't know that I did smuggle something in once
Speaker 1: because now tell me more. Um, they have a limited
Speaker 1: library and in a book, I did, and a couple
Speaker 1: of them. But it wasn't like you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I just said that was it was materials for the class.
Speaker 1: It was outside of the materials for the class, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't anything incendiary. It was just interesting books that
Speaker 1: they couldn't get in their library. So technically I smuggle
Speaker 1: that counts. That counts, I'll give you. And I used
Speaker 1: to also bring them like highlighters, which I'm sure they
Speaker 1: probably wound up using as like crack pipes, who knows,
Speaker 1: but anyways, they needed him for my class, and they
Speaker 1: these were good dudes, like my students were really good.
Speaker 1: I like that now. The from what I understand, the
Speaker 1: majority of the contraband comes into prisons, is brought in
Speaker 1: by the correctional officer. Yeah, that is true, Okay, so
Speaker 1: keep that in mind. Also as I'm telling you this story,
Speaker 1: this story is going to take place inside the Georgia
Speaker 1: Department of Corrections. So just you know one state south
Speaker 1: of South Carolina, specifically, it's the Special Management Unit, which
Speaker 1: is you know, the Maximum Security Wing. Okay, So he's
Speaker 1: in the state's maximum security facility for the state's most
Speaker 1: serious offenders and violent offenders. Right, and that's where this
Speaker 1: dude is hardened criminals in May. His name is Arthur
Speaker 1: Lee Cofield Jr. You can call him June the thirty
Speaker 1: one year old because locked up on a fourteen year
Speaker 1: bid for armed robbery. Right, he's like a career criminal
Speaker 1: and he got his start young. Now, Cofield was a
Speaker 1: documented gang member. He's has active criminal ties to the outside.
Speaker 1: For instance, he from inside of prison he arranged to shooting,
Speaker 1: so like he was like actively yeah, that's why he's
Speaker 1: not my dude. But to do that, he had to
Speaker 1: use a contraband phone. Right now, Cofield only had a
Speaker 1: few more months left on his time for his armed
Speaker 1: robbery and so he had a plan to set himself
Speaker 1: up for once he gets back outside. So, as we've covered,
Speaker 1: it's no great surprise that a prisoner like Cofield was
Speaker 1: able to have the smuggled cell phone, because you know,
Speaker 1: it's the prison guards who were getting it into him.
Speaker 1: But he had a history of having smuggled cell phones
Speaker 1: on him. He had even caught twelve times. Twelve times,
Speaker 1: and they're not any better going. Maybe we should check
Speaker 1: this guy, but you know whatever, Now, back in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: I found a report that he had a Verizon LG
Speaker 1: touchscreen phone and the charger. They were found concealed into
Speaker 1: cofields crotch. Like he's like just gotten tucked in the
Speaker 1: crotch phone. Yeah, he's just tucking a phone. But he
Speaker 1: gets written up for the contraband phone. Cofield says, and
Speaker 1: I quote, I don't give it about that phone. I've
Speaker 1: had hundreds of phones, right, So he's like flexible. I
Speaker 1: think that once the guy, once the guy has the phone,
Speaker 1: like they're probably going to have more than one. I
Speaker 1: had a student who um got transferred to a different
Speaker 1: facility because they found four cell phones under his bed
Speaker 1: and was he selling over those just his I don't know.
Speaker 1: I didn't ask, you know, and cry, but yeah, that
Speaker 1: was he had a little hash of them under there.
Speaker 1: Apparently when I was doing my research into this, I
Speaker 1: found all these stories about like just how good people
Speaker 1: have gotten about smuggling in things into prison. They're now
Speaker 1: using drones to you read the freak stories, Oh we
Speaker 1: tied a phone to a cat, or we got this
Speaker 1: pigeon trained to bring in drugs like meth there into
Speaker 1: a prison. Right, those stories are out there, but the
Speaker 1: drones are now the new crazy story about what goes
Speaker 1: on in prisons. Right, But I don't think that really
Speaker 1: is the point. You know, it's kind of like it
Speaker 1: excuses the correction officers, So I think I want to
Speaker 1: keep the focus on them throughout this. Well, there was
Speaker 1: when I was teaching at the prison, they had an
Speaker 1: outbreak of was it k too that synthetically um? There
Speaker 1: were guys taking it in that not in my class,
Speaker 1: but then that just general gen pop um who And
Speaker 1: they were having like seizures and collapsing and hallucinations and
Speaker 1: were hauled out and ambulances and um. I was told
Speaker 1: by the guards that oh, it's coming in in the
Speaker 1: spine of books like that they get from family, and
Speaker 1: so we're having to tear up all the books that
Speaker 1: come in, which I was like, didn't come from any
Speaker 1: of my books, But then someone else told me, no, dude,
Speaker 1: it's the guards. It's not coming in in the spot,
Speaker 1: Like the families are not taking apart books and then
Speaker 1: rebinding them to get k two in. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: just come on. Now, it's time for me to tell
Speaker 1: you the other person in this story Sidney Kimmel. Now
Speaker 1: Sidney Kimmel is a California based billionaire. He's the nine
Speaker 1: year old who was worth about one and a half
Speaker 1: billion dollars. You may know him. He founded Jones New York,
Speaker 1: the fashion label okay Yes, So he sells that for
Speaker 1: two point two billion, becomes a billionaire. Right Other than
Speaker 1: the Jones New York, Sidney Kimbel also goes insides, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna make a name for myself in Hollywood. He decides like,
Speaker 1: I'm done with fashion, I'm gonna go make movies. So
Speaker 1: he's the money man behind a string of movies such
Speaker 1: as Crazy Rich Asians, Hell or High Water Moneyball, the
Speaker 1: flop that Ryan Gosling made about falling in love with
Speaker 1: a sex doll lars and The Real Girl. All these
Speaker 1: are his movies united, right, these are all he's just yea.
