Sir Allen Stanford, the Ponzi artist
April 29, 2009 12:27 AM   Subscribe

The Dark Knight - On Sir Allen Stanford
posted by Gyan (9 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
I remember when I was a kid and I used to watch $25,000 Pyramid and think, wowwwww. Now 50 Billion doesn't even seem like a big number anymore.
posted by iamkimiam at 12:48 AM on April 29, 2009


Interesting that the article mentions that Stanford first started his Antigua venture under the corrupt Bird regime. Robert Corum has a little more to say on Antigua's corruption here.
posted by adamvasco at 12:54 AM on April 29, 2009


A good article overall, but writing like this drives me nuts:

Tidwell’s hair is prematurely gray; at 40, he’s almost preternaturally easygoing, despite an unbridled passion for Swiss watches.

How is your level of tension directly proportional to your love for Swiss watches? Maybe he's easygoing because always knowing what time it is makes him comfortable.

There's a cookie-cutter magazine style that follows the Introduce Source/Make Him A "Character"/Interview Him model -- I understand the writerly impulse to make everybody in an article into a filmic and fascinating figure, but when this kind of stretch is required, it's best just to let the guy be boring.
posted by Shepherd at 2:09 AM on April 29, 2009 [2 favorites]


I personally found Stanford a relief after the utterly unremarkable Madoff. There was a man who showed how to scam billions with panache, a perfect Bond villain with his own Caribbean realm, humonguous yacht, fleet of private aircraft and helicopters, and gaggle of mistresses, unafraid of scamming drug lords and bringing his flashy and vulgar lifestyle corrupting even into the most hallowed grounds of gentlemanly Britishness, the Marylebone Cricket Club.

Phew! And I was afraid that being a crooked billionaire wasn't fun anymore!
posted by Skeptic at 3:34 AM on April 29, 2009 [6 favorites]


Speaking of Stanford-linked ponzi schemes.
posted by FuManchu at 4:14 AM on April 29, 2009


I can't have been the only one expecting a video of Christian Bale's Batman with a Batman-voice-esque dubbing relating to Stanford, right?

The funny/interesting/sad thing about the whole MCC saga is the fact that so many people (Ian Botham, looking at you) have said that they were concerned from the beginning, and yet at the time were perfectly happy to dub it a cricket revolution, just what the sport needed, and were posing with Stanford for photos etc.
posted by djgh at 6:05 AM on April 29, 2009


I was expecting one of those 4chan-style "The Dark Knight" conversations.
posted by amuseDetachment at 6:31 AM on April 29, 2009


Fabulous article. Long but detailed, I love it when the Texas Monthly surprises with something like this. BTW Stanford's not even a real knight: he's an honorary knight of Antigua.
posted by Nelson at 9:22 AM on April 29, 2009


"Panorama is aware of strong evidence that Sir Allen was a confidential agent of the DEA as far back as 1999."
posted by Gyan at 3:16 AM on May 10, 2009


« Older A faithful viewer I will always be, I ain't...   |   'a screamer, a gasper, a startler or (sorry) a... Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments