March 19, 2025 • 29 mins
Caroline and a group of David Bloom’s most recent victims knock on his apartment door. He greets them, with an egregiously calm demeanor. There's yelling, there's crying. Caroline unloads all the pain and fury she's been harboring against the man she once considered a mentor and friend. David is soft-spoken and apologetic, and claims the accusations have all been a misunderstanding. He promises to return everyone's money.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Previously on Once Upon a Con, I start calling every
single person David Bloom ever introduced me to to warn them,
like you called.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Me, probably like in the week when we came back
from France and you asked me. I think, did you
give him money?
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Yeah, that's what I asked.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
You, and then I said yes.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
French chef Vincent san Marco is the latest David Bloom victim.
I uncover he was.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Insisting and he was saying, I'm going to make so
much money. So I started giving ten k, and then
the sol house come in.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
I give twenty k, and then David does something that
I don't see coming at all.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
He's pathologically He's a psychopath, like a real psychopath.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm Caroline de Morey, and this is Once Upon a
Con episode seven, jumping through hoops like circus animals.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
The date of giving me back some money was coming in.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Chef Vincent san Marco gets real lucky in a weird
kind of way when he gives David Bloom thirty thousand
dollars to invest in some bogus IPOs. David uses that
money to move into the Villa Carlotta and introduces Vincent
around to everyone. As this amazing French chef. He's opening
(01:42):
a restaurant with a few weeks later. Some of the
quote profit from those IPOs Vincent invested in is due
and to keep Vincent believing it's all real, and to
prevent him from outing David to everyone at the Villa Carlotta,
David is backed into a corner.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
If he doesn't give me back the money, you cannot continue.
I got most of it back, and right, it's a
Ponzi scheme. So basically, I'm sorry, but I got your
money back.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Yeah, you probably got my money. Yeah. What Vincent is
saying here is that the twenty thousand dollars David Bloom
gave him back probably came out of the thirty five
thousand he scammed from me. But at the time, in
Vincent's mind, David wasn't actually returning his money at all.
So hold on, so hold on. So it's not that
(02:31):
you caught him and he was going to give you
your money back because he was scared of being in trouble.
It's because he was giving you back parts of your investment.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Correct. Wow, he basically was giving me like at least
like seventy percent of my pre investment has a returnal
investment and keeping the rest to invest in something else.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Oh my god. So that's why that makes so much
more sense.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Why when I think about it after, I say like, oh,
he was really trying to make me believe still so
he can continue to do that on other people.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Wow, so you thought you were making money?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Correct?
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Deal?
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Can the restaurant as well?
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Next week my lawyer is going to take you to
the restaurant. And like, can I ask you?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Did I blow this up for you guys? Or was
it already blown up?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I mean you did blow it up for us, like
you called me and you asked me. I think, did
you give him money?
Speaker 1 (03:38):
After my phone called a Vincent? He texts David asking
about the rest of his money and oh about that
restaurant they're going to be opening together soon.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
So I text him like, so, what's up? What are
we doing? So he told me he sold the building?
Speaker 1 (03:54):
Mmm, sold the building. Vincent is reading now from his
last Tech conversation with David Bloom from August twenty twenty one.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
So I say, what the fuck, man, you sold when
you were still telling me we are going to get
the keys. This is unrealistic.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
After doing some quick research in a restaurant trade publication,
Vincent figures out David is lying he never really owned
that building after all.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
That was owned by a Japanese group and opening a
Japanese restaurant.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
And did you ever hear from him again?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
No? Ever, never, ever, never ever ever ever.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Wow, So how did you feel when you found out
that this wasn't even his building his restaurant to give you?
Speaker 2 (04:45):
I mean I knew it. I should have known. I
was stupid, That's the way I felt. You know that that? Yeah,
I should have known. What did I do it?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Well? Vincent did what victims of con artists rarely do.
He reported David Bloom to the police. I mean, he's
out ten grand, not to mention the myriad opportunities he
passed up thinking he was opening a restaurant with David.
And after getting scammed, Vincent goes down an internet rabbit
(05:17):
hole like I did, reading everything he can about David
Peter Bloom.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I think he's pathologically sick because that's how he lives.
Since he's eighteen years old.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
He was born this way.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
He was born this way. He comes into your personal life,
and he comes into your intimity, and you open him
your heart, and so you feel stubbs after when you
do some research on him, Like you can't see that
his first scam was his parents and his grandmother. He
starts scamming the people at the college he went to you,
So he's pathological. I mean, this person is sick. He
(05:53):
shouldn't be in his streets.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
Yeah. Yeah. If he's going to do it to his
parents and his grandmother, we never stood a chance. It's
been nearly two years since Vincent went to police and
David's still not been charged with a single crime.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
I feel yeah, like you say, I've bondone by the system.
You know that the good doesn't go at the end
of the movie in the Sunset on his horse.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Yeah, I feel that. I totally understand where you're coming from.
By the way, I think David Bloom will listen to
this because he's that obsessed with himself. So knowing that
David Bloom is probably listening right now, what do you
want to say to him?
Speaker 2 (06:34):
Nothing?
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Really, no, there's nothing to say nothing.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
I mean, I hope the American system is going to
put you away. He should be deserving. I don't think
you should go to prison. I think it should be
in a crazy house.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, yeah, forever. I'm beginning to realize that David Bloom
was a cancer at the Villa Carlata. Through asking around,
I find out that David scammed several of my neighbors,
but not everyone is comfortable talking about it out of
shame and embarrassment, and I admit I was scared to
(07:08):
go public with this at first too. I was worried
how it would affect my Pizza Girl Pasta Sauce company
and my reputation as a CEO. But then I realized
my silence is exactly what David Bloom wants, and I
refuse to give that to him. At this point, I
know for sure there's another woman who lives across from
(07:30):
me who says David Bloom tricked her out of seventy
thousand dollars, and a guy down the hall who tells
me that David got another forty thousand from him, all
using the same ruse an IPO investment opportunity. So David
is totally comfortable scamming his neighbors, scamming his family, scamming
(07:53):
his friends, and even scamming his own wife. So it
shod not come as any shock that he also scammed
his employer.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
First, he was doing great at work. He rammed himself
up to a point where he was making about fifteen
grand a month, and he set record after record at
my company.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
That's David Bloom's former boss. Who will call Harry because
he wants to remain anonymous. Remember the credit repair company
David Bloom said he owned, Well, Harry actually owns it.