Speaker 1: So Sydney Kimbell does this for a while, then he decides,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get into philante a piece. That's what he's
Speaker 1: doing these days. He's all into philanthropy. Like the Johns
Speaker 1: Hopkins University. They get a big endowment from him. So
Speaker 1: now they have a cancer center that has his name
Speaker 1: on it. And there's the going back to the early
Speaker 1: winemaker of American history, Thomas Jefferson. Sidney Kimbell gave money
Speaker 1: to the university to Philadelphia that carries Jefferson's name, and
Speaker 1: it was the medical school now has the Sydney Kimmel name.
Speaker 1: So when this scam went down, Kimmel was ninety two
Speaker 1: years old, so he's always been years young. Really, yeah,
Speaker 1: condescend So this aging businessman turn Hollywood philanthropist. He has
Speaker 1: no connection to Cofield, he has no understanding. He doesn't
Speaker 1: know he's about to be a target. Right, He's just
Speaker 1: this ninety two year old guy. He's just trying to
Speaker 1: give money away. Now, he had never met him, had
Speaker 1: no reason to cross pass, would have no idea that
Speaker 1: there was some prisoner locked up in Butts County, Georgia.
Speaker 1: Who's got his eye on him? Right now, that's just
Speaker 1: it's just defied his imagine. A Now, for those who
Speaker 1: have never had the pleasure of traveling through Butts County,
Speaker 1: I have not. Maybe I have. It's south of Atlanta. Okay,
Speaker 1: I don't think I have, I have, I got, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know. On your way down to
Speaker 1: way Cross, you probably come across. Let's say yes. Now
Speaker 1: you may be wondering, Elizabeth, Sarah, how do you rob
Speaker 1: a billionaire from inside a maximum security stage from how
Speaker 1: do you rob a billionaire from inside a maximum security prison?
Speaker 1: Great question, thank you, thank you. Well you use one
Speaker 1: of the hundreds of contraband phones that you have, and
Speaker 1: Kofield was able to then use this to contact a brokerage.
Speaker 1: And these are smartphones. Yeah, these are smartphones. So let's
Speaker 1: take a quick break and then I will tell you
Speaker 1: how he used a smartphone to get stupid on this billionaire. Nice. So, Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: we got our dude, I'm not right, dude, but Arthur
Speaker 1: Cofield are. Yeah, he's a bad guy. Are bad guy
Speaker 1: of the story. And then we got Sidney Kimmel, our target.
Speaker 1: And mark of the story. And we're about to have
Speaker 1: them meet your ready, not physically, but you'll get the idea.
Speaker 1: They're gonna, Okay, they're gonna butterfly this. It's so cute.
Speaker 1: So Cofield is able to contact this Charles Schwab brokerage
Speaker 1: using a smartphone, right, so in June, Cofield pretends to
Speaker 1: be s K. Yeah, so he calls himself. Now, this
Speaker 1: is the billionaire investor Sidney Kimmel. So he calls Charles
Speaker 1: Schwab up and he gets a broker on the phone,
Speaker 1: and Cofield is able to sweet talk this investment firm
Speaker 1: into transferring eleven million dollars off Sydney Kimmel's money. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: The federal prosecutors still can't exactly determine how it was
Speaker 1: that Cofield was able to find Kimmel or his Charles Schwab.
Speaker 1: How did he know he had to give his number,
Speaker 1: his account number. Just wait, a nice kind of thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, they do have to make those kind of
Speaker 1: transfers over the phone. It's that is yeah, that is true.
Speaker 1: So he had the advantage there. Now, So Scott McAfee,
Speaker 1: he's a federal prosecutor on this case, he said quote
Speaker 1: Mr coo Field had figured out a way to excess
Speaker 1: accounts belonging to high net worth individuals, frankly billionaires located
Speaker 1: across the country. Now we see why he said billionaires plural?
Speaker 1: Is that because Coo Field also managed to hit up
Speaker 1: Nicole worth Time, who I don't know, but she's apparently
Speaker 1: the wife of Herbert worth Time, who was a Florida
Speaker 1: billionaire who has uh he made his money on eyeglass innovations.
Speaker 1: So yeah, billionaire eyeglass guy, so worth of them. Nicole
Speaker 1: worth Time, she gives him two point to five million dollars. Here,
Speaker 1: you know, he's basically transferred out of their account. He's
Speaker 1: able to steal the funds and transferred to a second account,
Speaker 1: then convert him into gold coins because gold coins are
Speaker 1: apparently co Field's fiscal instrument of choice. He just loves
Speaker 1: the double eagle, all right, So he uses that same
Speaker 1: move on Sidney Kimmel. Now, interestingly, in the worth Time case,
Speaker 1: they didn't want to press charges, so he's facing no
Speaker 1: criminal charges for stealing two point to five million. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know if they want to be embarrassed.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they don't want their finances like that.
Speaker 1: That's probably it could be a little one, a little
Speaker 1: bit of both. And how much did he transfer out
Speaker 1: of fourth time? Two million? Yeah, they're like it's pocket change.
Speaker 1: They like it's just an embarrassment. Don't tell people such marks.
Speaker 1: So let's get back to our original question. How is
Speaker 1: a bank robbing gang banger who's in prison able to
Speaker 1: call up Charles Schwab and steal from the accounts of
Speaker 1: billionaires with just a cell phone. How let's get into
Speaker 1: the wise and what force Elizabeth arthur Ly Cofield. Uh,
Speaker 1: let me back up just a second and tell you
Speaker 1: a little b about his criminal history. You can get
Speaker 1: an idea of who this guy is and then you
Speaker 1: can imagine him on the phone. Alright, So, arthur Ly Cofield,
Speaker 1: when he was fifteen years old, he robbed his first bank, right,
Speaker 1: he goes in, he's not very good at it. It's
Speaker 1: his first time. He walks into a branch of Choice
Speaker 1: Community Bank in Douglasville, Georgia, and he robs them for
Speaker 1: hole dollars. Right, So, when Cofield walks out of the
Speaker 1: bank with his stolen loot, the die pack goes off.
