Oh My Fraud

Warning: This is a machine-generated transcript. As such, there may be spelling, grammar, and accuracy errors throughout. Thank you for your understanding!

Caleb Newquist: If you're a rock star, your job is to create and perform rock and roll music. If you're a comedian, your job is to create and perform stand up comedy. Ostensibly, the more you focus on that, the better the product.

Greg Kyte: And rock stars and stand up comedians are not the CEOs of their own businesses or brands, and they're definitely not the accountants of their own businesses or brands. They're in product development. That's it. And according to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, [00:00:30] rounding to the nearest percent 0% of frauds are caught by people in product development.

Earmark App: If you'd like to earn CPE credit for listening to this episode, visit earmarkcpe.com Download the app, take a short quiz, and get your CPE certificate. Continuing education has never been so easy. And now on to the episode.

Caleb Newquist: This [00:01:00] is Oh My Fraud, a true crime podcast where instead of taking your kid and demanding money, our criminals just take the money. I'm Caleb Newquist.

Greg Kyte: And I'm Greg Kyte.

Caleb Newquist: Oh, Greg, it's great to be back with you again. It is talking the fraud. Yeah. Uh, I'm really just kind of stalling until I have to ask you to read a review. So do you just want to read the review?

Greg Kyte: It is. It's always wonderful. Uh, seeing you, too. [00:01:30] Uh, but but absolutely. I love I love reading reviews because. Because they're getting better. This one made me so happy. Uh, it's a five star. Yeah, it's a five star review that was left for us on Apple Podcasts. It says, quote, I wrote this review just to see if it would get read at the top of an episode. And sure enough, it did. But seriously, I need 120 CPE credit hours to reactivate my license, and working through the backlog of oh my fraud episodes is making [00:02:00] that process entertaining and educational in that order. And after reading that, I've got to ask you, did we just get back to the future? They wrote the review in the past, but somehow they knew that that we would read it in the future. Is this is this person the the accounting Biff Tannen what what the fuck just happened?

Caleb Newquist: I just think they knew how to set us up. We got to give credit where credit's due. They just, like, I know how to get read on this show. I'll just set them up.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, likely. [00:02:30] That's the case. Yeah, they they could, they could. They used they used our hubris, uh, in an attempt to prove that the Law of Attraction was real. So either either we got back to the future or we got Oprah Winfrey, one of the two, into reading that review.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah. Either way, uh, I'm fine. So regardless, we love getting reviews and whether you're trying to reinstate your license, which is no, no picnic or you just want if, you know, you just want to hear a good fraud story, [00:03:00] leave us a review on Apple Radius on Spotify, uh, or earmark wherever you listen, uh, do that for us.

Greg Kyte: We would love it. Uh, we also want to let everybody know that we are more than just disembodied voices. Inside your podcast app, we take this show on the road. If your firm has an in-house training or your event needs a keynote presentation that is ridiculously fun and ridiculously informative, let us know, because we got that. And don't worry, we're pros. We'll keep the language squeaky clean [00:03:30] when we're in your house. Uh, I mean, we will do that unless you specifically say you want the swears, then we will gladly oblige.

Caleb Newquist: If you're interested in hiring us for your event, send us an email at omai. Fraud at earmark cpe.com to get pricing and availability. So, Greg Kite changing subjects. I'd like to believe that most people can remember [00:04:00] a point in their youth when a particular bit of music kind of clicked with them maybe an artist, maybe a song. I was asking my wife about this, and for her it was, uh, k.d. lang, constant craving. Um, and, um, that's.

Greg Kyte: A that's a cool answer. What does your wife trying to just just make sure that everybody knows that she would be the coolest of the three of us.

Caleb Newquist: I mean, she she loves k.d. lang, and [00:04:30] we we actually sidebar the we we bought k.d. lang tickets because she was doing a tour, uh, early in 2020. And of course, we did not get to see k.d. lang in early 2020. Yeah. So it's not only music. You and I have talked about this before, but not only is it is it music that I'm thinking of, but like also comedy. And so whether it's it's a funny show, like a funny sitcom or you remember stand up comedy, a [00:05:00] stand up comedian that you first clicked with, uh, I don't know, there's something magical about those, um, occurrences in your youth, so I'm just curious about that for you, Greg Kite.

Greg Kyte: Well, let me start by tackling the stand up comedy side of stuff, because I, I have a very, a very clear memory of that. I was, I was probably in fifth or sixth grade. I'd been I've been swimming competitively since I was eight years old. Uh, so we were on some trip somewhere to some bigger, uh, [00:05:30] swim meet and, and I and we had. Yeah, we had to travel there. I traveled with my, my best friend in swimming and we and and we just decided, I guess his parents decided we would camp wherever we were, I'm sure to save a buck on a hotel room. So we were camping, and he brought a little portable, uh, cassette tape player. This is this was in the 80s, and and he, he and he also brought a he brought Eddie Murphy's debut album titled [00:06:00] Eddie Murphy. And we listened to it in the tent on the the cassette player. And I'm pretty sure he was not supposed to have this cassette. And we listened to it. We like, like this, like 11, probably 11. Yeah. And we're I mean, it depends.

Caleb Newquist: It depends on the parents. Right? Some parents are like, it's fine. And some parents are like, absolutely not right.

Greg Kyte: And his I think I got the impression that it was a hot it was a hot cassette and that okay. Like, hey we just got to keep this, got to keep [00:06:30] this cool. Just keep the volume down. And and here's the thing I, the thing I remember from that cassette was Eddie Murphy's song called Boogie in Your Butt, is what it was called. Right. Uh, and, and that that I was dying about about boogie in your butt and, uh, and so I remember that I don't really remember the song. So before we recorded, knowing that we were going to talk about this, actually [00:07:00] listened to it on YouTube, and I was like, that's not good. That's not good. That's not it's not particularly funny, and it's not particularly good. But at 11 it was comedy gold. Of course it was. And yeah, and I was dead.

