Dear Ones, I apologize for neglecting jailed serial scammer Kevin Trudeau for a couple of weeks, and not blogging about anything of importance in the interim. I got pretty busy with actual paid work assignments, and I was also weakened from laughter at the worse-than-stupid shenanigans of one of Katie's former b.f.f.s, Mocktor Loony Coldwell. I did manage to get in a blog post and a couple of updates about the latter, and you can read all about the little Teutonic twerp's latest lunacy here. But I'm bored with him. Let's get back to Katie.
So. There was a big rummage...um...estate sale at Katie's gaudy Ojai, California McMansion over this past weekend (Feb 28-March 2, 2014). The picture above was taken at the beginning of the sale as buyers were flocking in, with lines all the way out the door. Proceeds from the sale, as well as from the sale of the home itself, will go to pay the court-appointed receiver and the lawyers... and then if anything is left over, it's possible that some of it might go towards Katie's big ($37.6 million plus interest) fine to the FTC... and then at some point some moneys might possibly trickle out to the customers who were screwed by Katie's dumb diet book. That's the plan, anyway. (Sorry, GIN members who were screwed. Y'all are way at the back of the line. And not the line of eager shoppers going into Katie's house of horrors.)
The lamestream media were reporting the Ojai estate sale as an "auction," but it was merely a tag sale, a fact which I confirmed, even though I had pretty much figured that out myself after reading the write-ups from the people who were actually running the sale. I don't know how much longer the link to the catalog will be valid, but if you haven't seen it already, do pay a visit and take a look at some of the items that were up for grabs. I am sure you will sigh with envy over missing a chance to get a little piece of Katie.
Among many other places, the sale was announced on Katie's Facebook page on February 25. His proxy (presumably his longtime friend/business partner/ex-g.f. Janine Nubani Contursi) wrote on his behalf:
If anyone is interested in buying any of the furnishings/personal items at the Ojai property please see the link... The receiver will be selling everything. The items in the home are in my opinion priceless. Many are antiques. All have my energy infused in them. They are all like amulets. Remember...I shall return!
And his fawning fans responded with comments such as this:
You have some wonderful treasures. When you get out you'll have fun once again finding more.
So many beautiful things! I used the pictures to do some dream building. Felt so good. You can always create other beautiful spaces. Thanks for your positive posts. They encourage me to find joy in every moment. I love being alive. Your posts remind me every day how blessed we are. Thanks, KT.
Wow, Kevin! Every piece there is as unique as you are. But I have to say, I sure do admire you for being able to let go of material things so easily. "It's not about the money you make, it's the person you become." You taught us this at the events. It is so true, because this is why people love you so much. You practice what you preach. Kevin, we love you because you have a beautiful heart!!!! I am looking forward to your next post.
...making room for bigger and better things..!
KT it's not right what they are doing to your stuff, I know it's just stuff and you will get more if you want to. But it's still disgusting how any human being can be this vicious and inflict intentionally pain on others. I hope you could save at least the most irreplaceable books from the distant past. We love you!
If i had the money to buy the house with all in it, i would buy it and after, when this situation is over, i would give it back to him, but i am sure that after this situation Kevin is going to be more powerful than ever , i am sure Kevin is laughing about all this, because he knows that what is coming is imaginable, all the best
WOW...what magnificent treasures indeed! And now your soul seeks for treasures of another kind, and may you be blessed with an infiinite [sic] abundance of them of every kind, shape, and form wherever you are!
...if I had the money I'd buy everything, even the house and hold it for Kevin so that he can have it all back. But we look forward and look for the good, look for the gold.... Feel good now. I believe that everything will be just fine for you KT!! You're a good soul KT.
Kevin's situation reminds me The bible story about the man that lost all his children and fortune and then God gave him back and much more.
Okay, you get the drift.
Shockingly, not everyone was so enamored of Trudeau's treasures. After looking at some of the pictures on the estate sale managers' site, my friend Tim Donohoe remarked, "I see he had Saddam Hussein's decorator."
