Part One: The King of Con Artists, Victor Lustig

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hmm, what's still in the zevia on my work laptop
and fucking my life up for days? My me at
thirty when I finished working last night. This is Robert
Evans hosted Behind the Bastards, recording immediately after the worst

(00:20):
disaster to happen to me in in tens of hours,
just a just a tremendous funk up last night as
I was standing up from my work desk and uh,
I am, I am, I am in a bad way.
Friends and fam Lee my guest today to help me
through this this tragically difficult time is Sharene, Lonnie, Unice, Sharine,

(00:43):
how are you doing? Thank you for waiting forty minutes
for me to get my gaming laptop ready to be
my working laptop. It is okay. Me and Sophie had
a much needed catch up. And I mean, yeah, you're
having a much better worse day than I am. And
I am I'm having a trash day. Yeah, I'm very sorry,
and I mean, honestly, I commend you for even recording

(01:04):
with me today. You know, oh no, no, no, the
show must go on, even if the laptop that wrote
it seems to be permafued um. But I guess, well,
time will tell on that one. Yeah, I do think
it's funny that you were drinking a zvia though those
are great. That's Robert's favorite thing. I don't know what
I have all the flavors in the house. I don't
know which one I was. I thought your favorite was

(01:26):
the ginger. That's probably my favorite. But there's different zvias
for different times. There's like a squirt style zvia that's
like kind of citrusy. That's very good. Um, the grape
one is quite nice. That's one of my favorites one
if I'm kind of a the ginger ailes great. I
have the Cherry Cola and the dr Pepper knockoffs for

(01:48):
when I'm like because they have caffeine that's like my
my during the day drink. There's a there's a there's
a decaf cola that I'll have later in the evening
before I switch over to my nighttime zvia. Is that
I take you ever water in between? No? Why would
I fish fucking that? Do you want come in your
in your in your body? No? No, thank you. I

(02:09):
was gonna say. I brought that up because I thought
it was might maybe one of those things where like
you were you're gonna hate Zevia forever now, but you
can't do that. You're not the Zvia's fault that I
dropped a beverage that that that can't be blamed upon
the Zvia. There have been hundreds of zebas on this
desk that did not trash my laptop, So the fault

(02:31):
must lie with me or I don't know if the
government feels like a good thing to blame the government for.
It's on every day a white man takes responsibility, So
I really applauded you for that. It's it's definitely an
even mix of me and the government. How do you
feel about con artists con artists con artists? I mean,

(02:53):
depending on the con I'm okey kind of respect a
fascinated by then yeah, um, because I think it's like
there's a I don't know what it is, but there's
probably a particular personality type or something. It's like equivalent
of pathological lying to me, and they're very good at it,

(03:15):
and there's something very like scary interesting to me about that,
you know. And there you know, there's con artists in
every society. And we will in part to talk about
a con artist in India, but I think con artists
are the most American thing you can be, because this
is a nation. As a song I partly remember said
Americans love freedom, and nothing says freedom like getting away

(03:37):
with a crime. And that's like what we love con
artists like even when they're fucking as as long as
it's not like we hate them when they've specifically fucked
us over, but as long as they haven't specifically sucked
us over, we love them. And I didn't mean respect,
like a loving respect. I just meant like, depending on
the cont Like, that's what I'm saying, Like, like, if
it's like a funny scam that doesn't hurt anyone, I'm

(03:59):
all about that. But obviously the majority, You're right, it's
the most American thing to do is to exploit people
and then benefit from it, you know, Yeah, I mean
they mostly hurt people. Like I love l Ron Hubbard.
I'm I'm I'm very on the record about my my
deep appreciation for that man and his schemes. Um, because
they're just so I don't love l Ron Hubbard. How

(04:19):
did you say that with a straight face? He's the
absolute best. He stole his own baby, He stole his
own baby. He stole his own baby and made himself
a god and then had teenagers search for gold in
the ocean. He was a sick, sick person. He was wonderful. Um,
Yes he did. He left an unthinkable amount of human

(04:40):
shrapnel in his wake, but he's so fun to read about. Uh.
And the guy we're talking about today is a better person. Um.
And if we're being entirely honest, both of our characters today,
I don't know. I guess you could probably if if
there if they count as among the worst people in history,
they're on the very low end of that bar. You're
not you know, mass probably not mass rapists, definitely not

(05:03):
mass murderers. Um. But they did scam and destroy the
financial lives of a lot of people, depending on your
they both targeted rich people, so it's gonna be pretty
easy to sympathize with both of them. I felt like
we needed a little bit of a break. Um. And
I love a good connartist story. That's the thing I'm
all about, a Robin Hood story. You know, like if

(05:24):
you're scamming from corporations or very rich people, Like if
you're scamming Jeff Bezos, keep doing that, you know what
I mean? Like, I would love you to keep that. Um,
but yeah, I'm a robin Hood kind of scammer. I
like that. Both the guys were talking about today loved
to portray themselves as robin Hood style characters. They were not.

(05:45):
They did steal from the rich to give to themselves,
like and generally more like stell from the upper middle
class to give to themselves. Um, robin Hood would be
taking it a bit far. But they're both very entertaining men.
And we're going to start with the tale of Victor Lustig.
Have you ever heard of Victor Lustig? I don't know,
I don't think so. Yeah, he's he's a hoot. So

(06:08):
Victor was born on January four, probably in Hostine, Austria, Hungary.
So this is back when you know that country existed
before they made a series of bad decisions. Why are
we saying probably, well, because he's a con artist. And
there's a debate as to whether I mean to be honest.
Does they also say he's six to there's no hard

(06:29):
evidence this man was born at all. He definitely existed,
but we have no idea where he was born. I
like Sharnes. I like Sharnes comment. So he also say
six too, and he got his degree from insert faith
university here. Who are we talking about here? I was
just teasing about how you can't rely on what people

(06:51):
like you care, why on the age or whatever, And
I was just making jokes that men live out their height,
that's all. Yeah. I mean he he lied about absolutely
every aspect of his life. And it's probably That's why
I say probably he claimed for his whole life to
have been born in haustin Austria, Hungary. There's no evidence
that he was born there. Um, there's no evidence that
he was born at all, although he absolutely existed. Um, like,

(07:12):
there's no evidence of where specifically he was born. I
should say. That's so interesting when you think about that. Yes,
it is interesting he covered his Yeah, it's also he
was born in the eighteen nineties, which is like it
was a lot easier to cover your ship back then
because all public records were just like a guy with
a sheet of paper inside of building downtown and then
all of Europe burned down several times, so it's a

(07:35):
lot of people were able to hide ship as a
result of the World Wars or anything. Yeah, exactly, Like
it's just a piece of paper with a description of
you as a baby on it. It's pretty easy to
to escape back in those days. So the most credible
version of his early life that we have suggests that
he was a very intelligent young boy born to a

(07:57):
nearly impoverished family. UM, something of a genius, and based
on the rest of his life, I believe this. Like
obviously he was a narcissist who lied constantly, he was
also a genius, so I have no no doubt that
he was a very intelligent boy. Um. He himself described
his parents, Ludwig and Emma, as quote poor peasant people
who scraped out a living on a rough land, uh

(08:19):
in a grim stone house. So these are like poor
peasants living off the land. And he's a very gifted boy,
noted by all of his teachers, who have been very intelligent. Again,
Victor is our source, but you know, his life kind
of does back this up. And I have no trouble
seeing him as a brilliant youth who was stifled by
the demands of his peasant life and its lack of opportunity.
So he's he's smart, he wants more out of life.

(08:40):
His parents are dirt poor farm and pigship in the
middle of nowhere, right, that's kind of the way this
kid grows up. He must have been bored and somewhat
desperate as a young man now. According to Victor, his
parents separated when he was eight because they could not
afford to take care of him or his older and
younger sibling. He was sent to live with his father's relatives,
a situation he found even worse than his previous life.

(09:03):
By age twelve, he had run away from his second
home and decided to make a life for himself somewhere
else in Europe. Within a year, he had made it
to Budapest, a beautiful and exciting city that offered much
more in terms of opportunity and stimulation. Victor would later
tell a secret service agent who was interrogating him that
one specific event in Budapest inspired his subsequent criminal career.

(09:25):
In the spring of nineteen o three, he was scavenging
for food in the dumpster of a Budapest hotel. It
was nighttime, the moon was out, and he saw a
young rich woman on the balcony of that hotel wearing
a golden evening gown. He later recalled to me, she
was a fairy princess. She was with a man much
older than she. I saw the waiter come and take
their order. My mouth began to water because all I

(09:47):
had had to eat for three weeks had come out
of garbage cans. So, you know what, I'm already getting
the bullshit meter. And again he there's good chance he
grew up poor. He's also a consummate liar. We'll get
to that in a second. So as he claims, he's
watching like as from the dumpster, watching this rich couple.