Caleb Newquist: Well, in this episode, uh, we are discussing one musician and one comedian who we are. Well, uh, they're we're both in kind of our orbits of interests, and, [00:07:30] uh, I'm sorry to say, but they had some bad luck, uh, with some fraud. And, uh, we're gonna get into those, um, we're going to get into those stories. The celebrity Courtney Love singer songwriter, actress, bad tweeter. Greg, uh, you were there for grunge. Uh, you're the right age, right? Geography, were you not?

Greg Kyte: Yeah, [00:08:00] yeah, I was absolutely. I grew up in Seattle, so yeah, in the late 80s and early 90s, I was right there. That was the time. It was it was it's it's weird knowing that my brother. So. So I was a preppy church kid. My brother was the rocker of the family. Okay. And it's it's weird and also awesome knowing that he, he participated in the grunge movement. Not he's not a musician, but he's definitely a big fan. So I know [00:08:30] he went to some like very in the spirit of grunge concerts of a lot of the, the grunge bands, as grunge was becoming a global phenomenon.

Caleb Newquist: Probably saw some good early shows.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

Caleb Newquist: So since you were the preppy church kid then, were you aware of did you have any kind of frame of reference when it came to Courtney Love?

Greg Kyte: Um, no, I did not. I did not, uh, yeah. I got, [00:09:00] I gotta say, uh, as a preppy church, you probably could have.

Caleb Newquist: Used as a preppy church kid, you probably could have used a Courtney Love in your life. That would have been an interesting like, uh.

Greg Kyte: Well, that's that's the only, like, even today, the only reference I have for Courtney Love is I know that she she was she had a role in the Woody Harrelson movie about the the biopic of Larry Flynt, the founder of hustler. Yeah. So which I, which I also think know is ironic that it's like I was a, I was a preppy church kid, so I didn't know anything [00:09:30] about Courtney Love. Oh, except for the movie about pornography.

Caleb Newquist: Yes. That's right.

Greg Kyte: That's, uh. Yeah.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah, yeah. No. So, um, I was, um, in the early 90s, I had not kind of transitioned from, you know, from the country to the to the rock, uh, and the grunge alternative kind of weirdness that, you know, because while my friends were getting me into Metallica and Guns N roses and stuff like the Nirvana and the Pearl jam and the Soundgarden, that was very [00:10:00] anti that stuff, like the hair metal, you know, that late 80s, early 90s stuff. Yeah. Um, so I kind of started. Discovering that in the more the mid 90s. But around that time, like I, you know, I, I started listening to hole. That was Courtney Love's first band and and so I knew who she was and I liked her music. And if you're not familiar with Courtney Love and I assume some people aren't. Um, she first came to prominence as the lead singer of this [00:10:30] band hole, which is an alternative rock band. Uh, it formed in 1989. They released they released their first album in about 1991, and their breakout album was called Live Through This, and that was in 1994. And there's a lot of people probably know well, this is how a lot of people know who she is. But she's the widow of Kurt Cobain, right? Who was the lead singer and guitarist of Nirvana who died by suicide in 1994? Um, so you know that that kind of puts her in the musical context. But you're right, Greg. She's also an actress. [00:11:00] Yeah. She actually was nominated for an Academy Award in 1996 for her performance in The People versus Larry Flynt. Okay. And, uh, she was nominated.

Greg Kyte: I mean, it was a it. I knew it was a very critically acclaimed movie, which was probably the way that I talked Christian Greg into watching.

Caleb Newquist: Hahaha.

Greg Kyte: Yes, yes. Watching it. Right.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah. It's like, well, this is this is great art. So yeah.

Greg Kyte: It's nominated for the.

Caleb Newquist: Lord. The Lord, the Lord has no judgment on art.

Greg Kyte: So no, no, [00:11:30] of course not. Wow, that sounds.

Caleb Newquist: Like complete bullshit.

Greg Kyte: Oof! Well, you know, don't don't don't get me started.

Caleb Newquist: No. Okay, okay. Oh, I'm that that's like a fun after show convo right there. Right? Right. Um, anyways, in that movie, she played Althea Leasure. That was Larry Flynt's fourth wife. Which sounds like in real.

Greg Kyte: Life, not just for the movie Althea Leasure. That sounds like, hey, we need we need a we need a name for the the wife of a guy who owns [00:12:00] a porn. Uh, Empire. Empire. Althea. Althea. Pleasure. Perfect perfect.

Caleb Newquist: Perfect. Um, anyway, throughout the 2000 and the 20 tens, she continued to record music and she continued to act. Uh, she also this is kind of in the research. This was kind of a surprise to me, but she also co-created and co-wrote three volumes of, uh, I believe it's pronounced manga. Uh, which is like a Japanese. [00:12:30] Is Japanese comics. Japanese like graphic, uh, graphic novel novels.

Greg Kyte: Yeah. Yeah yeah, yeah.

Caleb Newquist: Yep. Uh, which are extremely popular. Yeah. Um, so she did some of that. Uh, she is like, she is a very creative. She has had a very interesting, creative, uh, prolific career as an artist. And, I don't know, it's really fascinating when you kind of, like, step back from it all and look at what she's been able to do as an artist. It's pretty impressive. Unfortunately [00:13:00] for her, she has struggled with addiction for, uh, for many, many years. Uh, right. First she first got it. Yeah.

Greg Kyte: Being true to the to the grunge ethos.

Caleb Newquist: Yes. Of course. Yes. And that's when it started for her. Uh, she first got addicted to heroin, um, with Kurt Cobain in the early 90s. And she went into rehab in 2005, uh, and got sober in 2007. And she even said in a 2019 interview, uh, that she had relapsed as recently as 2018. [00:13:30] Oh, um, as best as I can tell, she is sober today. But, um, this is, you know, this has been part of her life. And, like, if you listen to interviews with her, you definitely she, she has kind of this reputation as kind of a pugnacious, kind of, like, volatile person and a loose cannon, you might say. And, uh, she's probably earned that. And I kind of get the sense that she understands that she has enough self-awareness that, um, she she would she would own that. Yeah. Um, but anyway, and.