Speaker 1: I didn't even know they put a diepack in. Diepack
Speaker 1: goes Yeah, he gets stay with the inc then metaphorically
Speaker 1: is now marked form this point on right now our
Speaker 1: career criminals. So despite his net beginnings as a criminal,
Speaker 1: Arthur co Field, he gets better. He's got natural instincts.
Speaker 1: He just is a criminal born right. His attitude, his ambitions,
Speaker 1: his makings all aligned to make him this what will
Speaker 1: soon be a master criminal. Now once he's locked up
Speaker 1: on the inside, co Field insides, you know, I'm a
Speaker 1: young man. I've been a bank robber. I think I
Speaker 1: should go to my next move, which has started prison gang.
Speaker 1: So he's just not a fan of the social contract.
Speaker 1: So he starts out a prison gang and he names
Speaker 1: his crew y a P. Now y a P stands
Speaker 1: for young and paid and yet young in prison exactly.
Speaker 1: He's apparently this y AP was inspired by his street name,
Speaker 1: which was Yeap Lavish. Yap Lavish, That's what he was
Speaker 1: known on the street. So Yeap Lavish a k A.
Speaker 1: Arthur Cofield Jr. His street name game is weak week
Speaker 1: according to me, I'll tell him to his face. You
Speaker 1: tell ye lavish right to his face, Elizabeth, So yeah, Lavish.
Speaker 1: Once he's in prison, he manages to have somewhat of
Speaker 1: a normal life on the outside even though he's locked up.
Speaker 1: On the inside. He's a young man. He gets himself
Speaker 1: a girlfriend. Now. Her name was Selena Holmes. She lives
Speaker 1: in Atlanta. She's being yeap Lavish's girl. She's got to
Speaker 1: have a lavish lifestyle, so they mostly communicate by phone.
Speaker 1: But he's sending her money. He's arranging her life with luxury.
Speaker 1: When I say arranging, I mean girl got a Mercedes
Speaker 1: from him. She is in a high rise apartment in Buckhead,
Speaker 1: which is like upscale of the neighborhood in Atlanta. She's like,
Speaker 1: like she's living. I was going to say she's like
Speaker 1: the Queen of bad decisions when you said that she
Speaker 1: hooked up with this stude in jail. But now I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: maybe she's they've never met in person, she's never had
Speaker 1: to be in the same room as now. She just
Speaker 1: has to do some phone calls and she gets some Mercedes.
Speaker 1: But that's not true. There's something else you also have
Speaker 1: to do. Because yapp Lavish is a young man, so
Speaker 1: he's interested in pleasures of the flesh. He has Selena
Speaker 1: FaceTime him in prison and She then has sex on
Speaker 1: camera with some man that he arranges her. Yes, they
Speaker 1: were kinky couple time in prison watching her get down. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so when you know that he's not the only
Speaker 1: one watching this, Oh, you think other guys in prisoners
Speaker 1: sitting there, probably charging them to watch with him. You hustler,
Speaker 1: I had not even thought about that. You've got me.
Speaker 1: You need better negative imagination. I'm over here thinking that
Speaker 1: he's a romantic, filthy, filthy, horrible people. We're moving on
Speaker 1: from dirty Kofield and Selena Holmes is right around this time,
Speaker 1: when he's got Selena doing all that she's doing for him,
Speaker 1: that he decides, you know what, I need to set
Speaker 1: up my life on the outside. So he decides, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go and buy myself a mansion. Now, being in
Speaker 1: prison and having no money of his own, he's going
Speaker 1: to need to do something about that. So he's He's like,
Speaker 1: I'll get a billionaire to buy it. So what does
Speaker 1: yapp lavish do? Summer? And this is, as I'm pointing out,
Speaker 1: summer COVID is at its worst point. In the summer.
Speaker 1: People don't remember everybody's inside, locked inside, acting weird, acting
Speaker 1: wild and co Field is on the inside to also
Speaker 1: acting weird and wild, just in a totally different angle.
Speaker 1: So the people are not distracted. I'm not giving them excuses,
Speaker 1: but the char shua people don't see them coming. But yet,
Speaker 1: then again, billionaires act weird, so and they're they're all
Speaker 1: working from home, and now we're a pandemic. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: were like a cat walking behind them on the bookcase
Speaker 1: exactly exactly. They're looking at their kids and don't wear that.
Speaker 1: Oh no, what Yeah, of course I prove I proved
Speaker 1: their transfer. So Elizabeth, what do you know about high
Speaker 1: finances and what it takes to posees someone? You seem
Speaker 1: like you're everything. Okay, so you said you needed a
Speaker 1: bagged account number. I mean I'm just assuming, like for
Speaker 1: security's sake, Like I can't call up and be like,
Speaker 1: hey about it, it's me Bill Gates. Turns out like
Speaker 1: I'd have to be like, okay, here's my account number.
Speaker 1: I would assume there's some sort of pin that you'd
Speaker 1: have to give them. These are all good things, so
Speaker 1: I'll just lay it out for you. Co Field a
Speaker 1: coordinated court documents. Co Field used a phone mask app
Speaker 1: called text now so that disguised his location so he
Speaker 1: wouldn't be like pinging as like, oh, an Atlanta area
Speaker 1: code in prison, he shows up as a Los Angeles
Speaker 1: area code, which is where Sydney Kimmel looked. So totally
Speaker 1: works now using text now, co Field phones up Charles
Speaker 1: Schwab and goes, hey, I want to open a checking account.
Speaker 1: So he doesn't try to like directly just take the money.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, take my account. Put some of my
Speaker 1: money in a different account. Do you guys still hold
Speaker 1: So they're less suspicious, they're not losing the money. Now.
Speaker 1: Co Field was told he would need to supply a
Speaker 1: photo I d and proof of address. That's all he needed.
Speaker 1: And when I say a proof of address, like, it's
Speaker 1: like what they tell me at the d m V.
