Oh wait, except De Angelis, while he did face consequences, didn't face *horrific* consequences. I guess turning himself in might not have yielded better results for him after all (although it likely still did in expectation, he got lucky).
This is a sort of baffling story to me, on a couple levels. By the time he founded Allied Crude Vegetable Oil, he seems to have had over a decade of experience doing fraud. Maybe two decades or more? The post doesn't say this but if you told me he started doing fraud at 15 I'd believe you. But it seems only relatively late in his career did he go down the path of "do increasingly big fraud to hide your previous fraud". What changed? How did a seasoned fraudster screw up like that?
Also: the possibility that he was laundering money for the mob is only mentioned as a way one of his victims conned themselves, but I can't help but wonder if he was actually a mobster? The way his "goons" are described makes them sound like mob soldiers, but it isn't explicitly claimed they did any violence for him, or even did threats of violence. They're only ever described as confederates in cons. What's going on there?
Thank you for giving this American hero the fair and balanced treatment he deserves. A lesser biographer would have been taken in by the slanders of his enemies.
> Schematically, the Food for Peace program involved paying farmers for surplus goods, and then giving those goods to starving people in low- and middle-income countries. However, this was a very unpopular program. So it was made more complicated than that in the hopes the American people would fail to understand what the program did. For their services overcomplicating the program to confuse the American people, commodity export companies made hefty profits.
Is this supposed to be be condemnation or praise? Given what happened to USAID earlier this year, “an unpopular foreign aid policy was saved by making it confusing” could be read either way.
Seems like a good time to link an old post of yours :P https://thingofthings.substack.com/p/fraudsters-turn-yourself-in
Oh wait, except De Angelis, while he did face consequences, didn't face *horrific* consequences. I guess turning himself in might not have yielded better results for him after all (although it likely still did in expectation, he got lucky).
This is a sort of baffling story to me, on a couple levels. By the time he founded Allied Crude Vegetable Oil, he seems to have had over a decade of experience doing fraud. Maybe two decades or more? The post doesn't say this but if you told me he started doing fraud at 15 I'd believe you. But it seems only relatively late in his career did he go down the path of "do increasingly big fraud to hide your previous fraud". What changed? How did a seasoned fraudster screw up like that?
Also: the possibility that he was laundering money for the mob is only mentioned as a way one of his victims conned themselves, but I can't help but wonder if he was actually a mobster? The way his "goons" are described makes them sound like mob soldiers, but it isn't explicitly claimed they did any violence for him, or even did threats of violence. They're only ever described as confederates in cons. What's going on there?
There is no evidence he had mob ties. I think it is just useful and not that difficult to acquire two dozen loyal henchpersons to help you do crimes.
I think the joke is that while he wasn't actually a member of the Mafia, it sure looked like he was.
But yeah, as far as I can see on Google, he wasn't actually a member and his goons were just people he was paying to do fraud with him.
Thank you for giving this American hero the fair and balanced treatment he deserves. A lesser biographer would have been taken in by the slanders of his enemies.
> I have no explanation for the discrepancy
Presumably Opus Dei's fault.
This story has inspired me to write the story of Duke Hanley, a giant among men as long as he wears high heels and the men are pygmies.
> Schematically, the Food for Peace program involved paying farmers for surplus goods, and then giving those goods to starving people in low- and middle-income countries. However, this was a very unpopular program. So it was made more complicated than that in the hopes the American people would fail to understand what the program did. For their services overcomplicating the program to confuse the American people, commodity export companies made hefty profits.
Is this supposed to be be condemnation or praise? Given what happened to USAID earlier this year, “an unpopular foreign aid policy was saved by making it confusing” could be read either way.
Turning a useful aid program into a moneymaker for fraudulent companies seems pretty dumb to me