Greg Kyte: Again, [00:14:00] like I said, I don't have Courtney Courtney Love, isn't it. She she's not she doesn't hold a very large place in my understanding of pop culture at all. But, uh, but her reputation, like you said, is broad enough that I go, oh, yeah, all that seems to track, even for a guy who. Right. With whom she's not she for a guy who doesn't know hardly anything about her.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah, right. Not not too much frame of reference.

Greg Kyte: But but loose cannon. Yeah. That's that seems to check.

Caleb Newquist: What [00:14:30] is also interesting though is despite all of these kind of all this kind of this dynamic in her life as an artist and, and tragedy, you know, losing, losing a husband at a very young age. She, uh, has done quite well for herself. Kurt Cobain's his share of the revenue from those records and all the money that that band made in the early 90s, that, of course, passed to her. Yeah. Um, along with the money that she made from all the stuff that she did. So she had like a pretty from I don't I [00:15:00] wasn't able to really pin down like the size of the fortune. We'll get into some numbers in a bit, but, um, she had a, you know, a sizable fortune as a result of that.

Greg Kyte: Yeah. You've got to think if if your husband was one of three members of the biggest band of the 90s, arguably. Right, then. Yes. Yeah. You're you're probably doing okay. Yeah.

Caleb Newquist: Right. And, um, what's interesting about the Courtney Love story, it's like, again, so this is a fraud story, and her particular [00:15:30] fraud story isn't so much a single event as it is kind of her whole career. And I don't mean that her art is a fraud. Her art is legitimate and kind of, you know, right. And interesting, interesting and critically acclaimed and whatever, whatever. Like she's she has the, the art chops.

Greg Kyte: This isn't this isn't a milli Vanilli type fraud story.

Caleb Newquist: Correct? Correct. But like she has been she has been, uh, exploited, [00:16:00] uh, throughout her career. And in December of 2021, uh, she published an essay in the Financial Times as a part the Ft was doing this financial literacy and inclusion campaign, and she wrote an essay for it. Right. And, um, it was pretty interesting. It was a pretty interesting read. And so I'm quoting from that, and.

Greg Kyte: It makes sense because most people who who aren't financially literate subscribe to the Financial Times. So it seems like they're going to make a big a big difference. [00:16:30]

Caleb Newquist: Right? So I'm gonna I'm gonna read from that essay and, um, to, to give you a sense of like where she was coming from, uh, she writes, my family has been the victim of every single financial crime there is. I don't want anybody to feel sorry for us, but some really horrible things have happened. We've had millions taken from us. It started a few years before Kurt's death in the early 90s, and only got worse after he died. Recently, my manager and an attorney discovered five forged wills of mine [00:17:00] 67 bank accounts, 102 Mastercard's and Visa's. There were Centurion cards with million dollar credit lines, I found one. That was being used in 2005 by someone I had I had fired in 1999. Basically, they stole every cent. And again, if you listened to her in an interview like, you know, she can come off again like she's she's just a live wire. Yeah. And so some of that might feel like hyperbole, but I kind [00:17:30] of don't think so. Like, yeah, she was on late last year actually. It was, it was I think it was actually in 2022, she was on Marc Maron's podcast, his WTF podcast, and she talked, uh, in broad strokes about how she had been betrayed repeatedly during her career in in that conversation and including, she gave up a portion of her share of Cobain's publishing rights.

Caleb Newquist: So it wasn't entirely clear whether actual [00:18:00] fraud occurred. Like no one's ever been arrested. Oh, yeah. You know, there's been there's been countless lawsuits, though, and a lot of that stuff has been settled out of court. But in in 2009, an attorney working for her claimed in a New York Post article that as much as like $530 million, uh, quote, may have been looted by unscrupulous investors acting on the singer's behalf. So like she had people looking into this because [00:18:30] it was it was it was so out of hand. Right? So even if you kind of listen to her and kind of don't take her seriously because she kind of feels, you know, volatile or not together, there were definitely people that were, you know, she hired people to look into this for her. And, you know, and, you know, we're getting we'll get into more of it. But it was clearly that she had been exploited because of, you know, the the kind of the vulnerability because of her [00:19:00] addiction issues. And, yeah, thinking about grief after her husband died and things like that, and then and then this going on for like 20 plus years or whatever it is. Um, that sounds kind of exhausting, but.

Greg Kyte: It does sound exhausting also, you know, and and whatever you think of Courtney Love, you also gotta go, really, you know, fleecing, uh, a widow's right. Just historically doesn't have a good, you know, juju. Uh, right. That goes along with that whole [00:19:30] right, uh, line of work.

Caleb Newquist: Later in that same New York Post article, this attorney said we have only been able to track down 30 million, but there is more. Um, there were accusations of real estate flipping. A lot of the money ended up in real estate and even accusations of money laundering, uh, uh, through, uh, bank accounts that were opened in her name and in Kurt Cobain's name and in their daughter's name. Um, and although no one was [00:20:00] specifically named, the lawyer had had had accused, quote, former assistants, former managers, CPAs, lawyers and a couple of banks. So because it was it was coming at them from, from from all angles.