(10:09):
And the food gets delivered, but instead of eating it,
they leave it on the table. The man pulls out
a lot of cash, gives it to the more money
than Victor had ever seen in his whole life, and
he gives it to the woman, who Victor slowly realized
was a prostitute um and then the too depart for
the bedroom, leaving this fancy meal on the table to
be thrown out. Uh quote. They both got up without

(10:29):
touching a morsel of that delicious food. What I saw
that night shattered my faith in women forever. That's the takeaway. Yeah,
that's the takeaway. That's that's well, that's one of his takeaways. Yeah,
we can't trust women because some of them are rich
people wasting ship. It's about women. Some of it's about
rich people wasting ship, Like it's all of that. Um,

(10:52):
I don't like that first takeaway at all. No, it's terrible. Again,
this is a man talking in like the twenties is
when he's relating a story to a secret service agent.
So again, this backstory comes courtesy of a criminal being
interrogated after he was caught for his many crimes talking
to a cop. So grain assault here, that's very maybe

(11:13):
I just I'm thinking about this because I just realized
the last time I heard your voice was and when
I was listening to the Elita podcast. But that's very like, uh,
the protagonist name, like, Yeah, the whole book is him
re talking to someone about his life, and it's just like,
and that's fully half of this guy's life story. Right.

(11:33):
We do have objective facts about him because he committed
a bunch of well documented crimes, but in terms of
his early life, we're just kind of trusting Victor here. Um.
And I'm sure there are elements of truth to this,
because any really good lie is based on elements of truth,
and he was a good liar. But also he's talking
to a cop This is the story he gives to

(11:53):
a cop. Victor claims, in addition to convincing him that
women could not be trusted, this also convinced him that
no person with enough money to waste a meal deserved
to keep their wealth. He dedicated himself batman like to
relieving the rich from their money from that point forward.
Not only that, but he would spend the rest of
his life pursuing beautiful women as many as he could
sleep with, because obviously they were willing to suck anyone

(12:15):
with money and he was going to have a lot
of it. So he takes a couple of lessons out
of this moment. Moment, Yeah, I agree with you up
until the beautiful woman thinks to be honest absolutely, like,
I don't agree. If you're going to waste a meal,
you shouldn't. You shouldn't be you deserve exactly you. I
would love to lift some wealth off of the wealthy,

(12:37):
you know, Like, I agree with that. And then realizing
at the very end it's just he wants to get
late a bunch, you know. That's and again, as another spoiler,
by the time he tells this story, he's the most
famous con man in America. UM and he is telling
us to a cop, but he is also telling us
because he knows this is going to become the public
story of his life and he wants as much sympathy
as he can get. And this interrogation where he else

(13:00):
his life story happens during the apex of the Great Depression.
Most working people could sympathize with a story like this, Oh,
he's not a bad like all of the great get
Like my cousin Pretty Boy, Floyd's whole story is, yeah,
he robbed banks, but he did it to give money
to the little people. And there's evidence that he did.
You can argue a lot of that was him protecting
himself by making sure that regular people wouldn't want to
turn him in. Um and that Victor's got a similar

(13:22):
story a lot of these con artists too, So he's
trying to frame himself as I'm a crusader for the
little guy fighting the corrupt rich, you know, I mean,
if you have the opportunity to leave your own narrative.
Of course, more like, especially during the time, a good
card artist would know that, like, people are going to
sympathize with this, you know, It's it's very layered. It
still happens. We're selling this. The same week as eight

(13:45):
women or eight people, including six Asian women, were shot
to death at a series of massage parlors in Atlanta,
and the police uncritically reported the shooters claims that, like
it was, obviously Victor is a much better person than this.
Victor does not murder anybody. Um, it is the story
of Okay, law enforcement has caught me. I'm going away.
But at least if I tell if they repeat the

(14:07):
story I tell them, maybe I will at least be
able to like set up a better narrative about myself,
you know, Um, that's what's happening here as well. Obviously
a much better person than that. Yeah, I mean thing,
even thinking about it makes my blood boil. And just
just the idea that the cops were like, you tell

(14:27):
us if you were a racist, right, Like I was like, yeah, not,
Like racists don't decide if they're racist. The racist in
that case is trying to He's specifically trying to set
him self up to be more sympathetic for both cops
and sort of like other white supremacists in Georgia, you know, like, oh,
he's just a guy with a sexual addiction. And these
damn you know, these evil interlopers coming into our country, uh,

(14:49):
fucking up our morals. Victor is playing towards the impoverished
masses of the Great Depression, being like, look, you guys
got sucked over by the banks. All I did was
steal from bankers because as a child starving in the street,
I knew that I needed to get revenge, you know. Yeah,
it's smart. He's a very smart man. Um. Yeah, and
again I should note also profoundly anti woman, although for

(15:12):
the time I don't think this would have stood out.
Um because again talking like the twenties and thirties, you know. Um. So,
I don't doubt though that Victor did spend time poor
and developed an anger at the wealthy, because he did
focus on the wealthy his entire career here was not
conning farmers out of their homes, um, and his frustration
with the wealthy probably did have an influence on his career.

(15:35):
I would that there. I would, however, be very shocked
to hear that the exact story he told during his
interrogation was true in any way. Um, there's probably aspects
of truth to it. He was in Budapest, probably, but yeah,
so Victor claims that his younger brother Emile, had moved
to Budapest it around the same time and had taken
to the life of a small time crook, and they're
both in their early teens at this point. Victor claims

(15:56):
to have followed after him, starting with simple panhandling and
moving on to picking pockets, and then to burgling homes
and businesses, and then finally to the noble trade of
a street hustler. Have you ever seen one of those
movies where there's like a guy in New York or
whatever playing one of those games where you guess which
cup has the ball in it for money. That's the
kind of ship Victor was doing, usually with cards. Like
he was kind of a card shark um and he

(16:19):
loved doing this kind of thing. He loves street hustling.
He has fast little hands, and before long he had
become an expert card shark, learning how to cheat at
various games in a hundred different ways. It was said
he could make a deck of cards, quote do everything
but talk. So he's very good with cards. There's an
element of performance there, right, like he likes to perform.

(16:40):
He yea in a different time he might have been
an actor. He was a good actor. Um, you have
to be to be this kind of kind artist. So
he was. However, especially you know, early teens into his
late teens, he was caught several times. You know, he's
learning how to do this right, and you're gonna sunk up.
In nineteen o eight, when he was eighteen, he spent
two months in a Prague prison for stealing. In November

(17:02):
of that year, he was arrested in Vienna for larceny, quote,
attempted false pretenses and being a hobo. So by this
point we know a few things. The tricks that had
worked for him in Budapest apparently had not translated well
to other cities, and as a young adult, Victor was
not exactly raking in the big bucks. He never gave
up on being a con man, though, and he spent
the next four years working a series of schemes in Vienna, Prague,

(17:25):
in Zurich. He was arrested and jailed for periods in
all three cities. In nineteen twelve, eventually he made the
call to move to Paris, where he scammed people in
bridge and poker and got in trouble over his constant
flirtation with the girlfriends of his marks. In the book
Handsome Devil, Jeff Mache writes, quote, he paid too close
attention to the girlfriend of a French sailor who snapped

(17:46):
a wineglass from its stem and slashed his handsome face.
The resulting scar, Lusted would later boast to spell bound
audiences came from a duel of honor at Heidelberg. So
he gets he's he's like in a bar being a
card and he starts like flirting with the girlfriend of
a French sailor who slashes his fucking face with a
wide bress just but like further drives home like I

(18:09):
hate women. I don't know that it does because he
doesn't is a spelling for the rest of his life.
He's cheats on women constantly. I don't have any of it.
He's I don't think he beats them. He's just kind
of like a sleazy guy. Hate beats Okay, he hates
Did I say beats on accident? No? No, no, no hate.
I just I think of, like, I don't know, probably

(18:31):
he's definitely misogynist. Yeah, I just feel like it's a
very instell mentality, right, Like he blames the prostitute for
whatever he saw when he was a kid, apparently, and
then a woman doesn't like her his coming onto him,
and she's probably a bit you know, here's here's the thing.
We'll see how you feel about this. He might have
been lying about all of that just because he thought

(18:51):
that Americans were misogynistic enough that that would be a
productive lae to tell. I don't know, we'll see how
you think about it from the because he's he's got
an he's got a really interesting relationship with his daughter. Interesting, Okay,
has a daughter daughter. Yeah, and he's he's apparently anyway,
we'll we'll get to that. So this lie about the

