Books

     Posted March 19, 2010. Elmore Leonard and I have something in common, although that something, unfortunately, is not the size of our respective bank accounts. His has many more zeroes in it. Nevertheless we are brothers in literary crime-that is, we both write about crime, his being of a fictional sort and mine being true life.

     My book, Operation Bullpen: The Inside Story of the Biggest Forgery Scam in American History, which has been sold to the movies, is the true story of a gang of grown-up Southern California dead-end kids who found a way to make money fall from the sky by forging the signatures of the likes of Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe and yes, Mother Teresa on baseballs, photos and more and selling them for untold millions on eBay and the TV home shopping channels.

     The book was published in 2006 and I swear I thought that would be the end of my crime-writing career. Happily though, it has not turned out that way. I am still writing and blogging about forgery and the fellows (it is almost exclusively a male pastime) who do it and sell it. As a result I know several FBI agents and federal investigators on a first-name basis. I also occasionally chat with various characters of dubious reputation who would be perfectly at home in an Elmore Leonard novel although they are, of course, actual human beings, not fictional creations. Remember the big O.J. Simpson brouhaha a few years ago when O.J. robbed some people in a Vegas hotel room to get some of his sports memorabilia back? The guy whose hotel room it was, and who ultimately testified in the trial that sent Simpson to prison, was Tom Riccio. One Sunday morning when I was in my pajamas Riccio called me to hear my opinion on something. Nice fella, actually, for a two-time ex-con.

     Anyhow I mostly don't write about forgery in this space except that in this case, I thought some of you might enjoy this piece. Any fans of "The Real Housewives of Orange County" out there? Okay, well, maybe not. But it turns out that one of the people on the show, Jim Bellino, who is married to the bosomy blonde Alexis, was also investigated by the FBI in Operation Bullpen. For your entertainment pleasure, here is my post on Bellino (which can also be found on operationbulpen.com as well as the industry-leading website of Autograph Magazine, where I usually post my forgery stuff):    

JIM BELLINO: REALITY TV STAR AND COUNTERFEIT AUTHENTICATOR

BY KEVIN NELSON. March 19, 2010. Of all the crooks in the crooked memorabilia racket, the hardest ones to catch are authenticators of dubious repute. If you doubt this, consider the case of Jim Bellino, a former authenticator who was the target of an FBI investigation during Operation Bullpen and who is now appearing on a reality television series, "The Real Housewives of Orange County."

Described by Bravo TV as "a self-made entrepreneur and businessman," Bellino is certainly all that and more. He is married to Alexis, one of the Orange County housewives, both pictured here. Since his appearance on the show, he has become the focus of Internet gossip for his past activities in the memorabilia business. I wrote about Bellino in my book, Operation Bullpen: The Inside Story of the Biggest Forgery Scam in American History, and I have spoken many times with the FBI agents who investigated him.

"He was close mouthed, a tough cookie to crack," said John Ferreira, the FBI undercover agent who posed as a memorabilia dealer and bought thousands of dollars of fake Babe Ruth-signed baseballs and other forged material from Bellino.

Based in the city of Orange in Orange County, Bellino ran a company called Forensic Document Services, which authenticated-that is, certified as legitimate-fake autographs produced by Greg Marino and other forgers who were part of the national ring that ripped off American consumers for $100 million before the FBI brought their fun to an end in 1999.

The Chicago FBI first identified Bellino as a subject of interest, and later the San Diego FBI probed his activities in Operation Bullpen. According to Tim Fitzsimmons, the FBI case agent who oversaw Bullpen and Ferreira's undercover investigation, Forensic Document Services was certifying "ungodly" amounts of forgeries and then selling them.

The FBI, in fact, combined with slugger Mark McGwire, then playing for the St. Louis Cardinals, to concoct an elaborate scheme to see if they could get Bellino to admit, on tape, that he was selling forgeries. "The scheme," as I write in my book, "had a few steps to it."