But David was one of his best employees.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
He wasn't conning clients. He really loved the company. That's
one thing a lot of people there said, is you know,
as much of a sleeves ball as he turned out
to be, he really did love my company, really did
work hard. Like everybody that worked around him knew he
wasn't some slimeball just conning clients. He wasn't lying to
the clients, or he wasn't scamming anybody. He was just
great at his job. He just it wasn't enough, Like
(08:49):
something about that to him is just not enough, like
a cheater. I guess like you could have a great woman,
a great life, but just have this addiction that you
just it's never enough, you know, That's what it seemed like. Yeah,
why did just do your job and make you were
making fifteen grand a month salesman, why not just do that?
Do you get a contact for him?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
My god, it's.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Never enough for something like that. See when somebody's used
to making millions off for free, for just robbing people,
taking advantage of them. I think it's just it's almost
like an addiction.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It's twenty eighteen now in Los Angeles. David's wife, Nancy
is trying to divorce him. He's been fired from his
job selling advertising on bus benches, and he's looking for
new opportunities and new marks, and he finds both at
Harry's Credit Repair Company. What does your company do exactly?
Speaker 3 (09:40):
We work with lenders and realtors all across the country
and help clients of THEIRS that have issues preventing them
from qualifying, meaning credit issues or stuff that's holding them
back from being approved for the financing. We help them
work on solving issues that fix their credit or raise
their credit scores, or just help them become quality.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Find and on one morning back in twenty eighteen, David
Bloom suddenly shows up unannounced and determined.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
He walked in off the street. So I happened to
be Actually, if I remember one of the reps came
up to me and said, oh, there's somebody up front
that would like to speak to the owner. They're looking
at seeing it for hiring. So I went up and so, oh, hi,
nice to meet you. And he seemed clean cut, well dressed,
well spoken. You know. We went into the conference room,
sat down, and me and the VP, you know, took
(10:28):
a meeting with him. It was sort of like an
impromptu interview, right. That was the first impression, and he
immediately starts bragging about himself. He's you know, he's a
duke grad. And I worked at this other credit bare firm,
top salesman, top salesman ever walked. I used to sell
billboards on the side of benches, you know, the ones
that you said at the bus stop, those little billboards,
And I made that company, rattled off all these millions
(10:51):
he made them, and they screwed me out of my commissions.
And the reason I left is because I was entitled
to blah blah blah money. And he was really adamant
about it, like it seemed Legit wasn't lying. You know,
it's hard to not believe him.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Did you like him?
Speaker 3 (11:08):
Well? He was likable because you know. He was very
well spoken, very articulate, well matter of fact, you know, confident. Hey,
I see you guys your credit repair. I was just
working over here, literally a blah blah blah and the
name of the business was one of the ones I
knew because the guy that owned it was sending me
clients and so I knew the name. And when he
came in, he said, I'm working. I used to work
(11:30):
for this guy, and I know the industry like the
back of my hand. I could be great at it.
Are you hiring? And so I was like, oh, yeah,
well we are hiring, especially somebody that's already in the
industry and knows And so I said, well, I mean,
if you're as good as you say you are, I'll
give you a shot. You know, you can only see
how you do. And when he came on board, I
trained him probably two days, and then he was on
(11:51):
the phones and everything I trained him, he immediately got it.
He was reading his scripts like perfect, and everything he
was saying to the clients on the phone I could
hear was exactly what I would say. At the time,
I was just, you know, just surprised that somebody walked
in that was looking for work that seemed like they
would actually be pretty good at the job, you know,
because usually we have to run an ad, go through
(12:12):
about ten to twenty people to find one and then
see if they even stick. And then it would be
like every four people we hired one would stick. So
it took like forty people to get one that actually
makes it. When one walks in off the street like
ready to go and they're sounding like they're going to
be pretty good at the job, it was really.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Rare, and David Bloom took to selling credit repair services
to prospective clients like a duck to water.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
All of a sudden, his numbers just went through the roof.
By eight months in he had broken company records. Like
it was just like from six months he was barely
even getting it. Their numbers wise, heat sounded perfect all
that time, but the numbers weren't there. From like seven eight,
nine months, he's just shot up. And so it was
one of those flukes where he just walked in off
the street. I want to say June of twenty twenty
(12:57):
was his peak at my firm. When he set the
fire on a record he bro you know, he broke
six records in a row. Bringing the company in fifty
sixty grand.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
I'm on David bloom as this amazing salesman making nearly
four thousand a week kind of confirms what his ex
wife Nancy previously said about David's incredible work ethic and
mightas touch.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
Back in New York, David's working at Paragon Sporting Goods
in Union Square selling tennis rackets, and of course David
is the highest grossing tennis racket seller in the country.
Showing up to work on time, he's got OCD. So
he's just you know, punctual, put together, fastidious.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
And being that star employee at Harry's credit repair company
is actually what facilitates his next scam. He is a
very smart man.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Oh, he's a genius. Like I have no doubt now
that I've seen this him because I always thought at
the time he was just a great SALESMD. Now I
realize he's just an absolute psychopath.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
It's a realization that takes Harry nearly three years to reach,
over the course of which David weaves a litany of
elaborate stories flush with details, involving a cast of impressive
movers and shakers supposedly operating in David's orbit. Harry still
(14:27):
has all of David's convoluted text messages. He's reading through
them now.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Well, here's what it starts to tell you the story
the ambassador here he has Noah has been one of
my vice best friends for twenty years. He's a former
ambassador to Argentina and one of the biggest fundraisers a
deal makers in town. He's awesome.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And David's made up association with all these important people,
coupled with his stellar work performance as Harry's best employee,
really sets Harry up to fall for what we all
fell for a seemingly amazing investment opportunity. How much money
did you invest with him total?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
I invested forty grand total. When he first started working
for me, he hit us within a month of Oh,
I'm so connected. I know everybody. My wife, she's doing
all these things politically. She's connected to Gavin Newso And
he dropped so many names, I mean my head was spinning.