Greg Kyte: It's nice to know that CPAs were involved in the, uh, in, in, in the, the fraud because, you know, we're we're only known as people's trusted business advisor, so. Right. Yeah. That that helps uphold the brand indeed in 2011. [00:20:30]

Caleb Newquist: So just kind of going back a little bit still, um, Courtney Love was sued by this attorney who was representing her, uh, because this attorney claimed that her now former client, Courtney Love, had made libelous statements about her. Courtney Love countersued over a letter that that lawyer supposedly had wrote to her daughter, Frances. And there's this Hollywood Reporter. This Hollywood Reporter article mentions that the lawsuit never [00:21:00] actually materialized. So in that case, Courtney Love prevailed in court on that libel charge. And, uh, if this all sounds like complicated and messy, that's because it is like, this is right. It was really one of those. It's kind of like, if you go back to our previous celebrity episode about Billy Joel, The Billy Joel story especially. Yeah, there's that story was a much older story than this one. And yet there [00:21:30] was so many articles about that it was really hard to like, like stitch it all together in a way that kind of like, so you could follow it. And so I hope you all appreciate this because it was not easy to kind of piece things together from like, because it's just like tabloid fodder. Right? Like that's the thing about like when celebrities get ripped off. Yeah. Like it's just tabloid fodder, right, right. People eat it up. And so, um, in any case, um, this was.

Greg Kyte: Caleb going. I work so hard for [00:22:00] you people. You don't understand the lengths I had to go to for this Courtney Love story. We we appreciate you, everyone. I do, the listeners do. Right? Right. Go. Go on Apple Podcasts and write Caleb a five star review. Just because. Because of how hard he works. Thank you.

Caleb Newquist: Greg. You're welcome. Anyway, so. Look, let's, um. I should be clear [00:22:30] about this. She definitely, according to love, definitely owns up to all of this. And so, back in that pizza. That I quoted earlier. Um, she wrote in a little bit later. She says financial literacy is one of the most critical things and artists can have, but it seems scary. It's scary understanding my fault and all this and acknowledging my overspending. So that's the other thing too, is like she was making lifestyle choices, right? And so a combination of like working with shady people and maybe being vulnerable [00:23:00] because of addiction and grief and those kinds of things. Um, and then also but spending money because some people really like to spend money. Um.

Greg Kyte: And that's, that's part of financial literacy, though, too, is, is realizing you can't just spend all the money.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah.

Greg Kyte: Right. Yeah.

Caleb Newquist: She later wrote about how Britney Spears, the Britney Spears conservatorship has been kind of covered to death. So I think most people know about that story. But, um, she said she [00:23:30] was glad that Britney was able to finally get justice over her whole conservatorship thing. And she then says, well, I hope, I hope my family's next. So it sounds like there's still things going on in their world. They're still trying to recover, uh, some of the money. And in that Maron podcast, she talks about her new manager. And so she's finally sounds like she's got somebody honest and, you know, has somebody that, like, is managing her business interests. Um, well, but it took a long time and it definitely cost her a lot [00:24:00] of money to get to that place.

Greg Kyte: The celebrity Kevin Hart, comedian, actor, businessman, ubiquitous pitchman with Infinite Hustle Kevin Hart, uh had the highest grossing comedy tour again in 2023. Did you know about that, Caleb?

Caleb Newquist: I did not know about that.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, I'm. But I'm not surprised. Uh, he's been listed among [00:24:30] the highest paid comedians since at least 2016. And according to my non-exhaustive research, he is currently the fourth richest comedian in the world. And the three ahead of him are people like, he's behind, like like, uh, Jerry Seinfeld is one of them, where it's like, of course everyone is. But he's also.

Caleb Newquist: Everybody's. Everybody's behind Jerry Seinfeld.

Greg Kyte: But he's also decades behind Jerry Seinfeld in terms of his that's true career. So you go, yeah, you're probably not going to catch [00:25:00] up with him. But also, just to put that in context, he's ahead of Adam Sandler, who's also decades ahead of him. He's ahead of David Letterman, who we all know is decades ahead of of, uh, Kevin Hart. And he's he's ahead of Eddie Murphy. So he's, uh, Kevin Hart. You look at the top ten list of richest comedians. He's easily the youngest guy on that list. Uh, here's here's an interesting thing is that during so during the writers strike that happened in 2023, [00:25:30] I found, I found that I had burned through all like like the writers strike lasted five months, and it felt like within five days I, my DVR was drained and I needed to find new things to watch. And one of the things that I stumbled upon was on Peacock. Kevin Hart had a show called Hart to Hart, which was which was his, uh, it was his. I mean, it's a talk show, but it wasn't really a talk show. It was it was absolutely a podcast [00:26:00] that some that they had filmed and done some production values and had a set for and. Gotcha. You couldn't listen to on, on, on Pandora, you had to watch it on Peacock. But really it was it was absolutely a podcast. But here's what I found fascinating about that, because, okay, so many podcasts with I mean, a comedian because he just he interviewed people and that was the whole thing.

Greg Kyte: And so often like, like I'm a big Pete Holmes fan, he has a podcast. His his [00:26:30] conversation always revolves back around to religion and spirituality and things like that. With with Kevin Hart. What I noticed on Hart to Hart was that his conversations with huge, huge celebrities like Jay-Z was on there. He had, um, uh, shoot, what's the what's the guy on Shark Tank who owned the Dallas Mavericks or still does Cuban? Mark Cuban was on Mark Cuban. Yeah. And and with and again I know those guys are known more for their business acumen. But even [00:27:00] he had he had uh sweetie on there the rapper sweetie. And with every single one of them he always wrapped the conversation back around to business, like, what are you doing to get ahead? What have you found? What have been the lessons you've learned about business? And so his podcast wasn't about, you know, jokes or your process for being creative. It was like, let's talk about the business of being an entertainer. And I thought that that was fascinating because [00:27:30] Kevin Hart, obviously he's known for being a stand up, but the dude is a business man, and he's all about the business of entertainment. Uh, he he and and he he is he is well known as a comedian just for his hustle because he's one of those guys where it's like, how many? I think I googled, uh, how many projects is is Kevin Hart working on right now? Yeah.