Some of the participants on the Skeptical Inquirer Facebook page had similar responses (here is the link to that thread):
Having looked at the pictures all I can say is that his interior decorator should be charged with crimes against taste. Just saying....
[Goes] to show you, you can have money without taste. More fit for an establishment in Nevada
Good grief, the catalog sounds like Liberace's house
So who was right: the Katie fans, or Tim and the skeptics?
I was informed by a very credible source that the stuff in the house was "mostly imitation crap bought from a warehouse sale," a fact that is readily apparent when looking at some of those photos. (Although I was also informed that the bedding was of good quality and the pool table was decent.) Kevin spent some good money on gaudy kitchen work and faux-finish paint work, which was of decent quality but reflective of terrible taste.
I also talked with someone who noted that much of the stuff was overpriced but nevertheless a lot of it was going out the door over the weekend anyway. Suckers!
I wonder who got Katie's prized autographed picture of Rush Limbaugh. (Rush and Kevin always were kind of turds of a feather, politically speaking. Particularly when Trudeau got on his racist rants.)
If you're just simply kicking yourself for not being able to attend this white elephant sale, not to worry: There will be another one in the spring, at Katie's Chicago-area (Oak Brook,Illinois) McMansion. Details to come.
* * * * *
The Ojai home has finally been sold too, and one of my sources told me that the place has to be cleared out because of that, though the new owners did get the pick of the loot. I guess this crushes Katie's dream of having someone buy the home and all of its furnishings so that all of those magically, mystically infused things could remain together (see below).
I also found out, from reading more than 200 pages of documents filed by the court-appointed receiver, that the home actually had been on the market for years, but due in large part to Trudeau's tacky taste, unloading it was a challenge. Here's a snippet from that pile of papers:
"Therefore anyone looking to purchase the property... will be confronted with a high cost of removing what Kevin Trudeau desired." That just about says it all.
I wrote about the Ojai house previously in my April 2013 post about Trudeau's doomed attempt to declare bankruptcy. In that post I visited Trudeau's past, citing a fawning November 2005 piece about Katie in Billiards Digest. That piece was written as he was launching his doomed International Pool Tournament (IPT). In describing himself as a visionary, he said, "I see things." Too bad he didn't see that orange jumpsuit and those bars... Anyway, the pic on this page is of Katie standing in the very home whose contents are now being sold off.
After studying the catalog of Trudeau's treasures, I asked someone who has known Trudeau very well for many years if Kevin's taste was really that atrocious, or if he was just being ironic (although Trudeau doesn't really strike me as the ironic type). "Or," I asked, "were the purchases calculated -- just props to employ for marketing a sense of opulence, in order to attract customers and investors for his schemes? Or were the gaudy appointments simply affirmations to convince himself that he had 'made it?' Or am I over-thinking this when I should just be having a snarking good time?"
The response was that I was both over- and under-thinking. "He had a desire for high-end things and bought what he could. He did well with clothes and cars, but anything else that took culture or class, major fail. Where you under-think is that his core personality is the little adopted boy who never grew up. Lots to prove, be better than everyone, become king. With matters of home and family and relationships he was like an eight-year old."
That makes sense to me.
By the way, the media made sort of a thing out of the February 25 blurb on Katie's Facebook page about his stuff being like amulets. But that wasn't the first time that in the interest of priming the pump for a rummage sale, Katie tried to convince people that his stuff has magical properties and special energies. Back in December, Kevin's proxy Janine tried to convince his gullible followers that his stately homes and all of the things in them were specially infused with special magickal energies. This is from December 2013.
"Perfect abundance/luck energy... The energy is off the charts!" As long as there are people who continue to believe in this kind of nonsense, there will be the Kevin Trudeaus to part them from their money.
PS added 18 March 2014: Here, from the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI) site, is an account from someone who attended the rummage sale.