He was showing me his phone. Oh look, I got
Adam Shift's number on speed dial. I've got Gavin Newsom
(15:26):
in my phone. And so he's like, I'm connected to
the mayor. I got this great idea we should present
to the mayor. The Mayor's doing this fund this they
call it a bridge home, right, I mean, they had
all checked out. So he said, the Mayor's got this
thing coming up that he's going to use some of
the Mayor's fund to launch this thing called a bridge home.
It's to help people that are homeless go through a
(15:48):
kind of like a path to get them off the streets.
So first they were going to get him into it
halfway housing where it got him clean, and then from
there we were going to put them into credit repair
to fix their credit. And they're from there, they're going
to get a job, and then they're gonna be out,
you know, working. So it was kind of like a
great idea. I mean he had to present it was
going to make us half a million dollars a month.
(16:08):
This is what he pitched. You know, he presented to
us like, if we can do this many you know,
this many clients, If we can handle fixing this many
clients credit, then I'll pitch the mayor on getting us
five hundred a month and we'll just come to feet
to one thousand and blah blah blah. The Mayor's fun
it's going to come out of their fund. They got
this slush fund. So that's where I started like getting combat.
If it wasn't conning me, like he wasn't asking me
(16:30):
for anything. He just said, you know, give us a
proposal that we can I can present my wife and
I can present to the mayor. He took it so
far that he said he got it approved. There was
a press release going to happen. The mayor wanted me
and the VP there. My VP was Hispanic at the time,
so he's like, he's Hispanic and it will look great.
He elaborate stories. We're talking about six months of this thing.
We work on this, right, we're expecting this. I'm getting excited,
(16:53):
telling my friends and family like I'm like, God, this
is going to be great. We're gonna help people. And
this guy's like connected to everybody. When the press release
was supposed to happen, all of a sudden, there was
this last minute change of events where it didn't happen, right,
So we went and bought suits. I brought my VP
of suit. We're all excited and then oh that's you know, hey, David,
today's day. Right, Well, we're supposed to go somewhere He's like, oh,
(17:15):
that changed, that got changed, and he says they're not
doing it now because it's bad timing. The mayor just
got hit with a lawsuit because there's a bunch of
fleas on skid Row because he hasn't cleaned up the
trash in forever, and now they're they're making a big
deal about the fleas that are causing these people to
get sick on skid Row. So now he looks bad.
We can't do a press release at the same time
(17:35):
he's having this negative press. So we google it right,
fleas skid Row, and sure enough, there's a whole article
about how, literally that day before there was this outbreak
of fleas, people are getting sick skid Row, they haven't
picked up the trash. So I'm like, oh my god,
I guess I guess it's.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Legit, you know, but it wasn't legit. I mean, yes,
there was a flea infestation on skid Row, that part
was true, But this whole homeless deal with the mayor
of Los Angeles, who at the time was Eric Garcetti.
We've put fourteen thousand extra people into shelter and housing.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
Was all.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
You guessed it bullshit. David is really good at using
current events to corroborate his scams. I mean, he reads
the newspaper every day. He knows what's going on in
the world, and he uses those tidbits to sell his stories.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
The mayor thing lasts about six months, and then right
around the point where the flea thing happened, it started
to fall apart. And his excuse for it not happening
after that was, you know, it's gonna be too much
of a haushole because your company has some negative reviews
on Yelp, and you know the mayor doesn't want to
get behind that because it's gonna look bad. So would
(18:51):
you be willing to start a whole other company, a
whole other corporation that we could do it? So I did.
I went and opened up a whole other corporation, two
of them, just separate to make it clean. Because he
literally had us doing jumping through hoops like a little
circus anamals, you know what I mean. And so we're
doing all this and it's just never material alive.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
But all that hoop jumping was just enough to distract
Harry from the second part of David's plan, the money part.
David convinces Harry that he has early access to the
IPOs of companies like Coinbase and Instacart, right around the
(19:29):
time when those companies are reported to be going public.
David tells Harry, I'm.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
Gonna buy it privately because he knows the owner.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Before it goes.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Public, they can sell shares privately to their friends.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
So Harry gives David forty thousand dollars to invest, and
in a few weeks he actually sees what appears to
be a return on his investment.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
And then all of a sudden, I start getting a
little money back because the first one's come through. But
he can only give me nine grand every day or
every other day. So the first day he gives me
nine grand cash didn't look like he'd taking the money
out of the ATM. It looked like out from one
of the mattress. To be honest with you, these weren't
bills that you get out of a bank.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Oh so we gave you cash, Yeah, it was cash.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Always cash. Envelope full, nine thousand dollars in bills, right, hundreds.
Because they think he was scamming other people and giving
me money, I put forty grand in that man's hands.
And I got twenty.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Seven back, so Harry's only out thirteen thousand dollars, but
he actually ends up losing much more than that. Remember
the guy I spoke to on the phone that day
who said he was Whole Food CEO AC Gallo and
played along with David to help scam me.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Ac sitting here with Caroline, the founder of CEO.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Of Pizza Girl, thank you so much for taking time
to chat with me. Yes. In August of twenty twenty one,
right after I start calling everyone David ever introduced me to,
including hair, to warn them, I make another call to
Harry's credit repair company to check on my account, and
(21:07):
this is the outgoing message I hear, Hi, this is Parry.
Speaker 3 (21:11):
I can't talk to you right now, completely met your
name and number.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
And a message I'll get back to you as soon
as I can.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
I was immediately shocked by how similar that voice sounds
to the voice of the guy pretending to be a C.
Gallo on the phone with me that day in David's apartment.