Greg Kyte: And it was and it was like a list of, of, uh, half a dozen movies that are like in the [00:28:00] that are in production right now. And that's just the that's just the movie side of stuff. So he doesn't just have and you know, and he's obviously he's still touring. He had the highest grossing comedy tour of 2023, like we just said. Um. But he also has been building and scaling just the business side. It's like the back end of stuff. He's been busting his ass and doing amazing things like that here. This is just a list of businesses that I found in an LA times article [00:28:30] from July of 2023, so this might not be the most current list, and it might not be an exhaustive list of the businesses that he owns. But first off, he owns a company called heartbeat. That's his media enterprise, basically content creation. They have a lot of a lot of comedians that they're promoting through heartbeat. He's got a company called Vida Hustle, which was his nutritional supplements company. Uh, which is crazy because I kind of go, oh, that kind of makes me uneasy if someone's selling nutritional [00:29:00] supplements because I go, hey.

Caleb Newquist: If it's good enough for Alex Jones, it's good enough for Kevin Hart.

Greg Kyte: Exactly. That's why. That's why I don't feel good about it. Uh, and then he's got, uh, he's got a company called heart House, which is his plant based fast food restaurant chain. I looked up that, and it looks like right now there's exactly four of them that are open, and they're all in the LA area. He also has, uh, grand, uh, coramino, which is his tequila brand. Right before between [00:29:30] getting off of work today and right now when we're recording the podcast I did, it crossed my mind to go to the liquor store to see if they had grand coramino just to have it, and then I was like, I don't got time for that. So I didn't, I didn't, and then but then lastly, and most, most surprisingly to me, he's got another company that's called Heartbeat Ventures, which is his own venture capital firm, the dude that to me, that that blows this whole thing apart. I, uh, in terms of like knowing that there is [00:30:00] a stand up comedian that also has a venture capital firm that's just beyond. So, um, yeah.

Caleb Newquist: That's that's a he's got a lot going on.

Greg Kyte: Right. And that's just as a business that's just his businesses. So, uh, it's again, this is from that LA times article. Uh, the it says that the dude's got 80 employees and he's got offices for his businesses in Atlanta and Hollywood and New York, New York. Now, uh, I don't I think I think you and I are kind of on the same [00:30:30] page with this. I, I do not enjoy I don't enjoy managing people and I and it's difficult for me to delegate stuff. Is that.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah.

Greg Kyte: Yeah I mean like, I hate it.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah. I think for me it depends a little bit on the content in the context. But yeah, for the most part I'm not. It's not something I like to do.

Greg Kyte: Yeah.

Caleb Newquist: And and I have enough trouble. I have enough trouble, Greg. Managing myself. Okay. What am I gonna. How am I gonna help somebody else? How?

Greg Kyte: See. And mine is not my.

Caleb Newquist: My main advantage [00:31:00] is age. That is what I've got going for me, Greg, is that I have fucked up more than most people because I'm older than most people. I mean, maybe that's not technically true, but that's how it feels.

Greg Kyte: So you've learned more. So. So let me let me interpret that. So you've learned more lessons. So you're like, I'm the guy who who learned through the hard way how to do this. Right.

Caleb Newquist: Uh, more or less. Yes.

Greg Kyte: Yeah. Because that because that's for me, I am I don't, I hate even like [00:31:30] I'm doing I do remodel projects around my house all the time. I really enjoy it and but I, I don't I hate hiring people to do anything that I feel like I could possibly do, like even demolition work. I love doing demolition work. And even though you think you can't mess up demo, uh, I'm totally going. You know what? Nobody's gonna do it with the love that I put into it. So I don't want to. I want to do all that stuff my own self. So so so. But but when we talk about business [00:32:00] and you talk about, uh, managing people and delegating stuff, the only way that you're going to be able to build a business, to scale a business is if you're able to manage people, if you're able to delegate stuff. So I know that my aversion to those things actually limits my earning potential. And I get it. It's a trade off because I still don't don't want to do that stuff. But, uh, Kevin Hart, obviously he's built and scaled businesses and that has required him to hire lots of people. Like I said, he has at least 80 [00:32:30] employees. Um, but by doing that, by building and scaling your business, it also opens you up to fraud, because think about it, uh, if you have zero employees and you have zero partners, uh, you will never be the victim of embezzlement.

Caleb Newquist: No one. No.

Greg Kyte: Right.

Caleb Newquist: True, true. Because like.

Greg Kyte: Because, like, we talk. We talk all the time about separation of duties. But also there's the one exception where it's like there's there's no one but me. Every cent in every cent [00:33:00] that I'm dealing with is my money anyways. So, uh, no one can. It's kind of the, uh, the, uh, the dragon. Smaug the dragon, uh, his his business method, where he obviously you can have. Siders who come in and try to steal your gold, but nobody inside your corporation can because you do it all yourself.

Caleb Newquist: Yeah, you're the only one.

Greg Kyte: So if you're a big celebrity just to be a celebrity above and beyond your [00:33:30] tequila company or your venture capital firm, you have probably got to have an entourage of people like an agent, like a manager. And I have no idea how an agent is different from a manager. And you probably have a publicist, and likely you have a designer. And in Kevin's Hart case, he also had a personal shopper. Uh, yeah. But but which seems seems.

Caleb Newquist: Mm. Seems crucial. Maybe [00:34:00] in the world of Kevin Hart.

Greg Kyte: It does again, if you've got six businesses plus you, like we said at the beginning, if you got six.

Caleb Newquist: Businesses, you don't really have time to just like hop over to the Nordstrom. Right. And like and like and like peruse.

Greg Kyte: You know I don't I don't know how you have time for anything. If you've got six businesses and you're always making Capital One commercials and comedy specials and movies.

Caleb Newquist: So there's a Capital One. I [00:34:30] thought it was American Express.

Greg Kyte: Maybe it's American Express.