(19:11):
scar in his face is really smart and an example
of how resource believes. You get slashed into the face,
you turn it into something that can make you money.
And having a dueling scar at this time, especially in
Germanic parts of Europe, was a huge deal. This was
something that if if you went to a school in
Germany or the Austro Hungarian Empire in particular, if you
were a noble child, like an aristocrat, you would not

(19:34):
make it out of college without a facial scar. You
had to get one, otherwise you would be mocked the
rest of your life. It was de rigor um. It
was a thing that you did. In particular, there were
all these these fencing clubs, dueling clubs in colleges, all
of the colleges and kind of the Germanic and like
Eastern European world. And it started just the thing. If
you're going to be dueling, you're dueling often with live blades,

(19:56):
you're gonna get slashed. But it became such like a
There were so any men who got famous who would
have dueling scars that every man who was anyone had
to get a dueling scar. And so it would happen
in these clubs is that young men would mutually agree
to scar each other and then lie they would like
slash each other's faces so that they would make sure
they got out of college with a nice scar on

(20:17):
their face. If you look at pictures of like officers
and the German and Austro Hungarian military, um, if the
early part of World War One in particular, almost all
of them are going to have some sort of mark
on their face because it's just like what you did
at the time. Otherwise you weren't really a man, You
weren't really a man of class, you know. Um, that's
interesting and when you learn ship like that, World War
one makes a lot more sense. Just how like stupidly modular. Yeah,

(20:40):
we all got to get a scar on our faces.
That is very that's that's a very good point. Back
then especially, it was probably just like, yeah, yeah, I
don't want to be I don't want to be emasculated
by not having this this wound that shows I can fight. Yeah,
so this is a good of myself. This, this is
a big deal for Victor because the fact that he
gets a facial scar makes it easy for him to

(21:01):
claim that, especially since he comes from Austria Hungary. Now
that he's got a facial scar, it makes it easier.
As long as he dresses nice, nobody's gonna doubt that
he's an aristocrat, which is kind of becomes a big
part of his life after this. So this this really
having this scar. It's like the fact that this he
gets this scar in a drunken brawl is the best
thing that could have happened to him. Um So, during
his time in the bars and brothels of Paris, Victor

(21:23):
heard lurid stories of the riches and opportunity in the
United States and what might be one of the first
signs that he really was brilliant. Victor did not immediately
commit to moving to the New World. Instead, he started
booking passage on first class cruise ships, listening that the
board rich people hanging out on those cruise ships would
be a captive audience for his scams. So he's like, yeah,

(21:47):
that's that's exactly what he's doing, right, like and that
that was a whole a type of guy, like the
dude and like Jack and Titanic, right, he's like a
scammer trying to get ship out of rich people on
the Titanic. There was a whole class of man who
would do that because there's all these different boats that
are going from um from Europe to the United States.
And that's really the best place to call rich people

(22:10):
out of their money because their board, they've got all
their cash with them, um, and you're not going to
if you can get them too, you can con them
into investing in something in you know, New York or whatever.
They're not gonna you're gonna have weeks on that boat
before they realize you're lying to them. Um. It's a
great place to do a scam. Stewart Donnelly who was
a con man who worked the same racket later recalled quote.

(22:34):
Victor had managed to fleece quite a number of smart
American businessmen, and he did it with a handicap of
knowing only a few words of English. He was the
only swindler I ever knew who could do his fast
talking through an interpreter. And I have to imagine that
the interpreter was actually something Victor found a way to
use to his advantage. He would often later in life
claim to have been a wealthy count, And I can

(22:55):
see how if he was dressing really well and hiring
a slick interpreter, he could call rich guys into investments
and purchases they thought were completely legitimate. Um, just because like, oh,
there's this rich count and he's got his interpreter who's
going to like help him make deals. Gives him more credibility,
gives him more credibility. Yeah, he's good at this. Victor
took the voyage across the Atlantic and back four times

(23:17):
before he met the man who would become his mentor,
Nikki Arnstein. Nikki was an enormous He's like six ft six,
half German jew from New Jersey. Nikki recognized talent in Victor,
and rather than try to protect his territory, Nicky took
the other scammer under his scammy wing. Jeff Mash explains
the crash course he gave and con artistry quote. You

(23:39):
always always let the sucker suggest the game, the master explained,
as the two men leaned on the ship's rail, staring
out over the vast oat but ocean. He must press
you to get you to play. Victor copied his mentors
every move, adopted his fancy clothing and manners, and studied
his effortless swagger. So he basically goes to con college
on these boats. He meets this guy is really good

(24:00):
at it, and like, yeah, it works out well for him.
The experience got LUSTI thinking about the rules to successful
conning and trying to actually develop kind of a scientific
list of what allowed you to con well, and he
would spend the next several years refining this list. Unfortunately
for him and unfortunately for a couple of other people,
World War One started in nineteen fourteen, in part due

(24:22):
to the aforementioned German rich kids with facial scars. We
don't know what Victor got up to during the war years,
but pretty much everyone who studies him seems to agree.
There's absolutely no way he fought for any side in
that war, but just not a chance to self serving
for that. You know who else wouldn't fight in World
War One? Hubbard? No, Hud Debt, Well, no, he fought

(24:46):
kind of kind of fought world don't defend him. He
bombed Mexico during World War two? Just stop it? Uh?
And you know who else would have bombed Mexico during
World War Two? I was gonna say, Raytheon. Yeah, and
there's a hell of a lot of weddings in Mexico
and Raytheon. If there's one thing Raytheon hates, it's a wedding. Uh.

(25:09):
Good times. This is a very long way for you
to say those. It is time for ads. We're back, Okay.
So by the time he was twenty eight years old
and by the time World War One ended, Victor was
in New York City, which suggests that all of the

(25:30):
violence and the evident collapse of the old European social
order convinced him that the United States was going to
be a better place to con people for the foreseeable future.
Moving to the USA had a number of benefits, aside
from its separation from the violence. For one thing, he'd
learned English and his time conning rich Europeans meant he
was already pretty good at pretending to be one of those,
and so in America, Victor Listig became Count Victor Listick.

(25:55):
He claimed to have been exiled from his domain due
to the fighting in the Balkans. He said he lost
all of his castles and a revolution now, despite the
finery with which he draped himself in order to play
this role, Victor's first u S schemes were distinctly middling
an ambition. His first was the pocketbook scam. He would
be friend to Mark on a train or in some
other transitory point. After talking for a while, the two

(26:17):
would find a wallet and work together to return it
to its rightful owner, a wealthy gambler who was also
Lustig's accomplice in the scheme. Listed would convince his new
friend to turn down the cash reward from the gambler,
but agree to let the gambler gamble the cash in
the wallet on a horse race, and that he and
his new friend would take the proceeds from that, which
were expected to be somewhere around twenty five dollars. During

(26:40):
this process, Listing would get the mark excited one way
or the other and convince him to add his own
money to the bet in order to increase the payout.
At the end of the con Victor would hand his
friend a bag that was supposed to be full of
cash but was really full of old newspapers, and then
of course walk away, pocketing the money and splitting it
with his partner. So that was his con. Is his

(27:00):
early first us con a first grift. Yeah. We all
got to start somewhere, right, You know, before I was
podcasting professionally, I would just shout at people from street corners.
Why did you say, before you started podcasting, you still
do that? Yeah? I love It's an art form shouting

(27:20):
at people from street corners. It's it's a it's a
calling in a lot of ways. Yeah. Yeah, Well it's
everyone's got to start somewhere, you know, Victor, you, um, yeah,
at World War One had to start somewhere. Which was
anybody to bring it back? Yeah? So Victor was arrested
in nineteen eighteen, a little before the war's end, for

(27:42):
one such pocketbook scheme. He jumped bail rather than go
to trial and this happened in Kansas City. But even
though Kansas City is kind of where he it's is
the first place we have on record of him getting
in trouble in the US. It also held a prize
for him the only woman he would ever probably maybe love,
Roberta Norik. Now. Roberta had grown up in a small
town in Kansas and after her father's death, had nearly

(28:04):
been forced into child labor because you know, this is
that's what you do with kids, as you make them
work to death if they don't have rich parents. Uh.
She got out of that barely. And she meets Victor.
And by the time she meets him, she's like still
in her late teens. I think she's probably an adult. Um.
Victor's like a decade older than her. He is much

(28:26):
more experienced. He's already a veteran con man. So clearly
there's a power and balance here. Um. And he he
tells her a bunch of really pretty lies he paints
he claims to be a count to her. Uh. And
he paints her a picture that, Oh, if you leave
with me, we can leave Kansas behind, well, visit the
great cities of the world. You'll be wealthy and pampered,
and he's not lying about like he's lying about being

(28:47):
account but he's not lying about taking her out of
Kansas and giving her a bunch of fine things. Um,
they go to Paris immediately, and obviously, like, of course
she goes with him, right, You're a teenager in rural
Kansas in nineteen eighteen who's barely escaped slave. Um, Kansas
is isn't great today, It was even worse back than
And some dashing European count says, I'm going to give
you all the finery in the world to take you

(29:08):
to Europe. Of course you go with him, right, And
I'm sure like once you're there, and you're like, oh,
he wasn't just I'll talk like once you know he
has money there in Paris. He's got a scar on
his face and a weird European accent. There's no way
for her to not know he's account And for a
while things are great. He buys her elegant dresses, he
tells her sweet things, and by late nineteen nineteen the

(29:30):
two were married in New York City. Together, they made
quite a site at society gatherings. A European count in
his American countess very few Americans knew enough about where
the Balkans were or what they were to ask any
questions about listings supposed domain. Eventually, Victor did come clean
about the fact that he was not a European count,

(29:50):
and she does not seem to have cared. She was
in love with him either way, and just as importantly,
he had rescued her from a life of Midwestern poverty,
and I think pretty much anyone would have made the
same all in her shoes, like a real one. Of course,
of course, so for a few blissful years, Victor and
Roberta conned their way up and down the Eastern seaboard.

