Chrisley Knows Bunk
This Week In Blunders – May 25-31
“Reality TV to me is the museum of social decay.” - Gary Oldman
Todd and Julie Chrisley walked out of federal prison this week thanks to another eyebrow-raising pardon from President Donald Trump. But the worst part of this nauseating little carnival ride came Friday
That’s when the reality TV celebrities held a press conference in their hometown of Nashville, Tenn., and hinted at a new show. Cameras “started filming literally the night that we got home,” Todd Chrisley said.
Anyone smart enough to read Business Blunders has probably never watched “Chrisley Knows Best,” which ran from 2014 through 2023. It followed the antics of a Bible-thumping, Southern family headed by a phony real estate millionaire and his gag-worthy excesses.
Turns out, it was far from reality and Chrisley didn’t know best. In 2022, the couple was convicted for defrauding banks out of over $30 million and dodging taxes.
Todd, 57, had been serving a 12-year sentence at Florida's FPC Pensacola minimum-security men's federal prison, and Julie, 52, was serving a seven-year sentence at the FMC Lexington prison in Kentucky.
Their daughter, Savannah, pushed for their pardons by sucking up to the GOP. She recounted that a prosecutor called her family “the Trumps of the South.”
“He meant it as an insult, but let me tell you, boy, do I wear that as a badge of honor,” she said.
Trump was a reality TV star and a convicted felon, too. His sympathies for crooks apparently run deep, pardoning hundreds of people, including 1,500 capital riot offenders, and even convicted drug dealer and violent criminals as he rails against Mexican drug cartels.
Not all pardons go well. Just before reluctantly leaving office in January 2021, Trump pardoned Eliyahu Weinstein, a convicted ponzi schemer. Weinstein was indicted again for running a new scam in February 2024.
To be fair, setting white-collar criminals loose on the world is a bipartisan enterprise because money talks. Biden freed a whole slew of swindlers before leaving office.
He commuted the sentences of:
Marc Dreier, Sentenced to 20 years in July 2009 for a $400 million Ponzi scheme.
Timothy McGinn – Sentenced to 15 years in August 2013 for a $130 million scam.
Brian Callahan – Sentenced to 12 years in September 2017 for a $96 million racket.
Gregory McKnight – Sentenced to 15 years in August 2013 a for a $72 million Ponzi grift.
Andrew Mackey – Sentenced to 27 years for a $12 million ripoff.
The Chrisleys may be the most sickening pardoned swindlers of them all because they’re planning a show where they promise to declare their innocence and push for criminal justice system reforms.
We now live in a world where criminals get to freely target their prosecutors – especially the ones with just enough fame and fortune to enjoy our two-tiered justice system. Why does the TV-viewing public put up with these abominations? Because we are a nation full of dupes who are always looking for a new Ponzi scheme to wishfully grow our money.
Here’s what Todd said at his press conference:
“Whether you believe it or not — because I was you at some point — even though this pardon has happened, I still was convicted of something that I did not do.”
“It could be you. It could be you, it could be any of you. And somewhere in this room, someone has had a family member that has been affected by the system.”
“You’re placed in a position as a defendant to either bow down and kiss the ass of the Department of Justice and accept responsibility for things that you did not do in order to avoid a stronger sentence.”
Personally, I’d prefer a reality TV show about the Chrisleys navigating the prison system for years on end and kissing the asses of fellow inmates.
USA Network might as well make a series about somebody’s drunk uncle claiming he’s not an alcoholic.
Dr. Cash, the Money Doctor and the Magician
Don’t take financial advise or give your money to anyone with a stupid nickname.
“Dr. Cash” received a three-year prison sentence on Thursday after recruiting victims in “church wealth seminars.” His real name was Terrance Chalk, 62, and if his unwary investors knew that, they might have discovered that he was convicted of multiple fraud offenses in 2006.
“He used this [church] setting to his advantage, holding himself out as a man of faith who was seeking to help other Christians like himself,” prosecutors said.
There are may be as many church swindlers as there are churches. Not long ago, there was this old Christian radio host William “Doc” Gallagher who called himself the “Money Doctor.” He wrote a book called “Jesus Christ: Money Master.” He was sentenced to 25 years in 2020 for fleecing the flock out of millions.
Makes you wish there really is a place called hell, doesn’t it?
Truly miraculous, however, was Rafael Alvarez, “the magician.” Between 2010 and 2020, his tax preparation firm in the Bronx, prepared 90,000 tax returns. His clients must have been really happy with the results. His work cheated the IRS out of $145 million, according to prosectors.
Alvarez received a four-year prison sentence on Thursday.
“Rafael Alvarez was touted as ‘the Magician’ when, in reality, he was an elaborate fraudster,” said U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton. “All Americans bear the burden of tax fraud and want scamsters of this type brought to justice.”
Except for maybe the tax-dodging Chrisleys?
Basketball Jones
Today we welcome Michael “Mickey” Monus to the Business Blunders Hall of Shame, where we remember the mistakes of the past in hopes for a better future.
This is a man who followed his dreams and made history in the 1990s for one of the largest corporate frauds in U.S. history – only to be surpassed by Enron and WorldCom in the 2000s.
Monus was a former high school basketball player who stood 5’9” tall. He went on to create the very short-lived World Basketball League, a professional minor league featuring players under under 6'5" tall.
Monus was also an original owner of the Colorado Rockies baseball team that began playing in 1993.
He funded his sports fantasies with about $10 million he stole from Phar-Mor, the pharmacy chain he founded in his hometown of Youngstown, Ohio, in 1982.
Monus grew Phar-Mor to 300 stores in 33 states in just ten years – but he did it by doctoring the books.
The retailer falsely inflated earnings to conceal massive operating losses. The $1 billion scheme involved every trick from fake inventory counts to bogus invoices.
Phar-Mor filed bankruptcy in 1992. And in 1995, Monus was convicted on 109 counts of fraud and embezzlement. He subsequently served 10 years in prison.
And today, Phar-Mor is no more.
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