This sounds great, products likely worsted, align with our values
right Brandford Company. And my my literally my stomach just
(21:45):
dropped and I was like, this is the same voice
in a crazy twist I did not see coming. It
turns out, while David was working at Harry's credit repair company,
he convinces his co worker I named Terry, to pretend
to be the Whole Food CEO A C. Gallo on
(22:05):
the phone with me that day. When Harry finds out
his employee Terry helped David scam me, it devastates him.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
You know, Terry was with me for ten years.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
When I realized that the voices were the same, I
was so scared to tell you. When I first told you,
I said, Hey, I think that this might be somebody
pretending to be the president of Whole Foods. I think
he works for you. You were like, there's no way there,
and I was like, no, what because I didn't picture
(22:45):
David rop into it, so it would be Terry doing it.
And then you came to the Villa Carlotta, and I
tould you in that back room and I played you
the voice, and you knew immediately I saw your face
and it just drop.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
It just it was like, Wow, I think you know someone.
You know.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I still kind of feel bad for Terry in a
way because I'm like, he got sucked into something. Did
he ever explain to you what happened.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
He never did. Well. He did tell me that David
had told him he needed a favor. It was I
remember exactly how he explained it because I got Terry.
I recorded Terry, and I took that to the police.
I confronted Terry at first. I went to the police
right after all this happened. I went to there and
filed my own report. When I talked to the lady,
I was like, I'm going to confront my employee and
(23:31):
fight out if he really did this and what happened?
Can I record him? I actually asked the lady first
the cop if I could record Terry without him knowing
about it first, because I wanted to get that evidence
so I could get something to handle them. And she said, yep,
as long as it's not in a bathroom or some
other thing, you can pretty much record people anywhere, you know.
I was like, okay. So I had laid my phone
(23:53):
on the counter in my office, called Terry in there,
imagic confronted him like, hey, Terry, you know this is
what's going on. I've heard this, this and this. Did
you do this? He was like, you know, it wasn't
something I knew what was going on. He kind of
danced around it. Like the way he made it sound
was he didn't know what he was doing, but he
(24:14):
knew he was doing something David needed him to do.
I even said, like, how could you do that and
not know you were doing something wrong? Right? Yeah? He
also did you know? I said, did you know?
Speaker 1 (24:24):
You?
Speaker 3 (24:25):
I'm pretty sure ask him, did you know you were
pretending to be the president? Yes?
Speaker 4 (24:28):
He did.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
I have the recording. He actually said, Hi. I'm like,
and David's like, ac ac if you look up a C. Gallow.
I mean, I watched a bunch of his Ted talks
and everything else.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Terry tried to I think Terry knew he was caught
at the time, and so he didn't know he's being recorded.
But at the same time, he kind of didn't want
to lose face with me because he's been with me
for ten years at the time.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
Yeah, And so.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
I was like, didn't his answer didn't sit.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Well with me?
Speaker 1 (24:52):
What could you possibly say?
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Is a reason he made it sound like David wanted him.
I'm trying to remember it something to do with getting
like a contrary. It was something helping David out as
he described me like he was helping David out and
then when I told him it ruined this person's life,
like you do understand what you did, Like this is
what really happened. He was in shock, so I don't
think Terry knew the full extent of what he did.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
That recording Harry made confronting Terry back in late twenty
twenty one was submitted to police as evidence, but ever
since Harry got a new phone, he can't find it
to share with us. Regardless, Harry promptly fired Terry after
that confrontation. I'm sorry, that's so hard.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
That was the hardest thing to do.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
I'm like wondering if like David even cared about what
he did to Terry, you know what I mean, Like
he lost his job of ten years. He you know,
potentially could go to jail if anything ever surfaces. Like
it's just does David even care at all?
Speaker 3 (25:53):
If he cared about that, he would have cared about you,
or cared about me, or cared about everybody canned.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Yeah, I feel like I'll just never stop. We reached
out to Terry to ask why on earth he would
pretend to be a sea gallow in David Bloom's scam.
He emailed us back, saying, in part quote, hekay screw
me over, cost me thousands of dollars and got me fired.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
I'm a frickin idiot and makes me sick.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
After sharing what I uncovered about David Bloom with my
neighbors at the Villa Carlotta and with several other victims
he scammed, we have a series of meetings to figure
out how we should move forward. I mean, we've got
a bonafide con artist living amongst us and something needs
to be done. So late one Sunday evening in September
(26:42):
of twenty twenty one, a group of us who are
mad as hell, quietly tiptoe up the stairs and down
the hallway to David Bloom's apartment at the Villa Carlotta
with iPhones in hand recording. We knock on his front
door and what do you know, he actually comes out.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
To talk to us. David, how are you.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
No?
Speaker 4 (27:12):
We're right here.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Next time on Once upon a Con, I apologize to you.
Why would you do that to me when I thought
we were friends?
Speaker 3 (27:23):
We are friends?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Well, but what did you gain from that?
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Nothing? What was the perfect?
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Nothing?
Speaker 1 (27:30):
I almost loved everything everything. It's time for David Bloom
to face the music. But will he weasele his way
out of this one too?
Speaker 3 (27:39):
I can use the company that is fifteen years I've
worked with the Dot Company.
Speaker 4 (27:43):
Can you lose your company?
Speaker 3 (27:44):
How couldn't I? You're committing crimes, so you all have
your money back.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
There's no trust anymore.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
It has to happen now.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
This podcast is dedicated to the memory of my amazing mother,
Bonnie Major, who would be soon super proud of me
standing up for myself. Once Upon a Con is a
production of AYR Media and Thirty two Flavors, hosted by
Me Caroline de Morey. Executive producers Eliza Rosen for AYR Media,
(28:16):
Alex Baskin for thirty two Flavors, and Jonathan Walton for
Jonathan Walton Productions. Written by Jonathan Walton, producer Caroline de Morey,
Senior associate producer Joe Pushesnik, Coordinator Molena Kroyevsky. Sound designed
by Tim Mulhern, edited and mixed by Tim Mulhern, Supervising
(28:39):
editor Victoria Chang. Mastered by Victoria Chang Engineering Justin Longerbeam.