Caleb Newquist: Whatever. It's a credit card.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, it's one of them. So, uh, so whatever.

Caleb Newquist: It's whatever, whichever credit card he's using the most, that's the one he's sponsoring. Right?

Greg Kyte: I'm sure you're absolutely right. Uh, so, yeah, like, so he obviously had need for a personal shopper. And in 2015, I don't think this was his his first personal shopper. But in 2015, Kevin Hart, uh, began his relationship with a man named [00:35:00] Dylan. Jason Sayer. Uh, Saya was hired by Kevin Hart to obtain several garments. And I gotta say, going back to that Peacock show, the Hart to Hart show. Uh, Kevin Hart, spiffy dresser. Like. Okay, he he's his his sweater game was was tip top. Man I like honestly watching that this summer I, I have purposely I bought a bunch of sweaters going into winter going wow this is going to be [00:35:30] this is going to be the winter of, of crewneck sweaters, uh, for, for Greg Kite. And that was inspired by Kevin Hart. I was not able to find any sweaters that were nearly as cool as Kevin Hart's sweaters, so. Well, I have to imagine.

Caleb Newquist: I have to imagine these are, uh, you know, the, uh, these these are the these are the four figure sweaters, perhaps, right, that I don't think.

Greg Kyte: I don't think any of us personal shoppers were shopping at Kohl's the way that Greg Kite, uh, did. [00:36:00] Uh, I have a personal shopper. Uh, but it's me.

Caleb Newquist: It's me. Oh, I'm very good. Yeah.

Greg Kyte: Uh, so here's here's a quote going back to to Dylan Jason Sayer, his his buyer. This was a quote from the Queens County DA's office. One of their press releases. It says, uh, sire first became acquainted with the actor comedian in 2015 through his personal shopping business, Sire Consulting LLC, through which he was contracted to [00:36:30] obtain several items for the actor. Through that connection, the defendant acquired Mr. Hart's various credit card numbers with the understanding that they would only make authorized purchases. Instead, he allegedly made over $1 million worth of unauthorized unauthorized charges on those credit cards over the course of 19 months. So I very boring fraud, if you're asking me.

Caleb Newquist: Uh, yeah. I mean, he just, uh, you know, he. Yeah, [00:37:00] he used a legitimate. He used a legitimate credit card to make legitimate, uh, purchases. Yeah, but he just kept the shit, right?

Greg Kyte: Right. Well, well, yeah, but $1.

Caleb Newquist: Million worth of shit. Yes, I might add.

Greg Kyte: So, yeah, he was the personal shopper for a super rich guy. So he got the super rich guy's credit card so that he could do his job, which is shopping. And while he was shopping for the client, he also went shopping for himself. That's the fraud. That's right. That's the that's the whole damn thing. [00:37:30] And, uh, and and I know I love this part of every fraud we look at here are some of the more expensive and the weirder things that he bought. Slash stole I.

Caleb Newquist: Can't wait.

Greg Kyte: He he bought, uh, five, uh, Patek Philippe watches. Which Patek. Yeah, that's what I sure it's.

Caleb Newquist: Patek.

Greg Kyte: Patek Philippe watches. Uh, I googled him just to see what they looked like. And, uh, and just on the Google search that I found out, there's a one watch worth $8.5 [00:38:00] million. So, yeah, this guy.

Caleb Newquist: They're very.

Greg Kyte: Nice, very, very nice. He didn't steal the $8.5 million one because he only he only stole. He's not.

Caleb Newquist: Even he's not even doing.

Greg Kyte: It right. He was or he was.

Caleb Newquist: What kind of personal shopper can't get the most expensive watch right.

Greg Kyte: But he. But listen, he had five of them and his and his whole thing didn't even come up to to. Well, it came up to like 1.25 million. Is about the the total that he stole. He bought he bought a Sam Friedman, [00:38:30] uh, painting, which was so funny because I was like, wait a second, wasn't Sam Friedman the guy who ran FTX? And then I was like, no, that's that's Sam Bankman-Fried. So it was close. Different guy. Uh, close. But, uh, yeah. But and I and I looked up some of his, some very nice abstract art he had here's he bought a couple of Louis Vuitton bags, which I go, that seems like a hack purchase to me.

Caleb Newquist: Fucking basic is so, so.

Greg Kyte: So basic. [00:39:00]

Caleb Newquist: But then basic.

Greg Kyte: He bought he bought 16 Bearbrick collectible dolls. Okay, now now.

Caleb Newquist: I'm impressed because I don't even know what the fuck those are. I didn't.

Greg Kyte: Either. I had to look him up. I had to look. And then he bought. He also bought five cause. Cause five cause collectible dolls as well. Look them both up. I kind of get it. They're sort of these artsy. They look. It's more like you're not buying a doll, you're buying art. And [00:39:30] there is sort of this, I mean, for it's still dolls. I don't know how much street cred you can have with dolls, but if you're going to have street cred with dolls, I'm going to say Bearbrick and Kaws are probably the ones that are going to do it. So really?

Caleb Newquist: Yeah.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, look him up, look him up. I will put a link. We'll put a link in the show.

Caleb Newquist: Show notes I will, maybe I'll look and you can.

Greg Kyte: Look at and you'll agree with me. It's like okay it says dolls. It's not like Barbies. It's not like they like.

Caleb Newquist: Are they like those [00:40:00] Russian nesting dolls? No, no, no, except they're made out of, like, doubloons.

Greg Kyte: No, they're fucking okay. They're weird. They're weird. Uh, it's like, if I don't know. Do you know who Modest Mouse is?

Caleb Newquist: Sure.