(30:11):
Victor was a contemporary of men like Charles Ponzi, who
will do an ex episode on someday. Ponzi was an
immigrant from Italy, and in fact, a lot of American
convent all of the best ones in this period are
European pretty much their guys who come here. And maybe
it's just a matter of like, if you don't grow
up in American society, you're better able to manipulate it,
just because you see the culture from a different angle. Um,

(30:33):
I don't know. Some of this probably has to do
with yeah, I think there's I think it also has
to do with the fact that a lot of Americans
will trust anything a stranger with an accent tells them,
especially in the nineteen twenties. Yeah, especially if it's like
like a more western e or like European accent. You know,
they like far than I am. Count wouldn't lie to me.

(30:55):
In nineteen twenty two, Roberta and Victor had their first child,
a daughter. Her name was Betty Gene, but Victor nicknamed
her Skeezicks for reasons I could explain, but I am
not going to because it's funnier if I don't um. So.
This was broadly a good time for the family, but
the law was never very far behind them, and as

(31:15):
a result, Skeezis grew up with a father who constantly
warned her about the man. He taught her Morse code
so that if they got questioned, he could tap the
message do not talk into her hand and she would
know to shut up, which is pretty cool. I mean,
you're not wrong, cool, but creepy is what's her name?

(31:38):
The nickname Betty Jane. The nickname is sk sis sis Jesus.
What do you want to guess? Why she's got that nickname.
Just give me a guess, sez its um, it's not
actually that funniest story, but I want to know what
your guests would be. I don't even know the sez

(31:58):
It's maybe she's what is say it again? Sis, I'm
saying it right? Um? Maybe she uh. I saw a
pair of skis at a shot and she was like
that was her first word she saw the skis. I
gotta have a ski, Papa ski. And then he was like,

(32:21):
you know what for you where you're gonna have Let's
just pretend that's the truth and move on. Tell me truth.
It's it's a character from a comic strip called Gasoline
Alley that was popular at the time. Characters like a
baby who's found in a bassinet by one of the
characters in the comic. I never read Gasoline Alley. I
think it was a big influence on Bill Waterson, the
guy who did um uh capolent Hobbs was one of

(32:42):
the first great really popular newspaper. Yes, nobody, nobody would
um it's funny or if you don't know the truth
is just like, oh, he liked this comic. He named
his daughter after the character. Yeah. Now, Victor having grown
up poor had vowed that his daughter would never eat
from the trash, is he ad uh? And he kept
this promise. His daughter would spend her life wearing fine furs,

(33:03):
going to private schools uh. And it is unclear the
extent to which Victor came clean to his wife about
his background. She definitely knew he was a con man,
but she seems to have believed for some time that
he was also a count. Um Now, Lustig was, if
nothing else, consistent about maintaining his cover. When he would
make friends and new cities, he would forbid them from

(33:23):
sharing gossip or telling dirty jokes around him. He treated
all women as ladies in the European sense, and he
acted with the kind of dignified air that Americans expected
from their nobility. So when he pretends to be a noble,
he's not hamming it up. He's very reserved and restrained,
and he's very consistent about the performance that he puts on.
Part the way, it's like this guy is a very
good actor. He goes method on this ship. Um. He

(33:45):
will like like people will like tell jokes that he'll
be playing cards with a group of shady characters and
we'll say something dirty and he'll yell it'll be like,
you don't I am like, you don't say those words
around me. I'm a nobleman, you know. Um deep deep
scale deep scam with a dud or defeat. Count Listig
increased the grandiosity of his schemes. The year she was born,
he presented himself to a bank in New York, pretending

(34:07):
to own a company that wanted to buy land to
make a chemical plant. He goes to his banks like,
I need some land. The banker shows him a plot
of land that is completely worthless because he thinks like
this European doesn't know the value of any land. And
sure enough, Count Listig agrees to pay twenty five dollars
for this useless land. Um. So they agree to do
the deal, but Listing tells the banker he could only

(34:27):
pay in a fifty thou dollar liberty bond. So he's like,
I'll give you this fifty dollar bond, you'll give me
twenty granded cash. That seems like a good deal, right,
And the president of the bank agrees. So while they're
settling out the paperwork, so like he gives the liberty
bond to the banker. The banker gives him the cash.
He puts the liberty bond in a in a like
a filing cabinet behind him, and while they're settling on

(34:48):
the paperwork, Listing fakes a heart attack, so the bank
president runs out to fetch help, and Listing opens the
file cabinet and takes the original liberty bond back out.
Then he closes it and departs for his cab to
see medical aid and just fleece town with his family,
having taken both the liberty bond and grade in cash
for the bank. That is not where I thought the
story was headed. Yeah, is incredible, wonderful scam. I also

(35:15):
just this should be a video podcast sometimes only because
when you say things, my face is contorts most like
I'm just speechless. But yeah, that is elaborate, and you
know what, I respect it and you kind of respect it.
And his his daughter. We have a number of interviews
from his daughter, and she she would for her whole

(35:37):
life stick to the idea that her father's her father
was a con man, yes, but his victims were the
real villains. Um she described them using. His language is
researched MISCREANTSS and he's researches the people he calls to
make sure they deserve it. His cons were then a
good deed to uncover their misdeeds. Um. And in the
case of this banker, it was he's trying. He was

(35:57):
trying to ski him, this poor European and out of like,
out of twenty grand to buy a worthless plot of land.
He needed to be hurt, you know, he needed to
have his money taken, and it was ensured anyway, which
is fair. It was. That's why it's again never immoral
to rob a bank. Um, you said it, I said,
of course, we have a T shirt that says it. Um. Sorry,

(36:18):
I'm not cut up on your merch, Robert, thank you.
There are always rob ensured banks. T shirts are very popular. Um.
So yeah. And she has a little bit of a
point here. Victor's cons did always center around exploiting the
greed of his marks um, and that is one of
the reasons why it's easier to be sympathetic with him.
He was not. He was not like getting a conning

(36:40):
a bunch of like poor people into getting in like
a Ponzi scheme or something. Um. He was he was
stealing from bankers and ship most of the time, and
in gamblers and whatnot. Um, so yeah, I don't know.
It was Victor's next great con that truly elevated him
to the level of a legend. He took a pile
of his ill gotten winnings and exchanged them for fifty

(37:02):
thou dollars and freshly minted banknotes with serial numbers in
sequential order, and then, using like a razor blade and stuff,
he would painstakingly set to work scraping off the last
digit of each serial number and replacing it so that
all five hundred bills five hundred dollar bills had the
exact same serial number on them, so they appeared to

(37:22):
be identical bills. Right, we get where we're going so far? Okay.
Listed been paid a wood worker to make a series
of small boxes two ft long, nine inches wide and
a foot deep. All the boxes had bronze knobs and
dials which did nothing, and they were weighted with lead
so that they would feel heavy and thus valuable. In
doing this, Listed was appropriating an old scheme created by

(37:45):
a British con man called the Roumanian money box scheme.
Victor brought it to the US, but he added a
commitment to detail that made it truly special. So he
would start this con the way all goods cons do start.
He would meet some guy and like somebody with money,
usually like a wealthy business owner, and over course of
some small talk, establish a baseline of trust and understanding.