Legal counsel for AYR Media, Gianni Douglass, voice acting by
David Titelbaum. Our theme song, Freshly Served, was written and
performed by the incredibly talented Mattie Noise and is available
(28:59):
on on her soundtid
Previously on Once Upon a Con, I start calling every
single person David Bloom ever introduced me to to warn them,
like you called.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Me, probably like in the week when we came back
from France and you asked me. I think, did you
give him money?
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Yeah, that's what I asked.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
You, and then I said yes.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
French chef Vincent san Marco is the latest David Bloom victim.
I uncover he was.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Insisting and he was saying, I'm going to make so
much money. So I started giving ten k, and then
the sol house come in.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
I give twenty k, and then David does something that
I don't see coming at all.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
He's pathologically He's a psychopath, like a real psychopath.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
I'm Caroline de Morey, and this is Once Upon a
Con episode seven, jumping through hoops like circus animals.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
The date of giving me back some money was coming in.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Chef Vincent san Marco gets real lucky in a weird
kind of way when he gives David Bloom thirty thousand
dollars to invest in some bogus IPOs. David uses that
money to move into the Villa Carlotta and introduces Vincent
around to everyone. As this amazing French chef. He's opening
(01:42):
a restaurant with a few weeks later. Some of the
quote profit from those IPOs Vincent invested in is due
and to keep Vincent believing it's all real, and to
prevent him from outing David to everyone at the Villa Carlotta,
David is backed into a corner.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
If he doesn't give me back the money, you cannot continue.
I got most of it back, and right, it's a
Ponzi scheme. So basically, I'm sorry, but I got your
money back.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Yeah, you probably got my money. Yeah. What Vincent is
saying here is that the twenty thousand dollars David Bloom
gave him back probably came out of the thirty five
thousand he scammed from me. But at the time, in
Vincent's mind, David wasn't actually returning his money at all.
So hold on, so hold on. So it's not that
(02:31):
you caught him and he was going to give you
your money back because he was scared of being in trouble.
It's because he was giving you back parts of your investment.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Correct. Wow, he basically was giving me like at least
like seventy percent of my pre investment has a returnal
investment and keeping the rest to invest in something else.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Oh my god. So that's why that makes so much
more sense.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Why when I think about it after, I say like, oh,
he was really trying to make me believe still so
he can continue to do that on other people.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Wow, so you thought you were making money?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Correct?
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Deal?
Speaker 2 (03:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Can the restaurant as well?
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Next week my lawyer is going to take you to
the restaurant. And like, can I ask you?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Did I blow this up for you guys? Or was
it already blown up?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I mean you did blow it up for us, like
you called me and you asked me. I think, did
you give him money?
Speaker 1 (03:38):
After my phone called a Vincent? He texts David asking
about the rest of his money and oh about that
restaurant they're going to be opening together soon.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
So I text him like, so, what's up? What are
we doing? So he told me he sold the building?
Speaker 1 (03:54):
Mmm, sold the building. Vincent is reading now from his
last Tech conversation with David Bloom from August twenty twenty one.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
So I say, what the fuck, man, you sold when
you were still telling me we are going to get
the keys. This is unrealistic.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
After doing some quick research in a restaurant trade publication,
Vincent figures out David is lying he never really owned
that building after all.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
That was owned by a Japanese group and opening a
Japanese restaurant.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
And did you ever hear from him again?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
No? Ever, never, ever, never ever ever ever.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Wow, So how did you feel when you found out
that this wasn't even his building his restaurant to give you?
Speaker 2 (04:45):
I mean I knew it. I should have known. I
was stupid, That's the way I felt. You know that that? Yeah,
I should have known. What did I do it?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Well? Vincent did what victims of con artists rarely do.
He reported David Bloom to the police. I mean, he's
out ten grand, not to mention the myriad opportunities he
passed up thinking he was opening a restaurant with David.
And after getting scammed, Vincent goes down an internet rabbit
(05:17):
hole like I did, reading everything he can about David
Peter Bloom.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I think he's pathologically sick because that's how he lives.
Since he's eighteen years old.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
He was born this way.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
He was born this way. He comes into your personal life,
and he comes into your intimity, and you open him
your heart, and so you feel stubbs after when you
do some research on him, Like you can't see that
his first scam was his parents and his grandmother. He
starts scamming the people at the college he went to you,
So he's pathological. I mean, this person is sick. He
(05:53):
shouldn't be in his streets.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
Yeah. Yeah. If he's going to do it to his
parents and his grandmother, we never stood a chance. It's
been nearly two years since Vincent went to police and
David's still not been charged with a single crime.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
I feel yeah, like you say, I've bondone by the system.
You know that the good doesn't go at the end
of the movie in the Sunset on his horse.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Yeah, I feel that. I totally understand where you're coming from.
By the way, I think David Bloom will listen to
this because he's that obsessed with himself. So knowing that
David Bloom is probably listening right now, what do you
want to say to him?
Speaker 2 (06:34):
Nothing?
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Really, no, there's nothing to say nothing.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
I mean, I hope the American system is going to
put you away. He should be deserving. I don't think
you should go to prison. I think it should be
in a crazy house.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, yeah, forever. I'm beginning to realize that David Bloom
was a cancer at the Villa Carlata. Through asking around,
I find out that David scammed several of my neighbors,
but not everyone is comfortable talking about it out of
shame and embarrassment, and I admit I was scared to
(07:08):
go public with this at first too. I was worried
how it would affect my Pizza Girl Pasta Sauce company
and my reputation as a CEO. But then I realized
my silence is exactly what David Bloom wants, and I
refuse to give that to him. At this point, I
know for sure there's another woman who lives across from
(07:30):
me who says David Bloom tricked her out of seventy
thousand dollars, and a guy down the hall who tells
me that David got another forty thousand from him, all
using the same ruse an IPO investment opportunity. So David
is totally comfortable scamming his neighbors, scamming his family, scamming
(07:53):
his friends, and even scamming his own wife. So it
shod not come as any shock that he also scammed
his employer.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
First, he was doing great at work. He rammed himself
up to a point where he was making about fifteen
grand a month, and he set record after record at
my company.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
That's David Bloom's former boss. Who will call Harry because
he wants to remain anonymous. Remember the credit repair company
David Bloom said he owned, Well, Harry actually owns it.