First Ferreira wrote and signed a $20,000 check made out to McGwire's charitable foundation for children. He never made this contribution; it was a sham. On the memo line of the check, it read, "Charity." The FBI made a poster-sized copy of the check so it was big enough for two people to hold and the names and the amount could be seen clearly. Ferreira and Fitzsimmons then drove up to the Long Beach office of Jim Milner, McGwire's business agent who managed the foundation and was also in on the scheme. Milner and Ferreira held the check between them and smiled as Fitzsimmons took a picture of them. Additionally, Milner composed a letter on foundation stationery, later signed by McGwire, thanking Ferreira for his generous gift.

The FBI then arranged for Ferreira and McGwire to pose for a picture together, which further bolstered Ferreira's cover and lent him legitimacy (it was hoped) in Bellino's eyes. With all this material in hand, Ferreira, secretly wired with recording equipment, paid a visit to Bellino at his office in Orange:

The feds next moved to their target. Since Ferreira's usual demeanor had been a bust with Bellino, his colleagues argued for a change in approach-harder, tougher, more like a criminal. The ever-agreeable UCA said he'd give it a whirl, and on his next visit to Forensic Document Services he came on like a major asshole. Swearing and bragging and dropping the f-word all over the place and parading around with the two signed McGwire balls and the pictures of him and McGwire and him and Milner with the $20,000 check, Ferreira said he knew that all the garbage he was buying was bad and that all his customers knew it too. So to cover his ass he had dumped a load of money into Big Mac's foundation. You know, to help the kids. All that crap.

Trying to close the deal, Ferreira told Bellino he should do the same-make a donation-because he was dealing lots of forgeries too, right?

If he was, he wouldn't say. The cookie still would not crumble. All this tough talk made Bellino nervous or, as the agent put it, "hinked up." Failing once more to crack his subject, Ferreira took his balls and photos and left, and the hinked-up owner of Forensic Document Services was undoubtedly happy to see him go.

Despite all the effort the FBI put into investigating Bellino, the cookie never did crumble. He never admitted anything on tape because, he said, he was innocent. He was not selling forgeries. One last excerpt from my book:

Though his authentication firm, Forensic Document Services, closed its doors after the bust, Bellino told a reporter that he was "neither tried nor convicted of any crime because I never would knowingly buy or sell an illegitimate or forged autograph." Feeling sure he would be vindicated if his case went to trial, he declined to take the matter to court, citing the high cost of litigation and the length of time involved. Instead he accepted a deal with the government that gave him probation and expunged his record. He cannot, however, return to the memorabilia business without obtaining an order from the court.

 In the FBI's informal list of Bullpen subjects and the sentences they received, this is what it said about Bellino: "charged/probation/expunge/ban." In other words, the feds barely laid a glove on him.

Autograph authentication remains an imprecise science and a rather dodgy one at that. For an authenticator only gives his opinion on whether a signature is legitimate or not, and as the FBI concedes-and the certificate itself states-his opinion may be wrong. So since it's only his opinion, an authenticator can certify "ungodly" amounts of fraudulent material and it's still very, very tough for investigators to prove in court that he is breaking the law.

Pretty nifty little racket, no? Sounds like it might make a good reality TV series.

Kevin Nelson is the author of Operation Bullpen: The Inside Story of the Biggest Forgery Scam in American History. Contact him here.

Posted 2/8/10. Many people do not know that Jennifer and I had a baby, Leah, who died. She was born Monday, November 25, 1996, and died Friday, November 29, 1996, after five days of living only in a hospital. This is a picture of her in the last hour of her life; she had breathing problems she could not overcome.

One of the reasons that many people do not know about Leah is that I do not tell them about her. Privately, among our family and close friends, we of course speak of her and remember her. Every November around her birthday, a time of year that is particularly hard for her mother, we recognize her life by lighting a candle or hiking, as a family, up to the hill where we scattered her ashes. We talk about her freely with our sons, who never met her and will never understand the impact she has had on their lives.

Among people I do not know, however, talking about Leah represents an awkward challenge. Whenever a new book of mine comes out, the publisher releases biographical material about me that typically mentions the fact that I have children. I often speak publicly in front of groups, and occasionally do radio and TV interviews. These, too, generally mention my children, at least in passing, and this is where the awkwardness comes in. Do I say I have four children, or three?

