Wondertrash®

PI to the stars Anthony Pellicano, along with 4 other defendants, has been found guilty in the trail that shook Hollywood. To get your up to speed, Pellicano was Hollywood's Mr Fix It for years. When ever anyone had a problems, Big Mean Tony was the guy they turned to. For instance, when Michael Jackson was accused of getting inappropriately friendly with a young boy, Pellicano was the man who dug up the dirt on the mother. When the jury found out that the woman turned to welfare fraud to help make ends meet, she lost all creditability (plus a lot of sympathy), and Jacko got to go free.

Pellicano in fact might have been one of the most helpful men in Hollywood. When a distraught Chris Rock was accused by a woman of getting her pregnant, a woman whom he claims he never even met, Rock turned to Pellicano. When a nosy journalist started asking question about action film star Stephen Segal's mob affiliations, Pellicano left a dead fish on her windshield as some kind of vague threat cryptic warning. No one was exactly sure of the symbolism behind the fish, but since it was dead the point seemed to be clear enough.

Pellicano liked to play with recording equipment as part of his job. In order to get the dirt, he'd bug the objects of his investigations. Using a mac computer and a word recognition program, he recorded thousands of hours of all star phone talk. He'd then pour through the mundane details of celeb's lives, looking for the juicy bit that he could use for blackmail negotiations.

This little service came in handy when Tom Cruise was divorcing Nic Kidman. Kidman swore her phones were being tapped, and would interrupt conversation by abruptly asking "Did you get that Tom?" Naturally folks thought that she was cracking up, until it was revealed that Cruise had put Hollywood Tony on the case (Kidman apparently did have some sort of a breakdown during the divorce. She would sometimes spend days holed up in her bedroom, and start screeching if she heard any of her staff moving around the house.). Kidman was in fact on some of the recordings. There is even a rumor that he found out something 'explosive' about her.

Pellicano really started getting into heavy shit when he became wiretapping studio executives on behest of Paramount head, and Soprano's producer Brad Grey. Seems that Mr Grey wanted to get an unfair advantage over his competition, and that's where tony came in. He was the guy you turned to when you wanted an unfair advantage.

While the federal government was investigating him on the Anita Busch case, she was the reporter snooping around Segal's background, a warrant was obtained to search Pellicano's offices. They found some home made explosives, and a mess of C4 in his office safe. That wasn't the only explosive material they found. They also happened upon the tapes that sent shock waves through Tinseltown.

So the biggest trial in entertainment history geared up, as Hollywood stood back in fear that every skeleton in the closet might come tumbling out. Such luminaries as Sylvester Stallone, Keith Caradine, Gary Shandling, and Kevin Nealon found themselves on the witness stand. During Stallone's testimony it was revealed that Pelicano was the only guy that Sly was really afraid of.

Gossip hounds were waiting, eager with anticipation, for Hollywood's darkest secrets to come to light. In that context the trial produced an anti climax. The more salacious stuff never made it to light, though the jury were treated to some panicky phone calls from Chris Rock, to Mr Pellicano, begging for help with his 'girl friend problems'. In the end, Pellicano was found guilty on 76 out of 77 racketeering charges (It took the jury 9 days to reach the verdict, and the judge - Dale S. Fischer - a full hour tor ead it!). Director John McTiernan and Pellicano’s girlfriend, actress Sandra Will Carradine (ex-wife of Keith Carradine) also went down with him, both pleading guilty as charges. Hollywood can now breath a collective sigh of relief. However Pellicano looks forward to spending the rest of his life in prison, he will have plenty of time to pen the tell all book that could keep his family and descendants well provided for on into the next century! While Hollywood did emerge from this harrowing trial relatively unscathed, it has served to remind everyone what's crawling around under the rocks out there in LA. Meanwhile the 64 year old Anthony Pellicano has until his September sentencing to contemplate his future, and brood over his secrets.

Wondertrash Bogus Zen:

When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I'm beginning to believe it.
Clarence Darrow

It's good to know that in America the top job is open to anyone; anyone with a spare $150 million to spend on a campaign. Just because America is the Land of the Free doesn't mean that things come cheap. It's the land of the Golden Rule, and they what has the gold gets to make the rules, just as they who pays the piper gets to call the tune. I just hope that who ever gets elected remembers the little people who put them in office - the lobbyists with the brown paper bags filled with cash!

Wondertrash word of the day: meat suit

The human body, especially one's flesh, suggesting the burdens of corporeality for an otherwise ethereal being. For instance the soul in the body could be considered as a shadow hiding in a meat suit.

"Why did I have to be reincarnated into this meat suit?"

Check out Jethro Tull's Thick as a Brick over at Foxytunes.