But David was one of his best employees.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
He wasn't conning clients. He really loved the company. That's
one thing a lot of people there said, is you know,
as much of a sleeves ball as he turned out
to be, he really did love my company, really did
work hard. Like everybody that worked around him knew he
wasn't some slimeball just conning clients. He wasn't lying to
the clients, or he wasn't scamming anybody. He was just
great at his job. He just it wasn't enough, Like
(08:49):
something about that to him is just not enough, like
a cheater. I guess like you could have a great woman,
a great life, but just have this addiction that you
just it's never enough, you know, That's what it seemed like. Yeah,
why did just do your job and make you were
making fifteen grand a month salesman, why not just do that?
Do you get a contact for him?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
My god, it's.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Never enough for something like that. See when somebody's used
to making millions off for free, for just robbing people,
taking advantage of them. I think it's just it's almost
like an addiction.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It's twenty eighteen now in Los Angeles. David's wife, Nancy
is trying to divorce him. He's been fired from his
job selling advertising on bus benches, and he's looking for
new opportunities and new marks, and he finds both at
Harry's Credit Repair Company. What does your company do exactly?
Speaker 3 (09:40):
We work with lenders and realtors all across the country
and help clients of THEIRS that have issues preventing them
from qualifying, meaning credit issues or stuff that's holding them
back from being approved for the financing. We help them
work on solving issues that fix their credit or raise
their credit scores, or just help them become quality.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Find and on one morning back in twenty eighteen, David
Bloom suddenly shows up unannounced and determined.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
He walked in off the street. So I happened to
be Actually, if I remember one of the reps came
up to me and said, oh, there's somebody up front
that would like to speak to the owner. They're looking
at seeing it for hiring. So I went up and so, oh, hi,
nice to meet you. And he seemed clean cut, well dressed,
well spoken. You know. We went into the conference room,
sat down, and me and the VP, you know, took
(10:28):
a meeting with him. It was sort of like an
impromptu interview, right. That was the first impression, and he
immediately starts bragging about himself. He's you know, he's a
duke grad. And I worked at this other credit bare firm,
top salesman, top salesman ever walked. I used to sell
billboards on the side of benches, you know, the ones
that you said at the bus stop, those little billboards,
And I made that company, rattled off all these millions
(10:51):
he made them, and they screwed me out of my commissions.
And the reason I left is because I was entitled
to blah blah blah money. And he was really adamant
about it, like it seemed Legit wasn't lying. You know,
it's hard to not believe him.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Did you like him?
Speaker 3 (11:08):
Well? He was likable because you know. He was very
well spoken, very articulate, well matter of fact, you know, confident. Hey,
I see you guys your credit repair. I was just
working over here, literally a blah blah blah and the
name of the business was one of the ones I
knew because the guy that owned it was sending me
clients and so I knew the name. And when he
came in, he said, I'm working. I used to work
(11:30):
for this guy, and I know the industry like the
back of my hand. I could be great at it.
Are you hiring? And so I was like, oh, yeah,
well we are hiring, especially somebody that's already in the
industry and knows And so I said, well, I mean,
if you're as good as you say you are, I'll
give you a shot. You know, you can only see
how you do. And when he came on board, I
trained him probably two days, and then he was on
(11:51):
the phones and everything I trained him, he immediately got it.
He was reading his scripts like perfect, and everything he
was saying to the clients on the phone I could
hear was exactly what I would say. At the time,
I was just, you know, just surprised that somebody walked
in that was looking for work that seemed like they
would actually be pretty good at the job, you know,
because usually we have to run an ad, go through
(12:12):
about ten to twenty people to find one and then
see if they even stick. And then it would be
like every four people we hired one would stick. So
it took like forty people to get one that actually
makes it. When one walks in off the street like
ready to go and they're sounding like they're going to
be pretty good at the job, it was really.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Rare, and David Bloom took to selling credit repair services
to prospective clients like a duck to water.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
All of a sudden, his numbers just went through the roof.
By eight months in he had broken company records. Like
it was just like from six months he was barely
even getting it. Their numbers wise, heat sounded perfect all
that time, but the numbers weren't there. From like seven eight,
nine months, he's just shot up. And so it was
one of those flukes where he just walked in off
the street. I want to say June of twenty twenty
(12:57):
was his peak at my firm. When he set the
fire on a record he bro you know, he broke
six records in a row. Bringing the company in fifty
sixty grand.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
I'm on David bloom as this amazing salesman making nearly
four thousand a week kind of confirms what his ex
wife Nancy previously said about David's incredible work ethic and
mightas touch.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
Back in New York, David's working at Paragon Sporting Goods
in Union Square selling tennis rackets, and of course David
is the highest grossing tennis racket seller in the country.
Showing up to work on time, he's got OCD. So
he's just you know, punctual, put together, fastidious.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
And being that star employee at Harry's credit repair company
is actually what facilitates his next scam. He is a
very smart man.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
Oh, he's a genius. Like I have no doubt now
that I've seen this him because I always thought at
the time he was just a great SALESMD. Now I
realize he's just an absolute psychopath.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
It's a realization that takes Harry nearly three years to reach,
over the course of which David weaves a litany of
elaborate stories flush with details, involving a cast of impressive
movers and shakers supposedly operating in David's orbit. Harry still
(14:27):
has all of David's convoluted text messages. He's reading through
them now.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Well, here's what it starts to tell you the story
the ambassador here he has Noah has been one of
my vice best friends for twenty years. He's a former
ambassador to Argentina and one of the biggest fundraisers a
deal makers in town. He's awesome.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And David's made up association with all these important people,
coupled with his stellar work performance as Harry's best employee,
really sets Harry up to fall for what we all
fell for a seemingly amazing investment opportunity. How much money
did you invest with him total?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
I invested forty grand total. When he first started working
for me, he hit us within a month of Oh,
I'm so connected. I know everybody. My wife, she's doing
all these things politically. She's connected to Gavin Newso And
he dropped so many names, I mean my head was spinning.