(38:07):
Then at some point in the conversation he would ask
his mark, you've heard of Himile Debray right now? They hadn't,
because Emil Debray never existed, But Listing would explain that
Dubray was a genius from Serbia who was quote a
little unbalanced. Uh. And he would go for the I'm
gonna read like, we have an exact copy of his
spield that he gives to the secret Service, So I'm
gonna read that. Now this is him what he would

(38:28):
tell his marks about this fake person, Emile Debray. Emile
Debray was in Sarajevo on that fateful day in nineteen
fourteen when Archduke Francis was assassinated. In fact, there was
some suspicion he wasn't on the plot, for he was
a Serb patriot. In any event, the Central Powers captured him,
but instead of putting him in prison, they took him
to Berlin and installed him in a luxurious apartment stocked

(38:48):
with vintage wines and a quite delicious housemaid, and gave
him the facilities of their most modern laboratory. He had
only one instruction, produce a quick, full proof method, full
proof method of duplicating four in currency. You see, as
the German armies overran the low countries, they had to
maintain them, and they wished to use British and French
and Dutch Dutch currency rather than their own. So at

(39:10):
this point in the scam list it would take out
the box, which he would claim was an evolution of
Dubray's chemical method of duplicating currency that he developed for
the Germans. He'd say that the genius had only completed
his research at the very end of the war, so
Germany never had a chance to use it. The inventor
had grown frightened that he'd be executed as a collaborator,
and of course he'd gone to the count's like Count

(39:32):
Listig's royal father, and his father had taken Debray in
and protected him. Debray had died soon after the war,
and Listic had found the formula for this money duplicating
box in the man's possessions and he'd crafted this box
to the inventor's specifications. At this point, Listig would take
a real hundred dollar bill one of his clone notes
out of the box. He'd put in a blank piece

(39:53):
of white currency paper with it, and then he would
turn a crank on the box. He would tell his
mark that machine worked by using a radium roller, and
since radium was so expensive, the boxes cost fifty dollars
each just to as symbol. He would then claim that
the way the special chemical process worked would allow men
to make perfect duplicates of any bank note or liberty
bond in circulation. It just took eighteen twelve to eighteen

(40:16):
hours for the copy to be fully printed. Showing a
true commitment to the scheme, lest It would wait with
his mark into the until the new bill was ready.
Using sleight of hand, he'd replaced the blank paper with
one of his identical hundred dollar cloned bills. The mark
would then walk away, convinced he'd seen Listing duplicate perfectly
a hundred dollar bill. To further submit his legitimacy, he

(40:36):
would go with them to the bank to cash the
cloned bill, and since the bills were legitimates, save for
the serial number. The clerks never noticed anything. MOSTI would
then sell the box to the mark, and of course
the mark would immediately put a blank like currency paper
in there. And but he'd have to start that twelve
to eighteen hour like waiting period, which would good lusted,
plenty of lustig, plenty of time to escape with the

(40:58):
money that they'd given him. Uh. Well, it's a pretty
great con right. That is an elaborate asspot And again
I respect it. He's not a lazy con man. That
is a lot of work. That is groundwork. You know,
you gotta respect the groundwork, the fucking labor. Uh. He
thought about everything. He thought about everything, Like he established

(41:22):
his trust. He stays with them. You know, he goes
to the bank with them. There's no way he's gonna scam,
you know this. Not this guy looks at how much work.
This has to be legitimate. Yeah, So he sold boxes.
This was a very successful scheme. He made a fortune
off of this. He sold boxes for varying prices, like
kind of whatever they would put in. He'd be like, well,
i'm your friend. You know it costs me this much,

(41:43):
but I okay, I have extras. I'll give you whatever
it like you can. So he sold one for forty
three thousand dollars to the owners of a pool hall
in Montana. He sold another for ten thousand dollars to
merchants in Chicago, one grand to a cans and businessman.
A crime syndicate in New York paid forty six thousand
for one, and a banker and Lafornia paid a hundred thousand.
Just like, that's like a million dollars in this time

(42:04):
he is making. He would have to leave town every time, right, yes, absolutely,
he immediately books at the funk out of there. And
is he with his family during this time? Like they
we'll talk about sometimes often he had We'll talk about
this a little bit later. The best thing about this
scam from a con man's point of view is that
very few of his victims could go to the police

(42:25):
because doing so it did mean admitting that they had
intended to counterfeit US currency. I mean everything. It's a
great scam. It's really great scamp. It's really great. It's
so good respect that your respect. I hate to say it,
but yeah, it's it's very very good. One of his

(42:47):
marks did catch him once, but hilariously, the man was
so convinced that the box was real that he thought
he had fucked up the machine by turning the crank
early and as soon he says like, man, I'm so like,
I'm glad I caught you. I'm so sorry I turned
it early and it didn't work incally. Oh, you idiot,
you've destroyed the machine. You have to give me another
twenty five grand for a new box. Oh my god,

(43:09):
he's so good at this. Yeah, he is amazing. He
was only arrested once for the scheme, and he likely
escaped conviction that time by bribing the cops with some
of the fortune that he had accumulated at that point.
Listig spent his money as quickly as he made it.
Of course, he could lose tens of thousands of dollars
in a manner of days gambling. Uh, and he also

(43:30):
developed a penchant for setting up well, we'll talk about
his secret family later. By Victor, Listig was at the
absolute height of his powers. He had paid his tailor
to sew fifteen thousand dollars into the lining of his
suit so he'd have cash to bribe his way out
of emergencies. When he was arrested for swindling a real
estate man out of ten thousand dollars. Listick was sent
to a jail that he immediately broke out of, and

(43:51):
we don't know how he broke out of. It said
that he broke out of a bunch of jails. The
reality he's probably just paying people, like he was just
bribing guards and stuff to get out. Money talks, money talks,
money talks, and a good current artist walks. That was
very good. Wait did you just make that up? Thank you?
Thank you? Are you about to do a really cool
I mean it was like the perfect It was a

(44:11):
perfect time. You know what else walks the good people
at Raitheon, because it is not a crime to sell
weapons of war if you are raytheon we're back from
outer space. So by nineteen Victor Lustig is like he's

(44:36):
he's doing the best that he's ever been doing. And
it was around this period that Victor, who was probably
the premier con man of at least the United States,
maybe the whole western world, it authored a list of
rules that he believed all successful con men ought to follow.
These are like his Tin Commandments of Conning, Motherfucker's. Here's
how they were reported in an article I found in

(44:56):
the Smithsonian magazine. Quote be a patient center. It is this,
not fast talking, that gets a con man his coups.
Number two never look bored. Number three. Wait for the
other person to reveal any political opinions, then agree with them.
Number four. Let the other person reveal religious views, then

(45:16):
have the same ones. Number five hint at sex talk,
but don't follow it up unless the other person, unless
the other fellow shows a strong interest. Number six. Never
discuss illness unless some special concern is shown. Number seven
never pry into a person's personal circumstances. They'll tell you
all eventually. Number eight never boast, Just let your importance

(45:40):
be quietly obvious. Number nine never be untidy, and number
ten never get drunk. Good good rules for conning people. Yeah,
I mean, honestly not bad rules for being a journalist.
Not because do you want them to do you want
to just mirror them? You know you want you have

(46:00):
to feel comfortable in every way, so you don't you
wait for them to share information, then you just agree
with it. Yeah. Well, and I mean that part is
not the good journalism stuff, but the never look board
wait for the other person to reveal things. Um don't
pry into their personal circumstances, Like what about don't drink it? Yeah, no, absolutely,
you drink when you're writing, you drink when you're recovering

(46:22):
from doing journalism. You don't want to be drunk conducting
an interview. It's not helpful. Um, sometimes you might have
a beer or two because like sometimes you that's that's
the circumstances in which you're conversing with the person. And
if they don't drink, But don't you think like there
is an element if you are if you know, if
you know that you're gonna be talking to someone that
maybe it has a different view than you, you're not

(46:42):
gonna just straight out say you have a different view.
You're just gonna let them share and just like not right, Yeah,
well you're going to share. You ask them, You ask
them questions when those questions are relevant. You don't need
to disagree with them because that's not your job in
that instance. Yeah, but yeah, no, I mean this is
just good, Like he's he's right about all of this.
None of this is like yeah, very reasonable stuff. Yeah. Now,

(47:06):
Listen shared his success with his family, buying his wife
and daughter whatever they desired and filling cash boxes at
various banks with money for them. He also acquired a mistress,
Ruth Etting, who was a famous singer at the time.
Victor kept his wife and his daughter out of his
life on the road as much as possible. He justified
this to them by claiming that they needed to be
hidden both from his marks and from the laft for

(47:26):
their own protection. He hired a bodyguard and a maid
to watch over them while he was away, which had
the added benefit of ensuring his by now very suspicious
wife was always watched by two employees who answered to him.
And of course he is fucking around constantly on them.
And he keeps his family a secret from this is
like his secret family. Most people who meet the Count
don't know that he has a wife and kid um,