Greg Kyte: And they have that head with the mouse. Head with a little x eyes. It's like the these dolls remind me of, like, Modest Mouse. So go just Google them. You'll get it. Just pause the pause the fucking podcast and Google Bearbrick and [00:40:30] caused dolls and then get back here and it'll make better sense. But anyways, here's what this Dylan, uh, Jason Singer guy does. Is he he he buys over $1 million worth of stuff on Kevin Hart's, uh, credit cards. And he he he shows them all off on his Instagram page. Just brilliant. Just that's how that's really how you you do, you do fraud is you steal the stuff and then show it off on social media. So that's, that's that that's arguably how the dude got [00:41:00] caught. And when he, when they did arrest him, they, they searched his home and they seized, uh, $250,000. Which of uh, worth of assets, uh, which I hope was really $250,000 worth of exclusively weird dolls. Just I want to see FBI agents with boxes of dolls hauling them to their vans.

Caleb Newquist: I want to see FBI. I want to actually I want to see FBI agents like, backing slowly out of the room because they're so freaked out over.

Greg Kyte: Yeah, okay. [00:41:30]

Caleb Newquist: Weird ass.

Greg Kyte: This is this is what he did. Uh, maybe. Maybe we should have.

Caleb Newquist: We actually can't place you under arrest. Maybe we should. Maybe we should.

Greg Kyte: Have worn out. We should have worn our bulletproof vests. Uh, here, here's another quote from the the Queens County DA's office. Uh, it says regardless of whether you're a celebrity or not, anyone can fall victim to this kind of fraud, which is wrong. Not everyone can. Only people who hire personal shoppers can [00:42:00] be, uh, victims of this kind of fraud. But regardless, she went on to say, it is paramount to keep track of your expenses, check your credit card reports, and diligently keep your financial information to yourself. And I will tell you that bugs the hell out of me that they would say that because, uh, if everyone if everyone kept track of their expenses, then yeah, this this, it's. And it's not that this wouldn't happen. It's just that it would get detected more [00:42:30] quickly if everyone did that. But like we said before, if you're scaling your business, you have to delegate things. Things like tracking your expenses. And if Kevin Hart was tracking his expenses, that's all he would do all day, every day is track his goddamn expenses. He wouldn't have time to do a show or to exercise or to venture his capital. He would just be a very, very busy accounts payable clerk.

Caleb Newquist: So, [00:43:00] Greg, uh, did we learn anything?

Greg Kyte: We did, I did. Uh, okay. One of the things, as much as I. As much as I hate this, uh, it's true. You can't be in business without exposing yourself to the risk of being a victim of fraud. And the reason why I. I hate that is it? And I and I know we've we've touched on this in prior episodes. [00:43:30] It's it's like the retail stores where they just they basically they almost have an expense item in their budget that says, we know that shoplifters will steal this much of what we've got in our store. So we've just got to make sure we price appropriately to cover that as a just as a like I said, it's just it's a it's a cost of doing business. And I think that anyone at Kevin Hart is a great example of this. Courtney Love is even a bigger example of this where it's like [00:44:00] you, I mean, I think with Courtney Love, she, like you kept pointing out she was an easy target because if she's stoned all the time, it's probably pretty easy to take her stuff. Uh, yeah.

Caleb Newquist: She's not paying attention, but. But she also, by her own, by her own admission, she's like, I'm I'm spending I'm spending lots of money. Yeah. And I trusted people to do stuff and. Right. And that wasn't paying attention.

Greg Kyte: And that's the thing you've got to trust people to do [00:44:30] stuff for you when you're in business. And and right there, that means that you are exposing yourself to the to, to the risk of becoming a victim of fraud. Because any time you trust somebody to do something, they could violate your trust and they could take that. So but but also I we have to realize and this is something I got to talk myself through, is that it's the whole risk reward thing that you you got to take that risk to be in business. And, and like we said before, I, I, I don't take I well, I [00:45:00] don't like delegating, I don't like managing people. And so because of that, I understand that I'm limiting my earning potential because I'm not I'm mostly I don't like doing that kind of work. But also there's not that risk that I'm taking by doing it. So I think that has to be said. But the the big lesson that I think really comes from both of these, uh, these celebrities is just and it's, it's financial literacy, but it's also making sure that you're [00:45:30] taking responsibility for the financial side of the business. Uh, and this really, I mean, the whole thing, the quote that you read, one of the quotes you read about Courtney Love really brought it home.

Greg Kyte: Is this like she. Because what what what did the quote say? It was like my attorney found five fake wills and 60 something credit cards and this many bank accounts and all this kind of stuff. And I go, it sounds like your attorney just pulled your credit [00:46:00] report. Uh, I don't think they did. Like it wasn't a big, like, private investigator gumshoe. I think they just pulled your credit report says, do you have 5000 credit cards that you're actively using? Miss miss Love. And she's like, nope, I've got three. And it's like, cool. Let's maybe close some of these bitches down. Yeah. And that's so whoever you are and I don't I don't care if this is just if you know listener get your credit, get your credit report the actual [00:46:30] one from the credit bureaus, you get a free one every year. Um, I get I get rate. Do you have do you have any of those credit cards that give you like updates for your credit score? Like if it changes, I do, yeah, I do too. Like my Costco Visa card through Citibank does that. Um, but but that's not that's not going to help you. Because if you've never gotten your actual have you ever gotten your actual credit report from. Yeah, from the bureaus I have.

Caleb Newquist: Um, but I admit that it's been a while.

Greg Kyte: Right.

Caleb Newquist: It's it's [00:47:00] been those services also do good. Uh, they do a good job of monitoring your activity. So if something like a new account is opened, um, uh, they notify you, they're like. Or it is something that shows up. And so, um, for what it's worth, um, you know, unless you really want to see it for yourself, the activity is, is pretty well monitored through other means.