He was showing me his phone. Oh look, I got
Adam Shift's number on speed dial. I've got Gavin Newsom
(15:26):
in my phone. And so he's like, I'm connected to
the mayor. I got this great idea we should present
to the mayor. The Mayor's doing this fund this they
call it a bridge home, right, I mean, they had
all checked out. So he said, the Mayor's got this
thing coming up that he's going to use some of
the Mayor's fund to launch this thing called a bridge home.
It's to help people that are homeless go through a
(15:48):
kind of like a path to get them off the streets.
So first they were going to get him into it
halfway housing where it got him clean, and then from
there we were going to put them into credit repair
to fix their credit. And they're from there, they're going
to get a job, and then they're gonna be out,
you know, working. So it was kind of like a
great idea. I mean he had to present it was
going to make us half a million dollars a month.
(16:08):
This is what he pitched. You know, he presented to
us like, if we can do this many you know,
this many clients, If we can handle fixing this many
clients credit, then I'll pitch the mayor on getting us
five hundred a month and we'll just come to feet
to one thousand and blah blah blah. The Mayor's fun
it's going to come out of their fund. They got
this slush fund. So that's where I started like getting combat.
If it wasn't conning me, like he wasn't asking me
(16:30):
for anything. He just said, you know, give us a
proposal that we can I can present my wife and
I can present to the mayor. He took it so
far that he said he got it approved. There was
a press release going to happen. The mayor wanted me
and the VP there. My VP was Hispanic at the time,
so he's like, he's Hispanic and it will look great.
He elaborate stories. We're talking about six months of this thing.
We work on this, right, we're expecting this. I'm getting excited,
(16:53):
telling my friends and family like I'm like, God, this
is going to be great. We're gonna help people. And
this guy's like connected to everybody. When the press release
was supposed to happen, all of a sudden, there was
this last minute change of events where it didn't happen, right,
So we went and bought suits. I brought my VP
of suit. We're all excited and then oh that's you know, hey, David,
today's day. Right, Well, we're supposed to go somewhere He's like, oh,
(17:15):
that changed, that got changed, and he says they're not
doing it now because it's bad timing. The mayor just
got hit with a lawsuit because there's a bunch of
fleas on skid Row because he hasn't cleaned up the
trash in forever, and now they're they're making a big
deal about the fleas that are causing these people to
get sick on skid Row. So now he looks bad.
We can't do a press release at the same time
(17:35):
he's having this negative press. So we google it right,
fleas skid Row, and sure enough, there's a whole article
about how, literally that day before there was this outbreak
of fleas, people are getting sick skid Row, they haven't
picked up the trash. So I'm like, oh my god,
I guess I guess it's.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Legit, you know, but it wasn't legit. I mean, yes,
there was a flea infestation on skid Row, that part
was true, But this whole homeless deal with the mayor
of Los Angeles, who at the time was Eric Garcetti.
We've put fourteen thousand extra people into shelter and housing.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
Was all.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
You guessed it bullshit. David is really good at using
current events to corroborate his scams. I mean, he reads
the newspaper every day. He knows what's going on in
the world, and he uses those tidbits to sell his stories.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
The mayor thing lasts about six months, and then right
around the point where the flea thing happened, it started
to fall apart. And his excuse for it not happening
after that was, you know, it's gonna be too much
of a haushole because your company has some negative reviews
on Yelp, and you know the mayor doesn't want to
get behind that because it's gonna look bad. So would
(18:51):
you be willing to start a whole other company, a
whole other corporation that we could do it? So I did.
I went and opened up a whole other corporation, two
of them, just separate to make it clean. Because he
literally had us doing jumping through hoops like a little
circus anamals, you know what I mean. And so we're
doing all this and it's just never material alive.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
But all that hoop jumping was just enough to distract
Harry from the second part of David's plan, the money part.
David convinces Harry that he has early access to the
IPOs of companies like Coinbase and Instacart, right around the
(19:29):
time when those companies are reported to be going public.
David tells Harry, I'm.
Speaker 3 (19:36):
Gonna buy it privately because he knows the owner.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Before it goes.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Public, they can sell shares privately to their friends.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
So Harry gives David forty thousand dollars to invest, and
in a few weeks he actually sees what appears to
be a return on his investment.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
And then all of a sudden, I start getting a
little money back because the first one's come through. But
he can only give me nine grand every day or
every other day. So the first day he gives me
nine grand cash didn't look like he'd taking the money
out of the ATM. It looked like out from one
of the mattress. To be honest with you, these weren't
bills that you get out of a bank.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Oh so we gave you cash, Yeah, it was cash.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Always cash. Envelope full, nine thousand dollars in bills, right, hundreds.
Because they think he was scamming other people and giving
me money, I put forty grand in that man's hands.
And I got twenty.
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Seven back, so Harry's only out thirteen thousand dollars, but
he actually ends up losing much more than that. Remember
the guy I spoke to on the phone that day
who said he was Whole Food CEO AC Gallo and
played along with David to help scam me.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Ac sitting here with Caroline, the founder of CEO.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Of Pizza Girl, thank you so much for taking time
to chat with me. Yes. In August of twenty twenty one,
right after I start calling everyone David ever introduced me to,
including hair, to warn them, I make another call to
Harry's credit repair company to check on my account, and
(21:07):
this is the outgoing message I hear, Hi, this is Parry.
Speaker 3 (21:11):
I can't talk to you right now, completely met your
name and number.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
And a message I'll get back to you as soon
as I can.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
I was immediately shocked by how similar that voice sounds
to the voice of the guy pretending to be a C.
Gallo on the phone with me that day in David's apartment.
This sounds great, products likely worsted, align with our values
right Brandford Company. And my my literally my stomach just
(21:45):
dropped and I was like, this is the same voice
in a crazy twist I did not see coming. It
turns out, while David was working at Harry's credit repair company,
he convinces his co worker I named Terry, to pretend
to be the Whole Food CEO A C. Gallo on
(22:05):
the phone with me that day. When Harry finds out
his employee Terry helped David scam me, it devastates him.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
You know, Terry was with me for ten years.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
When I realized that the voices were the same, I
was so scared to tell you. When I first told you,
I said, Hey, I think that this might be somebody
pretending to be the president of Whole Foods. I think
he works for you. You were like, there's no way there,
and I was like, no, what because I didn't picture
(22:45):
David rop into it, so it would be Terry doing it.