(47:48):
so his actual wife and child are his secret family.
But he has a string of mistresses and he also
sleeps with a tone of prostitutes that he meets at
various bronthlos because brathlos are the best place to meet
rich people that you can con right. And his trips
to brothels there was a pleasure aspect. It was also
a business aspect because, as he later recalled quote, there

(48:08):
is no better place to find a mark than at
a madam's. They are the best people in the world
to point out a mark to you. They know them all.
Like again, you find him Adam at a brothel, she's
gonna know who's got money and who is dumb, you know,
like yeah, like that's that's as like. And also and
also networking. And he's getting late, although I don't think

(48:31):
he pays off. And he's a very good looking, charming
man and he's making the money. So my guess is
that a lot of this was just like ship, we're
both in deconning rich guys, and you're hot, let's do it.
You know, how good looking I want to see? I mean,
I don't think is by modern standards, but yeah, he was.
He was considered to be very handsome. So most of
the pictures we have of him are older when he
was kind of balding. But he's got a very he's

(48:53):
got a very like distinctive face. Um. And again, most
people at the time, okay, here's a decent one. Yeah,
and most people at the time considered him handsome. He's
got like a nice, nice jawline and stuff. Um. The
standards were lower in the twenties. Uh yeah, so yeah.
This tactic, his tactic like kind of going into brothels

(49:13):
and using them to find Marx, eventually led him to
fall in love with yet another woman, Billy May Schibel,
a famous Philadelphia madam, and I'm gonna quote from the
book Handsome Devil here about their relationship. She handed Listing
the menu a book of nudes. These girls toiled day
and night, earning Sibel two hundred and fifty thousand dollars
a year. Listing soon discovered Pittsburgh's Grand Duchess Advice had

(49:35):
piqued his interest. Naturally listed contor using his money making machine,
but Schibel tracked him down rather impressively to a hotel
room in another city. There, Listing did something he'd never
done before. He gave the money back. Sibel was everything.
His homemaking wife, Roberta was not. Loud, body sharp as attack.
They shared an innate desire to exploit American greed to

(49:58):
separate those of high net worth and low more world
value from their cash Lustig and Scheibel became lovers and
partners in crime, maintaining apartments on New York's Park Avenue
Chicago's Lakeshore drive and a mansion in Beverly Hills, the
homes Lustig's wife yearned for. So he yeah, this this
is maybe more maybe his soul mate. Right, Like he

(50:19):
gives the money back that he cons because he's so impressed.
How good at this woman is at conning people, and
they go on a conning spree they buy the houses
that he'd always promised his actual wife. Um, it's a
bummer of a tale in some ways, but like this
is he does seem to really love this woman. He's
low key and romantic, you know, like that's he met
her and he was like you're you get me. He

(50:41):
was smooth as hell. Like Yeah. Now, Victor stayed married
to his wife, but emotionally and largely physically, he abandoned
her at this point. Now, he did not do that
abandon her financially. He kept her and his daughter well
supplied with money. But the whirlwind romance that had swept
Roberta out of Kansas was over. One night, he had
a dates edjeweled with his wife, but he forgot to

(51:01):
pick her up at the hotel for an elaborate planned
night out. She drank all the wine alone and when
he finally arrived she screamed at him. By the end
of nine, the two were divorced. His daughter never understood,
later asking how could a man who had so often
vowed eternal love for his wife, whom he really loved,
have an affair with another woman. She's a bummer now

(51:21):
While Roberta headed into an unhappy marriage with some other guy,
Victor sent his daughter off to an expensive convent boarding
school near Pittsburgh. Now he was, it must be said,
a doting father, and he visited her constantly. He also
formed a deep friendship with the mother Superior, who he
bought expensive jewelry for in spite of the fact that
she could not wear it. Betty said that her father

(51:42):
loved the nuns but hated the priests because they pressured
the nuns to do bullshit work around the church. So
kind of an interesting little detail about him. I feel
like he just always plays like I like the underdog here. Yeah,
he's he's definitely like has a has a has a
has a thing for that. In May of Night eighteen
twenty five, his marriage like this is back when his
marriage is on the rocks a little bit before he

(52:04):
gets divorced, Victor headed back to Paris by luxury steamer
with one of the true few men he would ever
trust as a partner, Dapper Dan Collins Collins, Dapper Dan,
Dapper Dan, that's his nickname. Dapper Dan Collins. Dapper Dan
was an infamous trickster. He'd started off his working life
as a lion tamer and a bicycle writer in the circus,

(52:25):
but had graduated to counterfeiting, fitting and eventually running rum
into the United States during Prohibition via a submarine he
piloted from the Bahamas to Philly. This is Dapper Dan
is a fascinating man, definitely more of a piece of
ship than Victor. He cons a lot of women who
don't have much like. He's a I don't know if
you call him the sexual predator, but definitely takes significant

(52:48):
sexual like uses sex to take financial advantage of women,
which Victor does not do. He definitely lies and cheets
on women constantly. He always pays them well, he's never
stealing from them, So I don't know. I don't know
how that I think morally. Dapper Dan is a creepier
guy than Victor. Um. Neither of them are very good men.
The two traveled to Paris intent on pulling off a

(53:09):
big deal, but without a clear idea of what precisely
it would be. After a few days of walking around
and plotting, the count figured it out. He was going
to sell the Eiffel Tower. Now, of course the building already. Yes,
I don't understand. Every time I'm more surprised, like I
sell the Eiffel Towers, sell the Eiffel Tower. On that's

(53:34):
all of the great con artists have leaps of evolution
like that, lu Hub. I'm gonna I'm gonna write pulp
stories for cheap little comic books, and then I'm gonna
create a new mental science, and then I have become
the prophet of my own religion. I just respect. He
just has a man crush on Alron, you know. Really,

(53:57):
it's the way he stole his own baby that that
impressed me most. That's a that's a that's a champion move.
Not a lot of people. He's a horrible he's able person.
You've got to respect. The grift, is what you're saying.
I like the way he made all of those young
people live on boats for ten years and search for
gold that he buried in past lives. I mean, yeah,

(54:19):
that's funny. Now he would throw them off the boat
when he got bored because he was lunatic. I love
the man, Robert. I want everyone to know, has the
biggest smile I've ever seen. He talks about Hubbard, he
looks so happy. It is story. Can you please let
the listeners know what my face looks like right now? Sophie,

(54:43):
she has she's concerned, she's disappointed, she's shaking her head.
I'm bummed out whenever I realized that we've covered l
Run Hubbard in such detail that there's really nothing left
for me to say about him on this show. But
you still do. But I mean, I'm always thinking about him.
To stick with Koresh, Robert, that was a better ta
I do love. I do love David Koresh and his

(55:03):
incredible cum gutters. But that is a story for another
day or for the HBO miniseries um where we were
the Eiffel Tower. So Victor Lust goes to Paris looking
for a con right. He and his friend go there,
Dapper Dan, and they know they're gonna scam, but they

(55:24):
don't know what scam they're gonna do. And they spent
a couple of days just kind of walking around talking
to people, getting the light of the land, and Victor
keeps seeing the Eiffel Tower in the skyline and he's like,
I'm gonna fucking sell that to somebody, because he's he rules,
that's ambitious, that is ambitious, and he's invincible. At that point,
he does right, like he's like, I could do anything.
I can sell the Eiffel Tower. Fuck it. So I

(55:47):
should note that at the time, the idea that the
Eiffel Tower would be for sale was not as preposterous
as it seems now. The Eiffel Tower was built for
the eighteen eighty nine World's Fair, and at the time
it was the tallest wrought iron billing on earth. It
was hated by the art community in Paris for being
a threat to the art and history of France and
a slight upon the hitherto untouched beauty of Paris. It

(56:09):
was very unpopular with like I have an art history miner,
I should have I should have remembered this sooner. But
it's like it was represented of this like really cold
metal industrial things. Yeah, And the reason it had gotten
greenlit and big part was that, like we talked about
this in the Krup episodes the late eighteen hundreds, early
nineteen hundreds, everybody is like making as many things out

(56:33):
of steel? Is the possibly it's the industrial revolution. Yeah, like,
look at what we can do. Look at how big
an iron building we can we can make um. So
the building was unpopular with a lot of folks, and
by nine it was also badly in need of repairs.
Listigs con revolved around convincing the right man that the
government had decided not to repair it. His mark, he decided,

(56:56):
would be an iron monger, someone in the salvage business
with a lot of cats. The Count and his partner
would convince the right man that the tower was being
torn back down and the city was soliciting bids for
people who would salvage the scrap metal once it was destroyed.
So that's the way in which he was selling it,
is like they're gonna tear it down. There's gonna be
all this perfectly usable scrap metal. Who's going to buy it? Right? Like,