This issue arose again last month when I was putting the finishing touches on the second edition of The Everything Father To Be Book, A Survival Guide for Men, which will be released this year. In my acknowledgments for the book, I thanked only three of my children by name, leaving out Leah. There was a reason for this. When you are having a baby, understandably, the last thing you want to hear is that something bad can happen to your child. I have written three parenting books, and after Leah died I had a spirited discussion with an editor (not my current one) about how much I should talk about her death when writing for expectant mothers and fathers.

"When you talk about that," she said (and she was a mother herself, and not unsympathetic to my concerns), "it puts the book in another category. It's no longer a parenting guide, it's a book about loss and recovery from loss." Indeed. As this blog post shows, as soon as I start talking about Leah the discussion becomes somber and the audience falls silent.

So, in my writing (especially for new parents) and my public speaking, I have generally avoided the subject, sticking with the public fiction of three children rather than the personal truth of four. Until the other day when I was watching TV. A man came on who was being interviewed on some issue or another. I can't recall his name, what program he was on, or the issue he was talking about. What I remember is that he said he was the father of two children, one of whom had died. "An angel," he called her. His eyes became teary. The host changed the topic, and they went on to discuss whatever it was they were supposed to talk about.

I was struck by this man's courage to be open about a hidden hurt. Following his lead, I decided to change my approach. I rewrote the acknowledgments to The Everything Father To Be Book, dedicating the book to all my children and mentioning them all by name. Is a child who is gone still your child? She is, and always will be. I have four children, and their names are Annie, Hank, Gabe and Leah.

Annie, who is now in college, with her sister

 Posted 1/22/10. Last week’s blog on my adventures at a naked beach drove Annette Kaiser of San Jose, California, to her dictionary to find out the actual meaning of the word “doppelganger.” I confess I did not know what a doppelganger was when I used it to describe a certain portion of the anatomy of the fellows running around unclothed at Baker Beach in San Francisco; it just sounded funny to me. A doppelganger, says Annette, a dedicated crossword puzzler who knows her way around dictionaries, refers to a person’s “evil twin,” which makes the reference even funnier, I think.

Looking to go to Italy? And learn some Italian while you’re there? Do you have long-lost family relatives in Italy and need help in finding or contacting them? Beyond the Sights can do all these things for you—and more. It is a new travel business just begun by my very own bro, Dave Nelson. And when you get to Italy on a Beyond the Sights tour, these are the five Italian instructors who will be teaching you the language. Ciao, baby! 

 Steve Conlin, aka Steve the Bartender, dropped me a line the other day, saying that he has moved from the Los Angeles area—formerly he was a bartender for the stars, at the old Bel Air Hotel in Beverly Hills—to Las Vegas. You may recall Steve’s contribution to this column not long ago, his sharp recitation of the events surrounding actor James Dean’s death. Steve is “now appearing,” as he says, at Wynn Las Vegas. Next time you’re there, look him up and ask how a novel he is thinking about writing—“a Southwest desert noir novel concept featuring a bartender/detective character in the tradition of Philip Marlowe”—is faring.

Ever hear of streak running? Neither had I until I got a note from Nancy Shohet West, who is a writer and streak runner who has enjoyed my Runner’s Book of Daily Inspiration. Streak running is not running around with your clothes off, like those fellows at Baker Beach. It is, says Nancy, “ a term to describe people who run a mile or more every day without ever taking a day off.” Nancy does indeed run a mile or more every day, and she blogs and tweets about it with the same energy and enthusiasm she gives to her streaking. Last I checked, Nancy was up to Day #895 in her running streak, and that is in the Massachusetts snow.

By the way, let's hear it for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts! Way to go, brothers and sisters.

Last year Pearl Felson died at the age of 87, and her son Leonard decided to honor her life and memory by writing a blog. It’s called A Year of Kaddish, What a Year of Daily Praying Triggers Within and Without. Leonard is an old Hayward friend of mine who is now an esteemed journalist living in Hartford, Connecticut. He is Jewish, and he says that according to Jewish custom, “a spouse is obligated to say Kaddish [prayers] daily for one month; when a parent dies, the children say it for eleven months.” So his blog is a sort of year-long prayer for Pearl. But, he adds, it isn’t about his mother directly; it is also about his spiritual quest and life appraisal following her loss.