Greg Kyte: And see, don't kick my legs out from underneath me. Caleb. [00:47:30] Newquist. Sorry about that. You gotta get the actual freaking report. Because. No, because because what's awesome about that is when you go through, if you go through the entire report, if you will see stuff because like what I bought this was seven years ago, I bought a sleep number bed from the sleep number store, and I think they had some 0% financing or something like that. So I was like coolest. And I paid it off though still in like a couple of months. Uh, but on my credit. But, you know, and on the credit report, it doesn't [00:48:00] come through as sleep number bed. It comes through as whatever the holding company, whatever the bank. Is. Yeah, something like that. But it's but it's a worthwhile exercise to go through there and go. I don't recognize this. What is it? Tie it back and go, oh, okay. Sleep number bed. Right. It that makes sense. That's taken care of. That's closed down. If you do that. And it doesn't have to be all the time, the more often you do it, the better. And this stuff. But again, with these frauds that we're talking about, Courtney Love probably would have saved millions of dollars had [00:48:30] she or a trusted person done that for her on a regular basis.

Greg Kyte: So it's it's easy and it takes care of it. Um, also and again, I know like the the formula for getting a high credit score is weird, but I'm a big I'm a big proponent of closing, like consolidating your credit cards. If you've just accumulated a bunch of cards and you don't, you don't. You know, you don't need them. You you don't need a lot of cards, right? You [00:49:00] maybe need two tops. I have exactly one credit card that I use and that's it. And I would say simplify everything to where it gets down to the minimum number of things that you need. Close everything else down. It might, like I said, it might monkey with your credit score for a minute, but not for long. Do that. Take care of that. Um, a third another thing that I, that I think of, and this is more on the Kevin Hart side with his personal shopper, is that there are companies out there like divvy, [00:49:30] which was recently purchased by Bill, and Bill used to be Bill.com. Uh, and now divvy is not divvy anymore.

Caleb Newquist: It's. Wait, Bill wasn't William I don't I'm so confused.

Greg Kyte: No, it wasn't Bill. Bill is short for Bill.com. Oh, not for William comm. And now divvy is not divi. Divi is now bill spending expense, which is a horrible name. And I'm. But I'm not trying. That's the name of A.

Caleb Newquist: That's a name of a [00:50:00] business.

Greg Kyte: That's the name of divvy now. And divvy is a it's like a, it's a business spend uh, solution. So basically with divvy, I'm just going to call it divvy. I've done some work for them. Back when they were divvy, they had a full.

Caleb Newquist: Disclosure, ladies and gentlemen, full disclosure.

Greg Kyte: Oh, well, full disclosure too. I tried to contact him to say, hey, you should sponsor this episode. And they and and they they they blackballed [00:50:30] me. Well, they didn't blackballed me. They just I probably they probably had a full day of work and didn't look at, have time to respond to my email. But regardless, they should have sponsored this episode. No, they could have they could have told you everything they do. But it's not because it's not just it's not just like, hey, we need a credit limit on this for this personal for this card. But it's also like, you can you can, uh, you have it's like real time reporting that you can see of all of the cards [00:51:00] that you have out there, what they're spending it on, how much they're spending. So, so in theory, even if you've got a bunch of people spending it, there's one place you go to and you go, you can look through there and see if anything seems huge, seems excessive, seems like a weird place for people to buy stuff. So there's ways that you can track it. So there's products like that that are out there. There's also a very interesting thing about virtual credit cards that you just use one time. Are you familiar with these?

Caleb Newquist: I don't believe I am.

Greg Kyte: It's amazing because it's it's it's like you, [00:51:30] you have a credit card number that's good for one specific transaction and that's it. So that then if the, if, if you get that number out there and it's and anyone tries to use it a second time, it'll be automatically declined. So there's a lot of.

Caleb Newquist: Stuff that's real. That's some real uh like beautiful mind shit right there.

Greg Kyte: It's it's it's pretty interesting and it makes a lot of sense because of how many times, like, you, you get it. Well, like, for instance, when I had to sign up when we did the Claudia Viles, the very, very, very [00:52:00] nice lady who did some fraud episodes, I had to I had to like, pay $0.25 or something like this for a four month subscription to the Outer Reaches Main Journal or something like this to get access to the fabulous to this. But and it was one of those things where it was like $0.25 for four months, and then after that it's $100 a day. I don't know what it was. It was something, but I was like, I wish I had one of these virtual cards so I could pay my $0.25 and then not have to worry [00:52:30] about going back and canceling it, because the card just won't work when they try to use it again. So there's there's good things like that, but also it helps a lot when you're dealing with people like a vendor that you have to give a card to to go and do some shopping, because then they can only do that shopping and then the card's gone. So there's stuff like that you can look into. Technology can help you with a lot of fraud stuff. And hey, companies that have stuff like that, we have slots that you can buy on. Oh my fraud to get the word out.

Caleb Newquist: All [00:53:00] right. That's it for this episode. And remember, just because you can read the words In God We Trust on a $20 bill that doesn't make you financially illiterate.

Greg Kyte: And also remember, there's no way your personal shopper can steal with you if you never hire a personal shopper.

Caleb Newquist: If you want to drop us a line, send us an email at oh my fraud at earmark Cpcomm Greg Kite, where are you on the internet? [00:53:30]

Greg Kyte: Uh, you can you can reach me on LinkedIn. Let's do that one. Okay. I'm Greg Kite, CPA on LinkedIn, I think is just, uh, linkedin.com/greg Kite, and you can find me. What about you, Caleb? Where can people get a hold of you?

Caleb Newquist: Yeah, sure. Linkedin. Caleb. Newquist. First name, last name.

Greg Kyte: Oh, my fraud is written by Caleb Newquist and myself. Our producer is Zach Franc. Rate review and subscribe [00:54:00] to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. If you listen on earmark, you can earn free CPE credit too. Or alternatively, if you buy a subscription to earmark, you can get all your CPE. So easy, so fast. That's what I do. I highly recommend it.

Caleb Newquist: Be like Greg, everybody.

Greg Kyte: Do it and join us next time for more avarice, swindlers and scams from stories that will make you say, oh my frog, my fraud.