(57:17):
you've got an opportunity to get a lot of of
scrap iron here for a good price. The Smithsonian writes
about the next stage in this con quote listed commissioned
to stationary carrying the official French government seal. Next, he
presented himself at the front desk of the Hotel de Creon,
a stone palace on the Palace de la Concorde. From there,
pretending to be a French government official, Listing wrote to

(57:39):
the top people in the French scrap metal industry, inviting
them to a hotel for a meeting. Because of engineering faults,
costly repairs and political problems, I cannot discuss, the tearing
down of the Eiffel Tower has become mandatory. He reportedly
told them in a quiet hotel room, the tower would
be sold to the highest bidder. He announced, his audience
was captivated and their bids flowed in. Now, listen, I

(58:02):
was gonna say that it really is a huge benefit
to like conning people. Was so much easier without the Internet,
without being able to confirm things, even with good telephone
service or telegraphs wherever the fun they had back then,
Like it's just of course you're gonna look at an
official seat, like you know what I mean, it's yeah,

(58:24):
guy with an accent, he's dressed well, he has money. Yeah,
you know, Like it's of course it's easy to do that.
It's like it's like how easy it is for murderers
to get away with it before. DNA is the same
same thing. It's not hard for them. Now about half
of murderers do get away with it in the United States.
It's something like that. But yeah, like you said that
with a smile. But continue, Look, I mean we canna

(58:46):
talk about stumping some day anyway. Um Listig pretended that
he was the deputy director of the French Ministry of
the Post and Telegraph. This was another brilliant move. If
he pretended to be too high ranking, his marks might
have recognized the lie. Right, you pretend I'm the head
of the French ministry, Well they might know that guy's name,
you know, just kind of like how you know that
a lot of people know that the head of the
Department of education. Do you know the deputy deputy director

(59:08):
of Department of Education? Probably not? Um so Uh. The
whole scam was as meticulous as you would expect from
a guy like Listing, right, that's his whole thing, is
he He is meticulous in his preparations. So for example,
he made sure they were really fancy refreshments. There truffles
in patte but he made sure they were the cheapest
brands of fancy refreshments, because this is a government meeting, right,

(59:31):
the Government's gonna put out freffles and patte for these
rich businessmen. But they're not going to buy the knife ship.
It's the government. You know. He thinks about all this ship.
You can't try too hard, you know, he put he
that's the thing that makes them specially. He thinks of everything. Yeah.
After evaluating all of the businessmen in the in the room,
all of whom are putting in bids, Listing settled on
one man in particular, Andrew Poissan. Now, Andre had not

(59:53):
given the highest bid, but he was the right man
to con the fact that he was new to the
being wealthy and new to being influential also meant that
he would have fewer connections, which would mean he would
not be as good at pursuing Listig afterwards. So once
the big meeting was over, Listig informed Poisson that he
had been selected, and the two met privately. This was

(01:00:14):
where the actual closure to the con came. Listig pointed
out that Poissan's bid wasn't the best, but he wanted
to support the young upstart in his new business. Unfortunately,
list It was a poor man. His government salary didn't
go far, and he was going to need a bribe
to give Poissan the deal to buy the Eiffel Tower
scrap metal. Now, the whole scrap industry worked by bribes
at this point, so this was not seen as odd

(01:00:35):
at all, and the fact that Listig asked for a
bribe actually made Poissan less suspicious because he's been wondering, like,
where were we meeting at a hotel instead of a
government office. Oh, it's because he wants a bribe. Okay,
I know how to do with bribe. This is how
business is done in Paris, you know. So Poissan writes,
listing a sizeable check in exchange for the tower, and
Listig skips put down with his business partner as soon
as it clears. They expected to have to lie low

(01:00:57):
for a while. But that's not the way things went.
As the magazine Proghetto summarizes, After a few days, he
realized that something didn't add up. There wasn't a word
in newspapers about the barely occurred fraud. Humiliated and offended,
the unfortunate Andrew Poissan decided to maintain absolute silence, not
making a complaint and preferring to accept the scam rather
than exposing himself to a certain humiliation. The unthinkable had

(01:01:20):
been accomplished, and so with the ardor of a seasoned
and limitless gambler, Gambler Listig resumed once again. He returned
to Paris to sell the Eiffel Tower again. Wow's giving
a shot. And you know this actually shows how smart
he is, because a lot of sources will describe Lusting

(01:01:41):
as the man who sold the Eiffel Tower twice. That
is not accurate. His second mark was a lot saffier
than Poissan and started asking for too many guarantees, asked
to meet in a government building to do the final deed,
and Listig bail's he realizes, like this, my I'm I'm
gonna get in trouble for this, Like this guy is
a little bit too bright for me to con. He
fucking bails and goes back to the United States because

(01:02:02):
he's he's at this point very smart con artist. Throughout
the late nineteen twenties, Victor continued to con without pause.
He was such a big name in the world of
charming criminals that he soon had imposters copycat counts who
would pretend to be him or someone like him in
order to carry out their own schemes. Count Boris Dobrinsky

(01:02:23):
developed a sleight of hand money boxed scam that included
fireworks for some weaks reasons. So many men imitated Count
Listing that it is difficult to say for certain which
scams were him and which were made by impostors. After
this point, things become clearer in Thecember of ninety when
Victor Listig finally made a bad decision, probably the worst
one of his life, and decided to rob a businessman

(01:02:45):
named Thomas Karns. Now, you will note that I said
rob and not con. Victor clearly had plans to con
the man because they were meeting in Victor in in
karns his house. But he seems to have been in
some sort of financial jeopardy at this point, probably as
a result of all of his mistresses and his daughter
her in his gambling. He had expenses and he got greedy,
and whatever the reason, he sneaks upstairs in this guy's

(01:03:06):
house during their meeting and just takes sixteen grand from
a box in a drawer, just robs him. Right, Um,
I think this is the only time he does it,
and it's a horrible decision because it seems so unlike,
unlike him, and very impulsive versus calculated, which is what
he usually was. I think it's a mix of thing.
So it's probably financial inspiration. You know, he gets to

(01:03:26):
do a bad spot. He needs cash quick, he doesn't
have time to work the con. I think some of
it's just ego. You know, you have so many hits, right,
you get away with so much for so long. I'm
sure that. I'm sure the success of the Eiffel Tower
scam played a factor to this, because like that could
have report me I can do anything. Um, So he
he fucks up, He fox up bad uh, and Thomas

(01:03:48):
Currens goes immediately to the cops. They started a man
hunt for this guy, who was by this point very
prominent and hard to miss. Listed left town quickly, but
he almost immediately got into trouble in Texas again when
he picked Shareff as the latest victim of his money
box scam. This scam worked, but again Victor got greedy
and he passed the sheriff a number of actual counterfeit bills,

(01:04:09):
and this is what finally brought the Secret Service down
on Listig's head. Smithsonian Magazine reports on what happened next,
and how Listing advanced from pretending to counterfeit money with
the cash box scam to actually counterfeiting money, which would
be his ultimate downfall. Quote. It was secret service agent
Peter A. Rubano who vowed to put Listing behind bars.
Rubano was a heavy set Italian American with a double chin,

(01:04:31):
sad eyes, and endless ambition. Born and raised in the Bronx,
Rubano had main has made his name by trapping the
notorious gangster Ignazio the Wolf Lupo. Rubano delighted in seeing
his name in the newspapers, and he would dedicate many
years to catching Listed. When the Austrian entered the counterfeit
banknote business in nineteen thirty, Listing fell across Rubano's crosshairs.
Teaming up with the ganglin forger William Watts. Listed created

(01:04:53):
banknotes so flawless they fooled even bank tellers. Listed Watts
notes were the super notes of the era, says Joseph Ling,
chief judge of the American Numismatic Association, a specialist in
authenticating notes, Listed daringly chose to copy hundred dollar bills
those scrutinized most by bank tellers. And became like some
other government issuing money in rivalry with the United States Treasury.

(01:05:15):
A judge leader commented it was feared that a run
of fake bills this large could wobble international confidence in
the dollar. Catching the count became a cat and mouse
game for Rubano in the Secret Service. Listig traveled with
the trunk of disguises and could transform easily into a rabbi,
a priest, a bellhopper reporter. Dressed like a baggage man.
He could escape any hotel in a pinch, and even
take his luggage with him. But the net was closing in.