Speaker 1: Do you have a utility bill? That's what they said,
Speaker 1: Sydney Kimmel, do you have a utility bill? So he's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: so I've got a water bill, literally shows them a
Speaker 1: water bill. So this is what Coo Field does. He
Speaker 1: phones an outside co conspirator and this person texts him
Speaker 1: a photo of Sydney Kimmel's driver's license and one of
Speaker 1: the billionaires utility bills his water bill. Yeah. So I
Speaker 1: nobody knows how this person knows these things. I'm just
Speaker 1: going to speculate and say that person works as his
Speaker 1: house staff. That makes sense, That would make sense why
Speaker 1: they choose Old Sydney exactly. That's my guest. There's nobody
Speaker 1: who knows. I say, you're correct, I do know the answer.
Speaker 1: And that's it. Next ye the Cofield. Hella convincing, super charming.
Speaker 1: Must have amazing phone game. His phone voice must be
Speaker 1: just perfect. He's like just hamming it up. The scenery
Speaker 1: in the cell he's got like a cell make on,
Speaker 1: like come on, keep going, stretching out, stretching out. So
Speaker 1: Charles Schwab, the company rep, tells him, okay, yeah, we
Speaker 1: can open checking account once he gets the photo I
Speaker 1: d the water bill. So then they transfer money eleven
Speaker 1: million dollars into a new Charles Schwab account. Right. So
Speaker 1: then he's like okay, but you know he's not done.
Speaker 1: He needs to get the money. So he's like, okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to cash out the account because that
Speaker 1: would you know, that would send bells and whistles going, right,
Speaker 1: So he's like, okay, I got bigger plans I need
Speaker 1: you to transfer for this money because I want to
Speaker 1: buy some gold. You know, it's a pandemic. They're like, oh,
Speaker 1: billionaires buying gold? That makes sense? Fine, right, He's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, the greedy man's first love gold. I need
Speaker 1: me some. I do need to point out that I
Speaker 1: really doubt that billionaires themselves are calling brokerage firms, like
Speaker 1: wouldn't he have like finance? Yes, that's what I was thinking.
Speaker 1: But then again, he also has his name on his
Speaker 1: water bill. I wouldn't expect a billionaid have their name
Speaker 1: or something whatever. So if there's a lot about this
Speaker 1: that I don't understand about being a billionaire, I've never
Speaker 1: been a billionaire. I don't want to be in a billionaire,
Speaker 1: but I don't understand their lives. Yeah, I don't get it.
Speaker 1: Would you if I gave you a billion dollars, would
Speaker 1: you immediately give it away? Pretty much? I mean I would.
Speaker 1: I'd want to live like a really nice life myself,
Speaker 1: of course, like sure everybody does. But I that kind
Speaker 1: of money that you're never going to touch. And again,
Speaker 1: like I was saying with like teachers and stuff, you
Speaker 1: can have multiple lifetimes and not spend all that money
Speaker 1: exactly to take care of myself and my family, and
Speaker 1: like we could be really comfortable and have like super
Speaker 1: nice stuff, and I could still give that money to
Speaker 1: people who really need salary. Cap your billion. Yeah totally.
Speaker 1: So you know I would be greedy and have like
Speaker 1: nice stuff for myself. I'm not saying turn it over
Speaker 1: and then just drink thin soup for this. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: like you know, when they're sitting on multiple billions of dollars,
Speaker 1: like you said that in lifetimes, they would never ever time,
Speaker 1: could not be able to spend. No, you know, I
Speaker 1: say share it. Yeah, I'm right there with you. I
Speaker 1: look at money like water and it does no good
Speaker 1: being locked up. Anyway, back to the story, give everybody
Speaker 1: a see it. Yeah, I let them with their beaks.
Speaker 1: So Cofield manages to get this Charles Schwab rep to
Speaker 1: not only transfer the eleven million dollars, but then to
Speaker 1: transfer it to the account, but then to transfer it
Speaker 1: to a precious metal broker in Idaho. He's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I want the money to go to Money Medals Exchange
Speaker 1: in Idaho in Boise, and he's like, okay, we'll just
Speaker 1: down that right over And so they send the eleven
Speaker 1: million dollars over and Cofield then purchases six thousand, one
Speaker 1: six gold coins, the American Eagle gold coin. You're familiar
Speaker 1: with American ego. So the U. S. Mint starts making
Speaker 1: this gold coin that is a like a few ounces. Well, here,
Speaker 1: I'll just tell you this is how the U. S.
Speaker 1: Mint was. It a special mash up between the U. S.
Speaker 1: Mint and sovereign citizens and stand the Smithsonian Institute. And
Speaker 1: you could get a plate, commemorative plate with it. Now.
Speaker 1: But the end I quote this is from the U. S. Mint.
Speaker 1: The U. S Mint produces American Eagle gold bullion coins
Speaker 1: in four weights, one ounce, half ounce, quarter ounts, and
Speaker 1: a tenth ounce. The coins are twenty two carrot gold
Speaker 1: plus small amounts of alloy. The U. S. Mint does
Speaker 1: not sell bullion coins directly to the public, so you
Speaker 1: got to go to one of these brokers. So it
Speaker 1: all seems kind of legit to everybody involved. Joshwab like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: buying gold in the pandemic. Yeah, fine. The gold people
Speaker 1: are like, yeah, eleven million dollars here, we'll take it.
Speaker 1: Here's your six thousand coins. Nobody questions it, right, So
Speaker 1: co Field manages to get all this going. He takes
Speaker 1: eleven million, turns it into gold coins. So what does
Speaker 1: he do next? Well, I forgot to tell you one thing, Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: you were curious about the paper trails. They would need
Speaker 1: it to get the gold coins transferred. To get the
Speaker 1: money transferred to the gold broker, Cofield had to send
Speaker 1: a disbursement request, and on top of that he also
Speaker 1: had to sound a letter of authorization. So he forges
Speaker 1: the letter of authorization and then manages this disbursement request.