 Here in supposedly sunny California, we are experiencing big rains and wild storms, including tornados. But I know this is paltry indeed compared to a typical winter up in the frozen tundra of northern Minnesota where Travis Roste lives. Travis, a frequent contributor to this space, tells me that it has been “cold as a well digger's bum here lately. Until just this week when it warmed up, the last couple weeks were 10 to 20 below at night. Brrrrrrrrr.” That’s enough to freeze your doppelganger, all right. 

The Wheels of Change Road trip chugs on: This Wednesday, I speak to the always friendly folks at the Kiwanis club in Benicia and on Saturday, Jan. 30, I hit the road again for a signing at Autobooks-Aerobooks bookstore in Burbank. 

Posted 12/31/09. One of the great things about having a website is that people write me letters, and some of these people are from the FBI. Fans of Operation Bullpen may recognize the name of Special Agent Adam Lee, who worked on the case in San Diego and helped bust forgers and counterfeit dealers around the country. Lee has since moved east where he is an Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Intelligence Division in the Washington, D.C. field office. But although you can take the FBI agent out of California, you can't take California out of the FBI agent, as this letter from Adam shows:

Kevin: During a Thanksgiving call from my family in California yesterday, I learned that you have a new book out. When I saw what your most recent work was about, I had to reach out to you; first to congratulate you and to share a quick story about my life with automobiles. As a kid growing up in California—and the son of a 1950s Los Angeles amateur drag racer—I bought my first car, a 1955 Chevy 210 business coupe, at the age of 13. I sold a home built go-kart and bicycle to pay for it. My father and I built the car together and had it ready for my 16th birthday. I drove the Chevy to high school everyday. Building that car with my dad and driving it as a teenager are the fondest memories of my youth. Eventually, I sold it to help pay law school expenses and have missed it ever since.

My love for cars seems to be programmed in my DNA. My son, who is eight, is already a classic car nut. Last year, we bought an old Dodge Charger together and I am teaching him how things work on it. This past summer, we put a fresh 440 in the car and he is always thrilled to hear it roar to life. My boy and I are very close and I am pretty sure he is collecting his own memories in our garage to enjoy later in life.

I am in Washington, D.C., now, as you know. I am living proof, however, that you can take the kid out of California, but you can't take the California out of the kid. Once again, congratulations. I enjoy your work very much and appreciate the subjects about which you write. Thank you once again, too, for your meticulous attention to detail covering Operation Bullpen. Take care, Adam

     I am, in fact, a big fan of the entire Lee family. When she was ordering some books from me, Adam's mother Patricia asked for some Wheels of Change flyers so she could include them in her Christmas card mailings. Sweet!

     Now, let me briefly share two more pieces of correspondence I recently received. One is from another Operation Bullpen reader who wanted me to sign a copy of his book. He sent it to me in the mail, and I was truly impressed. I have never seen a more well-read book in all my life, as this picture somewhat shows:

     I signed this book, and sent a new, fresh copy to him just in case the old one fell apart.

     Lastly, back to cars. Both my sons had a wonderful first grade teacher, Mike Mullikin, who gave Wheels of Change to his brother Tim, a self-described "huge car enthusiast." As proof of this, Tim sent me a picture of what is sitting in his driveway:

     Says Tim: "From left, the cars are: a red 1962 Ferrari replica, a 1998 Corvette (first year C5 convertible), and a 1973 Corvette Convertible. I am currently adding a 1966 Ranchero and a 1972 Mustang to the stable. Can never have too many wheels." Indeed. You can never have too many wheels, or bottles of champagne in the frig. Pop! Happy New Year, and let’s all have an auspicious 2010.

     P.S. Shameless plug: For folks in the Bay Area, I will appear on Denny Smithson’s talk show on KPFA on Monday, Jan. 4 at 3 p.m. For details about this and other Wheels appearances in January, see the News and Events box on the home page.