And then you came to the Villa Carlotta, and I
tould you in that back room and I played you
the voice, and you knew immediately I saw your face
and it just drop.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
It just it was like, Wow, I think you know someone.
You know.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
I still kind of feel bad for Terry in a
way because I'm like, he got sucked into something. Did
he ever explain to you what happened.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
He never did. Well. He did tell me that David
had told him he needed a favor. It was I
remember exactly how he explained it because I got Terry.
I recorded Terry, and I took that to the police.
I confronted Terry at first. I went to the police
right after all this happened. I went to there and
filed my own report. When I talked to the lady,
I was like, I'm going to confront my employee and
(23:31):
fight out if he really did this and what happened?
Can I record him? I actually asked the lady first
the cop if I could record Terry without him knowing
about it first, because I wanted to get that evidence
so I could get something to handle them. And she said, yep,
as long as it's not in a bathroom or some
other thing, you can pretty much record people anywhere, you know.
I was like, okay. So I had laid my phone
(23:53):
on the counter in my office, called Terry in there,
imagic confronted him like, hey, Terry, you know this is
what's going on. I've heard this, this and this. Did
you do this? He was like, you know, it wasn't
something I knew what was going on. He kind of
danced around it. Like the way he made it sound
was he didn't know what he was doing, but he
(24:14):
knew he was doing something David needed him to do.
I even said, like, how could you do that and
not know you were doing something wrong? Right? Yeah? He
also did you know? I said, did you know?
Speaker 1 (24:24):
You?
Speaker 3 (24:25):
I'm pretty sure ask him, did you know you were
pretending to be the president? Yes?
Speaker 4 (24:28):
He did.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
I have the recording. He actually said, Hi. I'm like,
and David's like, ac ac if you look up a C. Gallow.
I mean, I watched a bunch of his Ted talks
and everything else.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Terry tried to I think Terry knew he was caught
at the time, and so he didn't know he's being recorded.
But at the same time, he kind of didn't want
to lose face with me because he's been with me
for ten years at the time.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
Yeah, And so.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
I was like, didn't his answer didn't sit.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Well with me?
Speaker 1 (24:52):
What could you possibly say?
Speaker 3 (24:54):
Is a reason he made it sound like David wanted him.
I'm trying to remember it something to do with getting
like a contrary. It was something helping David out as
he described me like he was helping David out and
then when I told him it ruined this person's life,
like you do understand what you did, Like this is
what really happened. He was in shock, so I don't
think Terry knew the full extent of what he did.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
That recording Harry made confronting Terry back in late twenty
twenty one was submitted to police as evidence, but ever
since Harry got a new phone, he can't find it
to share with us. Regardless, Harry promptly fired Terry after
that confrontation. I'm sorry, that's so hard.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
That was the hardest thing to do.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
I'm like wondering if like David even cared about what
he did to Terry, you know what I mean, Like
he lost his job of ten years. He you know,
potentially could go to jail if anything ever surfaces. Like
it's just does David even care at all?
Speaker 3 (25:53):
If he cared about that, he would have cared about you,
or cared about me, or cared about everybody canned.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Yeah, I feel like I'll just never stop. We reached
out to Terry to ask why on earth he would
pretend to be a sea gallow in David Bloom's scam.
He emailed us back, saying, in part quote, hekay screw
me over, cost me thousands of dollars and got me fired.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
I'm a frickin idiot and makes me sick.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
After sharing what I uncovered about David Bloom with my
neighbors at the Villa Carlotta and with several other victims
he scammed, we have a series of meetings to figure
out how we should move forward. I mean, we've got
a bonafide con artist living amongst us and something needs
to be done. So late one Sunday evening in September
(26:42):
of twenty twenty one, a group of us who are
mad as hell, quietly tiptoe up the stairs and down
the hallway to David Bloom's apartment at the Villa Carlotta
with iPhones in hand recording. We knock on his front
door and what do you know, he actually comes out.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
To talk to us. David, how are you.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
No?
Speaker 4 (27:12):
We're right here.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Next time on Once upon a Con, I apologize to you.
Why would you do that to me when I thought
we were friends?
Speaker 3 (27:23):
We are friends?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Well, but what did you gain from that?
Speaker 1 (27:27):
Nothing? What was the perfect?
Speaker 2 (27:29):
Nothing?
Speaker 1 (27:30):
I almost loved everything everything. It's time for David Bloom
to face the music. But will he weasele his way
out of this one too?
Speaker 3 (27:39):
I can use the company that is fifteen years I've
worked with the Dot Company.
Speaker 4 (27:43):
Can you lose your company?
Speaker 3 (27:44):
How couldn't I? You're committing crimes, so you all have
your money back.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
There's no trust anymore.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
It has to happen now.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
This podcast is dedicated to the memory of my amazing mother,
Bonnie Major, who would be soon super proud of me
standing up for myself. Once Upon a Con is a
production of AYR Media and Thirty two Flavors, hosted by
Me Caroline de Morey. Executive producers Eliza Rosen for AYR Media,
(28:16):
Alex Baskin for thirty two Flavors, and Jonathan Walton for
Jonathan Walton Productions. Written by Jonathan Walton, producer Caroline de Morey,
Senior associate producer Joe Pushesnik, Coordinator Molena Kroyevsky. Sound designed
by Tim Mulhern, edited and mixed by Tim Mulhern, Supervising
(28:39):
editor Victoria Chang. Mastered by Victoria Chang Engineering Justin Longerbeam.
Legal counsel for AYR Media, Gianni Douglass, voice acting by
David Titelbaum. Our theme song, Freshly Served, was written and
performed by the incredibly talented Mattie Noise and is available
(28:59):
on on her soundtid
Host
Caroline D’Amore
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