Speaker 1: I don't know how he's doing all of this off
Speaker 1: of just a smartphone, it seems like. And once again
Speaker 1: I gotta go that the co conspirator is helping him
Speaker 1: with giving him an example of a signature whatever it is.
Speaker 1: I mean, fellas get crafty behind bars in terms of
Speaker 1: like making stuff amazingly crew No, yeah, to all the
Speaker 1: stuff with toilet paper they can make. It's just ridiculous.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine that he's forging documents that successfully. And
Speaker 1: then does someone have to go to Idaho to get
Speaker 1: the cold Well, yeah, we'll get to that in a
Speaker 1: second jump in ahead. And I'm just constantly surprised by
Speaker 1: all the paperwork this crime takes. It's practically like a
Speaker 1: day job. I'm like, what did you doing this? Just
Speaker 1: get a job? Like I want that anyway. So Cofield,
Speaker 1: you know he's got his outside co conspirator, most likely
Speaker 1: the one helps with the forgery. So you're asking, how
Speaker 1: do you get the gold coins out of Idaho? How
Speaker 1: did he get the gold coins out of idahos Ze
Speaker 1: I got an answer for you. Yeah, and I'd like
Speaker 1: you to close your eyes and picture. You're an Uber
Speaker 1: driver working in the Atlanta area. You don't love driving
Speaker 1: for a living, but you lost your job as a
Speaker 1: dancing bear trainer at the Moscow Circus. So the strip
Speaker 1: club you opened Slows also had its permits pulled after
Speaker 1: it's discovered the two of your dancers are actually animatronics
Speaker 1: purchased from a Chuck E Cheese Pizza What yep? So
Speaker 1: now you're having to drive an Uber to pay off
Speaker 1: all of your permit problems, pay back your debts from
Speaker 1: the Moscow Circus. Now while you sort out all of
Speaker 1: your permit problems so you can reopen slaws. You had
Speaker 1: to do what you had to do, so you had
Speaker 1: over to pick up your next runs. Will return, Yeah,
Speaker 1: one day it'll reopen. Have faith, people, so you arrive
Speaker 1: outside an expensive sky rise apartment in bucket. Your passenger
Speaker 1: steps out of the lobby and walks towards your prius.
Speaker 1: She looks statuesque, wealthy. You wonder why she called an
Speaker 1: uber and not a private car, but whatever. When she
Speaker 1: gets into your car, you marvel at the smell of
Speaker 1: her perfume. It smells expensive. I wonder what it is. Yes,
Speaker 1: I do too, Okay, I have no idea. I only
Speaker 1: know once from like right before Christmas when they have
Speaker 1: the like all the commercials. That's how I know what
Speaker 1: goes on in the perfume market. White diamonds. Baby, that's right,
Speaker 1: you know. I know this does So your passenger she
Speaker 1: doesn't talk too much, like at all, so you don't either.
Speaker 1: You're like thinking about what you can do. Should slass
Speaker 1: out a better wing recipe? You're like trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: think about Hey, look it's the grind cultures ar Rise
Speaker 1: and grind Elizabeth. So you drive to the airport, but
Speaker 1: you don't drive to departures and drop her off like
Speaker 1: you would some normal shmow like me. You drive her
Speaker 1: all the way round to the side to a little
Speaker 1: private section airport called Atlanta Signature airport. Yes. She instructs
Speaker 1: you to drive onto the tarmac and to head towards
Speaker 1: a private hangar. You're starting to wonder if she's famous,
Speaker 1: and you just don't know her because you don't watch TV.
Speaker 1: So you're like, well, maybe maybe I don't know who
Speaker 1: she is. Whatever. The private hanger you pull in and park.
Speaker 1: Before your passenger gets out, she asked you to wait
Speaker 1: a minute. You're like, I got an other ride. She's like, no,
Speaker 1: I've extended my trip. And you looked at and you
Speaker 1: see that she has. You're like, OK, just wait here. Now.
Speaker 1: You watch an armored van pull into the private hangar.
Speaker 1: Two armed men from a private security company get out.
Speaker 1: They walk over to the charter plane parked in the
Speaker 1: private hangar. You're like, oh, things are getting into and
Speaker 1: your nose so you're loving right. You hear someone say
Speaker 1: that the coins have arrived from Boise, like from Boise
Speaker 1: and I don't even know what this means. But the
Speaker 1: private security then meets two other agents after they step
Speaker 1: off the plane and they exchange a locked case. You're like, oh, secrets,
Speaker 1: and the private security then walks over to your passenger.
Speaker 1: She opens the case and expects the content and then nods,
Speaker 1: and it looks then that to be transferred over to
Speaker 1: the other security guards. And you're so giddy watching all
Speaker 1: this go down. Here is this international organized crime? What
Speaker 1: if I watching? So your passenger she returns to the
Speaker 1: car and says that she's ready to go now, and
Speaker 1: you're like, shall I ask questions? But you don't. You're like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be professional. You nod. You check the app
Speaker 1: for your next destination. She says, okay, yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: Randall Mill Road and you know right where that is.
Speaker 1: It's all the way back across town in bucket and
Speaker 1: you're like, okay, so money's money, money spends, You're gonna drive.
Speaker 1: So you driver back across town. Traffic sucks because it's Atlanta.
Speaker 1: But eventually you arrive at your destination Randall Mill Road,
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh dupe. You pull up the sprawling mansion.
Speaker 1: It's sitting atop a lush, green, sloped hill surrounded by woods,
Speaker 1: piney woods. This health has to be worth at least
Speaker 1: a million dollars to your estimation. Turns out you're wrong.