(01:05:37):
Listig finally felt a tug on the velvet collar of
his Chesterfield coat. On a New York street corner on
May tenth, nineteen thirty five, a voice ordered hands in
the air. Listig studied the circle of men surrounding him
and noticed Agent Rubano, who led him away in handcuffs.
So Listig start the man hunt for him. Starts heavily
in n when he robs this guy, and instead of

(01:05:59):
laying low, he goes on to start counterfeiting, and counterfeiting
so well that the US government worries he might collapse
the national economy because how does he count? How does
he how does he churn out? Also, so many counterfeit bills. Um,
he's he's you know, it's it's the attention to detail
that he uses with all of his schemes. He he
applies that to counterfeiting. He picks the best counterfeitter and

(01:06:21):
he gets the bills almost perfect. Um. You can find
pictures of his notes today. There's still some of the
best forgeries that have ever been made. And again, this
is happening during the Great Depression, and he's gotten he
gets to be so good at making fake bills that
they're worried he's going to crash a confidence in the U. S. Economy.
So it becomes kind of a matter of national security
to catch this guy. And again he just got too

(01:06:42):
big for his bridges, you know, all those costumes and stuff.
I feel like, who's going to play him in the movie,
you know, like Leotocaprio or I think, yeah, DiCaprio could
probably pull it off, you know, just natural succession from Jack.
I think, yeah, Well, and he played a Frank abcnail
and catch me if you can. Yeah right, yeah, yeah,
he's good at doing that. That kind of con man

(01:07:03):
I would also accept George Clooney. They don't look alike,
but George Clooney can do a hell of a con man.
I would always accept George Clooney. We we Yeah, of
course now looks take it. I would agree with you
on that. Um. I'm a fan of his love of pigs.
I'm a fan of his face. But go ahead, he

(01:07:23):
does his his life was saved by a pig. Okay,
just have to look it up that that is a fact.
George when he was a young man, he had he
He's always loved pigs, populade pigs, I think, And he
was a young man, he hadn't made it big yet
and he was sleeping with his pig in his tiny

(01:07:43):
apartment and his pig started freaking out, and George took
the pig out for a walk, thinking that it needed
to go to the bathroom. And it turned out the
pig had since that there was going to be an earthquake,
and the earthquake collapsed the building that he had been
sleeping in. Wow. Yeah, so thank you pigs forgiveness. George Clooney. Yeah,
I wonder if he eats bacon. I don't know. I

(01:08:06):
know he cuts his own hair a great man with
a weird like nineteen eighties contraption that you put around
your head and it gives you a bus cut me.
I thought, I love and I'm over here like great face. Yeah,
he's like he's hot, he's absolutely gorgeous. Yeah, his wife
is there anything about? So Listig was taken to the

(01:08:31):
Federal Detention Center in Manhattan, which was supposed to be inescapable.
Of course, he immediately escaped. In September. Listed crafted a
rope from prison bedsheets, cut through his bars using items
he'd had smuggled in, and swung down out his window
and repelled downwards. This was extremely visible, and a crowd
form to watch him repelling down the side of the

(01:08:51):
of the prison, so Listig took a rag from his
pocket and started pretending to be cleaning the windows. When
he reached the ground, he bowed to his audience and
darted a quote like a deer. He's a performers so good. Yeah,
he loves he loves the stage. He loves the stage.
He would have been a great actor. When police realized

(01:09:13):
that Listing had escaped, they found a note on his pillow,
a handwritten extract from the book Limiserab and This is
the quote from the book that he put on his pillow.
He allowed himself to be led in a promise. Jean
Valjean had his promise even to a convict, especially to
a convict, and may give the convict confidence and guide
him on the right path. Law was not made by God,

(01:09:34):
and man can be wrong, which is like, I mean,
you were counterfeiting bills. Yeah, he's still trying to cry.
He's crafting so narrative still like he knows people are
going to talk about that. He's like, oh, he's he's
well read and cultured. And he looked at this. Look
he's the He's like Jean Valjean. You know he's a convict,
but he's a hero. Listing stayed free for more than

(01:09:56):
three weeks. He was eventually caught in Pittsburgh by a
joint b I Secret Service task force. They spotted him
getting into a car and gave chase. His driver attempted
to escape, and the police eventually rammed the car, locking
their wheels together and grinding both wheels to a halt.
The agents ripped the doors open and pointed their guns
at the men inside. Listing told the agents, well, boys, here,

(01:10:17):
I am never clustered. He's he's he's a great character. Yeah.
He was taken before a judge in November of ninety five.
The New York Herald Tribune described him thus, his pale,
lean face was a study, and his tapering white hands
rested on the bar before a bench. Another journalist overheard
a Secret Service agent tell Listig Count, you're the smoothest

(01:10:39):
con man whoever lived. All the sympathy and his undeniable
smoothness was not enough to save the Count from Alcatraz Island,
where he was sent. His body was searched when he arrived,
and he was hustled or hose down with freezing water,
and then interned in one of the most brutal prisons
the US justice system ever derived. To to humiliate him,
the Count was marched naked to his cell, and I

(01:11:02):
think as a result of getting spread with cold watering
march naked, he gets sick. He gets very sick, almost immediately,
and he remains sick for the entire time he's in Alcatraz.
He makes nearly twelve hundred medical requests and has issued
five hundred seven prescriptions. His guards assumed he was faking
an illness as part of an elaborate escape plan, but
he was not. He was genuinely ill. His ex wife, Roberta,

(01:11:22):
who had divorced her husband by this point, was still
in love with him, and she repeatedly tried to free him,
even offering the director of prison seventy dollars. Eventually, his
release was set for August of nineteen forty eight. Lustig
did not think he could make it that long. November
twenty nine, nineteen forty six, he woke up with massive
swelling on the left side of his head. The Alcatraz

(01:11:43):
doctors finally took his sickness seriously and shipped him to
a secure medical facility in Missouri. It turned out he
had severe pneumonia, which had not been adequately treated over
his time in prison. He was attempted. They attempted to
help him, but it was far too late. Betty, his
daughter by this point an adulter's self, managed to track
her father down to the hospital, where she arrived in
March of n from the book Handsome Devil quote, she

(01:12:06):
knew instantly that she had waited too long. That he
found her father paralyzed. Watched carefully by guards, she took
his hand and whispered in his ear Morse code. I
love you, daddy. She tapped onto his palm his his
fingers tapped back faintly, I love you too. Sis. He
died two days after her visit. Wow. Yeah, it's bummer.

(01:12:29):
I mean it really is like the very extreme case
of like the boy who cried Wolf, right, Yeah, yeah,
I mean right, Like, of course they didn't believe. I'm
not one to defend the prison system, but like kind
of hard to believe the man who did nothing but
life for seventy years around. I mean, I will say
that's a very good call back to the Morse code

(01:12:51):
to happen. It's a perfectly cinematic. I'm sure there have
been movies made about this guy. Wait, I have a question.
Did I miss what happened to the soul Nate lady? Oh?
I mean they just split up at some point. Oh okay, Yeah.
You know he's he's never really able to stay with
anybody because his true love is conning people. You know, Yeah,
it is daughter. He is as good a father as

(01:13:12):
a man who does the things he does can be. Right. Yeah. So,
I mean that's the story of Victor Lustig. I don't
hate him. It's hard to hate him. Right, he's not
a good man, but he's not a monster, you know,
he's he's he was a great con man, and he's
an interesting, an incredible con man. He thought about everything,

(01:13:35):
he caned people, and they wouldn't go to the police
because they were also like that scam is fucking boss. Yeah,
he's present. I do respect that he targeted the wealthy,
eat the rich. I'm all for it. Um. Yeah, I
don't hate him. Yeah, all con men target greed. Unfortunately,

(01:13:57):
a lot of them target the greed of people who
are also very more and less. Dig seemed to pretty
much just go after people who were greedy and rich. Yeah,
and to hate that hard, to hate that. Not great
to women. She slept around, constantly, treated his wife like
ship and she really loved him. Um. But he taught
his daughter morse quote. He did teach his daughter morse code. Um.

(01:14:19):
That is not nothing. Um wow. Yeah, that's the story
of Victor Lustig. And now it's time for the story
of Sharine's pluggables. Yeah, oh me, oh my god, thank
you so much. That was an interesting segway. I'll give
you that. It's pronounced segua. I'm Sharine. Well you and s.
You can follow me on Instagram at Shiro hero S

(01:14:42):
h E E r O h E r O, and
then on Twitter at Shiro hero six six six. Uh
called ethnically ambiguous on a host name, But that was honestly,
I really enjoyed hearing about this man. I wanted to
give you a fun one, Sharine. We've had some we've
had some heavy conversations on this show. Put me so,

(01:15:03):
here's a guy who never murdered any babies or destroyed
anybody's bodies, just con some some rich folks. And that's
a good time, right, everybody needs It's it's a rough
world out there. This show is always pretty heavy. Let's
talk about some con artists for a week, you know,
let's have a good That was my thinking with this episode. Well,
thank you for letting me talk about it. Yeah, it

(01:15:25):
was very refreshing. It's always good to talk about a
con artist talk about another con artist on Thursday,

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Part One: The King of Con Artists, Victor Lustig