Speaker 1: It's worth four point four million dollars. So your passager
Speaker 1: steps out of the car. Thanks, you for the ride,
Speaker 1: and you're about to like drive away, but you watch
Speaker 1: for a moment and she walks towards a man who
Speaker 1: looks to be an architect because he's holding like one
Speaker 1: of those blueprint holder cases exactly, And so you're like, well,
Speaker 1: maybe he's a foremant. You don't know, so you just
Speaker 1: drive away. Right. What you don't know is you just
Speaker 1: witnessed the transfer of the profits of the one of
Speaker 1: the biggest robberies to ever occur in American to prison. Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: you just saw Arthur Cofield managed to gank a billionaire
Speaker 1: for eleven million dollars and get ready to buy a house, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna take a little break, Elizabeth. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: cool my jets, and then we're gonna come back and
Speaker 1: I'm gonna tell you how this all goes horribly wrong.
Speaker 1: Can we listen to some ads? Oh? Yeah, here, let
Speaker 1: me hit play. So, since you never asked, I'll just
Speaker 1: tell you, Elizabeth, your passenger it was a Liah Bennett. Okay, yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: a Liah Bennett. She was house hunting for Arthur Cofield.
Speaker 1: She is not Selina Home. She is a different co conspirator.
Speaker 1: She meets with the owner of the house, which, by
Speaker 1: the way, was not for sale. It was a new
Speaker 1: home that had been constructed by an architect, the one
Speaker 1: you saw in co Field. For whatever reason, don't ask
Speaker 1: me how he saw this house. He wan at it.
Speaker 1: So he made an offer on a house that wasn't
Speaker 1: for sale. He went higher than market value. He offers
Speaker 1: four point four million, and of course, it being capitalism,
Speaker 1: the owner is like, I go, I gotta sell. So
Speaker 1: he decides to sell. He can't turn down. He gets
Speaker 1: seven dollars as a down payment in cash, and he's like,
Speaker 1: all right, give me the remainder and the house is yours.
Speaker 1: Now you're you're you're with me. You gotta think something
Speaker 1: is hanky if you're gonna get somebody to offer you
Speaker 1: a house, offer you money on house that's not for sale,
Speaker 1: and then go, I'll give you cash on that. And
Speaker 1: they show up their first from the three quarters of
Speaker 1: million dollars and you're like here and by the way,
Speaker 1: they showed up with literal duffel bags of cash. They
Speaker 1: paid the owner in a duffel bags, like multiple duffel
Speaker 1: bags of cash. Goes down, house gets purchased. The billionaire
Speaker 1: is still none the wiser. His money is now being
Speaker 1: completely transferred and has now been turned into a multimillion
Speaker 1: dollar home in Atlanta. Doesn't know. It's like skimming cream
Speaker 1: from the Milia. This guy has no chance exactly exactly,
Speaker 1: but Arthur Cooke Jr. His good fortune is about to
Speaker 1: turn sour, like say milk. Yeah, well, otherwise we wouldn't
Speaker 1: be talking about, you know, the deal. The fun thing
Speaker 1: to focus on this story, at least for me, is
Speaker 1: all the people that took to pull off this scam. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm constantly blown away, not just the Charles Schwab Reppy
Speaker 1: have to sweet talk, but the co conspirators, all the paperwork,
Speaker 1: the metal dealers in Boise, Idaho, the security yards, you're
Speaker 1: you the driver. Well, it's kind of like the ultimate
Speaker 1: where there's a will, there's a way, Like you're not
Speaker 1: going to stop this dude because he's working from inside
Speaker 1: prison and he's able to pull off. And where there's
Speaker 1: a billionaire, there's always going to be a bunch of
Speaker 1: people who are like, I know, this is some stupid
Speaker 1: stuff I'm hearing, but I guess this is what they do.
Speaker 1: So it was really a great mark. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you want to like, excuse odd behavior. Tell people you're
Speaker 1: a billionaire, I guess. Anyway, back to its summer, the
Speaker 1: world mired in a pandemic cope is moving fast. So
Speaker 1: is Arthur Cofield. Right now, he secured himself his mansion.
Speaker 1: He's about to be released from prison. It's all needs
Speaker 1: to do is to just you know, make it through
Speaker 1: a couple more months. I mean, at this point, he's
Speaker 1: in a maximum security prison and he's got an architect
Speaker 1: on his payroll. He's paying that architect to make changes
Speaker 1: to the home. The architect calls him Archie. The architects like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's Mike dude. Right. So the architect was the one
Speaker 1: who originally designed and built the home. And so then
Speaker 1: when he gets sold, he's like, yeah, let me can
Speaker 1: we connect with that guy? And so then he's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you built a home, here's what I want. And so
Speaker 1: he's talking to Archie on the phone. The guy's name
Speaker 1: is Scott West, and Scott West is like and I quote,
Speaker 1: the whole thing was weird. He disappeared for a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks and calm me and say sorry, I was
Speaker 1: in Mexico. Blah blah blah. So he's writing off, everything
Speaker 1: is weird. He's like, yeah, this is how billionairess like,
Speaker 1: it's weird, but I've got money in my pocket from it.
Speaker 1: Exactly that it really offers the one excuse he needed.
Speaker 1: The owner of the house is this dude, Michael Zambilas.
Speaker 1: And Zambilas he said that when Archie A k Arthur
Speaker 1: k field a ka Yeap Lavish, we contacted him, you know,
Speaker 1: and I told you the house wasn't for sale, but
Speaker 1: he just couldn't say no to all that money. He's like,
Speaker 1: I gotta give it to him. The reason why he
Speaker 1: believed that the money was legit is Yapp Lavish told
Speaker 1: him that he was a music scout and that he
Speaker 1: worked with emerging artists, upcoming rappers, and that he'd also
Speaker 1: invested in bitcoin. Oh god, exactly, it's like a trifecta.
Speaker 1: So that but this is enough to be believable for
Speaker 1: his MBS. He's like, oh, yeah, of course, I mean
Speaker 1: this is so investing in bitcoin at that time was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this person is rich and smart. It's not like, oh,
Speaker 1: this person is stubborn and committed to being a bitcoin holder,
Speaker 1: which is what we would think now. So the rappers
Speaker 1: in the bitcoins cover story works well enough that nobody
Speaker 1: questions co Field or his money in Duffel bags. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's Atlanta, after all, was heep in mind? Where
Speaker 1: we are? It's not there, But there are plenty of
Speaker 1: young bitcoin millionaires in Atlanta and plenty of up and
Speaker 1: coming rappers to make this seem legit, is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: It's not that you know, Yes, cash deals, though, should
Speaker 1: always be a suspicion. So the whole criminal enterprise, it's light,
Speaker 1: it's flexible, it's moving, it's operating, it's working inside and outside.
Speaker 1: Everything is going great. But there's one problem because while
Speaker 1: he's working on this inside and outside, his whole criminal
Speaker 1: plan is it has this one aspect, which is it
Speaker 1: is really vulnerable to sudden exposure. It's like a soup
Speaker 1: lake and it's kind of fall if anybody learns anything
Speaker 1: about it. And one day Cofield's bad luck drops right
Speaker 1: into his lap and he was like, oh, the day
Speaker 1: is June, and the prison guards decided to just do
Speaker 1: a surprise inspection of the whole prison right and so boom,
Speaker 1: co Field is found with two cell phones. One of
Speaker 1: the phones is just sitting on his desk and he's
Speaker 1: got a dusk in his cell, so it's just sitting
Speaker 1: out on the desk. The other one was hidden in
Speaker 1: his armpits, so they had to like find it, and
Speaker 1: so he's got these contraband phones. They hand him over
Speaker 1: to the prison forensics, those guys that don't doesn't take
Speaker 1: him long examine the phones. They were like, cursory check
Speaker 1: reveals this plot to buy a mansion, and so they're like,
Speaker 1: you're gonna need to check more on this phone. So
Speaker 1: they start going diving deeper and they discover co Field's
Speaker 1: whole message history, all the d M s and whatever
Speaker 1: text messages he sent, all call logs, the whole bit,
Speaker 1: and they find all of the evidence they need to
Speaker 1: keep him in prison for another fifteen years. Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's basically caught dead to right now. Personally, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of curious what caused this sudden inspection. I mean, like,
Speaker 1: did he piss off the prison guards, did he cross
Speaker 1: the wrong person in prison? Was it a power play
Speaker 1: between gangs? Because this just seems like a really weird,
Speaker 1: suspicious and suddenly the phone will the above. Yeah totally
Speaker 1: also could just be dumb luck. I mean, I really dumb,
Speaker 1: but I still think it was a CEO anyway. So
Speaker 1: the inmates who are smuggling in contraband, you know, usually
Speaker 1: we're told like, oh, it's spines of books, like you're told,
Speaker 1: or like in movies it's like the bodily orifices. But
Speaker 1: you know, or you know the news story say oh
Speaker 1: Drone flew it in. But as I pointed out, it's
Speaker 1: mostly the correctional officers. And from what I've read, this
Speaker 1: is known by the prison industry. Yeah, so Adam Myers,
Speaker 1: this expert dip guy, he uh, he studies things for
Speaker 1: a site called prison Ology, and it's it's it's a
Speaker 1: firm and they made up a retired prison warden's prison
Speaker 1: executives and so forth, and so they have an insider's
Speaker 1: view of this. They know what is how this is
Speaker 1: going down. And he said, and I quote, this is
Speaker 1: a pretty widespread problem, and it really comes down to
Speaker 1: guards not being paid enough because it's a big amount
Speaker 1: of money that's hard to turn away from when they
Speaker 1: smuggle the phones in. So, you know, just like John Lennon,
Speaker 1: Cofield needed a little help from his friends, and the
Speaker 1: prison guards were only too happy to offer it right.
Speaker 1: So that's that's my thought. I once, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm not necessarily saying it was guaranteed. But how else
Speaker 1: is he going to get this phone and contact with
Speaker 1: Charles Schwab. No, Elizabeth, I know you, so, I know
Speaker 1: you're probably wondering, You're a little worried. What about Sidney Kimmel?
Speaker 1: Did anything? Did he find out? Did he know he
Speaker 1: got robbed? Did he lose get his money back? You
Speaker 1: don't care, well the money, the money was returned to him.
Speaker 1: He got his eleven million dollars back. Because Charles Schwab,
Speaker 1: when they found out what they had done, they needed
Speaker 1: to make sure that none of their other investors would
Speaker 1: hear about this, and and hear about it in some
Speaker 1: glaring negative time hearing about it. Yeah, Jos Schwab was
Speaker 1: in a quote. Schwab was aware of suspected of fraudulent activity.
Speaker 1: We launched an investigation, initiated measures to protect the client's account,
Speaker 1: and notified the authorities. As you can appreciate, this is
Speaker 1: an ongoing investigation and as such we cannot comment further.
Speaker 1: They took the approach were handling this. Don't you worry?
Speaker 1: So now to ensure all their other investors. They say
Speaker 1: all this, but people still can't figure out. I can't
Speaker 1: figure out. The Feds can't figure out how did Kochfield
Speaker 1: find all the information that he needed to access this
Speaker 1: billionaire's account? And you know that's the great mystery that
Speaker 1: I have no answers for you. But we found our answer.
Speaker 1: We think it's the CEO is how they got the
Speaker 1: the co conspirator. Yeah, but once again, I'm just speculating
Speaker 1: that they're in the house staff. If they're not, who
Speaker 1: is that anyway? You know how some kids are murder
Speaker 1: with a computer. This dude was like straight up doing
Speaker 1: like I don't know, gang land activities with a flip
Speaker 1: phone in prison. And that's just so impressive to me. Anyway,
Speaker 1: his Blackhead dream home, it's still sitting there, empty, unsold. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's quickly depreciating in value. It's right now it's no
Speaker 1: longer worth four point four million of the original asking
Speaker 1: price that he paid. It's not worth about three point
Speaker 1: five And people are suing to try to like manage
Speaker 1: it because the house will quickly turn into a wasted Yeah.
Speaker 1: So one last thing about contraband phones, Elizabeth. Now, as
Speaker 1: we've gone over prison guards are probably responsible for most
Speaker 1: of them, right, And this also allows prisons to have
Speaker 1: a reason to roust prisoners and to search their cells.
Speaker 1: And it also allows them to kind of give like
Speaker 1: a little uh black market pay to their prison guards
Speaker 1: so they don't have to do pay increases. But I
Speaker 1: don't want it to sound like these contraband phones are
Speaker 1: all negative. I was just going to say that I
Speaker 1: think it's important that we make a distinction that some
Speaker 1: contraband phones are used for crimes and some are used
Speaker 1: look like, well the journalists carry blanket. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: if you know. Okay, great writer Great Journalists has written
Speaker 1: a lot about this, and she makes the point that
Speaker 1: smuggled in phones are also how whistleblowers are able to
Speaker 1: report on the prison document excesses of the bad behavior
Speaker 1: inside the detention facilities. Also, some inmates have been known
Speaker 1: to self published books. They've been known to take college
Speaker 1: classes on smuggled phones. They also contact prison reform advocates
Speaker 1: their family members when they're having a crisis. It's it's
Speaker 1: really often a lifeline. It's a form of communication, of
Speaker 1: a connection education. It's so much more than just when
Speaker 1: there are poor conditions and the outside world doesn't know
Speaker 1: about it, um, And we've seen that multiple times. And
Speaker 1: then you know, you look at the fact that the
Speaker 1: absolute robbery of how much they charge for phone calls.
Speaker 1: California's best really can't charge him exactly, and it should
Speaker 1: be blanket nationwide because you know, I don't understand, well
Speaker 1: I do understand, but I just it's disgusting to me
Speaker 1: how much they skewer these guys. They're doing their time,
Speaker 1: and I think that you know, they're paying things back
Speaker 1: in a multitude of ways, and part of prisons rehabilitation. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but like there's the whole I think it's part of
Speaker 1: the dehumanization that is that is in our prison you
Speaker 1: know industrial complex that you know, you reduce these guy
Speaker 1: is they don't have a name, they're a number, um.
Speaker 1: And then you take it away where you don't get
Speaker 1: the like satisfaction of being able to talk to your
Speaker 1: family without some pain inflicted monetarily. Um. We need to
Speaker 1: talk to people. We need to talk to our family.
Speaker 1: And like you're saying, if you want to rehabilitate someone
Speaker 1: like you have to let them have a support and
Speaker 1: reconnect to the world outside. This should be part of
Speaker 1: the plan I think it's just important, an important point
Speaker 1: to make, which is that smuggled cell phones save lives.
Speaker 1: That's essentially what I want. Arthur Cofield, he's one example,
Speaker 1: but he's not a good example of all that you
Speaker 1: would find in prison. So cadger band phones keep rolling. Basically,
Speaker 1: there's just never one side to the story exactly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for every for every uh that what's his name again,
Speaker 1: Arthur yapp Lavish yapp Lavish. You know there's someone who's
Speaker 1: actually like just trying to be a human being surviving,
Speaker 1: and we have to be able to consider them and
Speaker 1: not just be hung up on oh drone smuggling phones
Speaker 1: in so yeap Lavish can order that his hits and
Speaker 1: billionaires anyway, what's a ridiculous take. I think you're right.
Speaker 1: There were no heroes, no anti heroes. It's just a
Speaker 1: bunch of well I mean, like, I guess the billionaire
Speaker 1: isn't so bad. I mean he's just sitting on too
Speaker 1: much money, but like you know, he didn't do anything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but like man, these you know, I always I think
Speaker 1: we're probably the most criminal friendly podcasts. We're definitely not
Speaker 1: like copagandas UM and I like to kind of find
Speaker 1: the humanity and people and give people the benefit of
Speaker 1: the doubt. And we've said it before that you know,
Speaker 1: most of the people that we talk about are just
Speaker 1: like they've made a series of bad decisions. And you know,
Speaker 1: because we don't talk about murder, we're talking about mostly
Speaker 1: financial crimes or other kind of ridiculous things. Um, you
Speaker 1: can find you can find a little redeeming quality for
Speaker 1: most of these people. Um, except for like the ones
Speaker 1: who are really cruel about it. The woman who scammed
Speaker 1: the town out of all the what was Rita saw?
Speaker 1: She was terrible. This guy is terrible. So I think
Speaker 1: it's interesting when we stumble across the people that's really
Speaker 1: hard to to you know, find it a sweet spot, yes,
Speaker 1: or anyone to root for. Yeah, but I'm also you know,
Speaker 1: you know, my ridiculous takeaway. Once again, thank you for
Speaker 1: asking Elizabeth welcome is the worth time family being able
Speaker 1: to write off two and a quarter million dollars like, well,
Speaker 1: that's just a learning experience whatever to anyway, thank you
Speaker 1: for listening. That's all I got for you. Thank you. Well.
Speaker 1: You can find us online a ridiculous crime on both
Speaker 1: Twitter and Instagram. Twitter. That's where we dropped the words Instagram,
Speaker 1: we dropped the pictures. We got you know, hype for
Speaker 1: episodes on both and also you can reach out to
Speaker 1: us if you would like. Email us at Ridiculous Crime
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. You've got a story, idea, a
Speaker 1: family confession, a personal confession. Hit us up. We love Dan.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton,
Speaker 1: end Aaron Burnett, produced and edited by Atlanta's pre eminent
Speaker 1: producer for up and coming gift rappers, Dave Coustin. Researches
Speaker 1: by Marissa Young, Loco Brown, and Andrea Hotlan. Bling is
Speaker 1: my favorite song, Sharp and Tire. Our theme song is
Speaker 1: by Thomas laars Lee and Travis The Real Girl. Dutton
Speaker 1: Executive producers are Ben Hell Bolden and Noel high Water Brown.
Speaker 1: We Die Say It One More Time. We Dequius Crew.
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