December 13, 2024 • 37 mins
This week we tackle a recent story featuring a three-hit wonder from the late 2000s in Sean Kingston and a band that never really got started in Lights Over Paris. Although their level of fame achieved was different, they both have now landed in the same place: jail. Find out how on this week's episode.
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(00:02):
Wall Street veteran Bernard Madoff has been arrested and
charged with running a $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
Congress wants to know what caused the Enron meltdown, and
while the collective rage currently is focused on low
comp. Tyco CEO Dennis Koslowski was
convicted of looting hundreds ofmillions of dollars.
This is one of the biggest fraudcases ever.
(00:23):
Their president's a crook. Well, I'm not a crook.
Find out more on this week's episode of White Collars, Red
Hands. In 2022, it was estimated that
there were 103,017 people in theUnited States who are considered
professional musicians. Now, there are more real
(00:45):
musicians, or I should say, there's more musicians than that
in the United States. But the large majority of those
people will never reach stardom.Most of them will never be a
household name or even be able to live off their wages as
musicians. But what if your dream was so
big that you'd do anything to achieve it?
(01:05):
What if you tasted stardom for abrief, fleeting moment and
wanted to hold on to the glory? Today we look at two different
musicians who committed fraud tomake their dreams come true.
Find out what happened on this week's episode of White Collars,
Red Hands. I played the trumpet in middle
school. AM.
(01:26):
Am IA musician. Technically, yes.
OK, I tell my students to draw, that they're artists.
OK, so we all lie to ourselves. I'm putting that on the resume.
I I think I was second chair trumpet in 7th grade.
A real life trumpeteer here everyone.
I am a musician and then I learned to play the euphonium.
(01:48):
So I don't even know what that is.
It's like a big trumpet or a small tuba.
It comes in two different shapes.
All right, you fucking nerd. Yeah, it is the least sexy
instrument. You can play.
I've never even heard of it, what was it called?
The euphonium. The euphonium.
Is it called a baritone? Oh, that I know it OK.
Yeah, but do you know the instrument or do you just know
that the baritone is like a range of singing?
(02:09):
No, I know it because my brotherplayed the tuba.
So. Oh, yes, that's what I'm saying.
It's a smaller tuba. Yeah.
Or a bigger trumpet. Comes in two shapes, yeah.
Well, we're actually not talkingabout trumpets or tubas at all
today. And if you want, I mean if you
want this to be about. That you know what?
We're going to find a tuba scandal.
I'm a musician. Look at my resume.
I like I have experience in trumpet and euphonium.
(02:32):
Welcome back to another episode of White Collar's Red Hands.
I'm Kashan and I'm Nina, and technically I played the
saxophone, so I would have been a musician as well.
We're like, see, we're three fists the way to a really good
brass. Band.
Were you in choir? No, actually, funnily enough,
not like in elementary school when they made you and then
after that I was not in choir. No, I was definitely in choir.
(02:55):
I was usually in Alto, some. I think one year I was a soprano
too, and then one time we didn'thave enough boys, so I was a
tenor 1. Wow, you give off Alto energy
because you try too hard. Wow, get wrecked.
Bro. That was so rude.
(03:16):
You know it's true. Yeah, it is true.
That's why it's so rude. The baritones of the female
singing world. Without it, she would not have a
harmony. What, you just want to listen to
melody all day? Is what most people are there
for you? Right.
Anyways, what you all are actually is our episode today.
(03:39):
Today we're going to be talking about, like I said, two
different musicians who committed some fraud, One you've
definitely more than likely haveheard of and the other one
you've never heard of. All right.
Sean Combs. Sean Combs.
Sean, No, it's not about Sean Combs.
All right, fine. We're not doing that, no.
Diddy in this episode, you guys all right No Diddy, not Sean
(03:59):
Diddy Combs, but we are going tobe talking about Sean Kingston.
So the year is 2007 and you can't go anywhere without
hearing the song Beautiful girlswafting through every speaker
that you pass. That song was playing constantly
on the radio, in the grocery stores, in the mall, every
(04:21):
everywhere. Beautiful Girls was a hit.
The song had 26,000 downloads the first week that it came out.
Now remember, this is impressivebecause it was 2007.
Yeah, and most downloads weren'ttracked because they were giving
children viruses on Limewire. I was just saying because they
were on Limewire. Yeah, yes, it was the second
most downloaded song in 2007. The song beating it was
(04:43):
Rihanna's Umbrella. Oh wow, What?
And now I was just saying Rihanna looked a little bit like
Sean kicks in at the the Super Bowl performance because.
Sean is fat shaming. No, I'm sorry about that one.
(05:04):
You're fat shaming Rihanna. She was pregnant bro.
Yeah. You'll have her suicidal from
that comment. Sean Kingston looked a little
pregnant. It's not.
It's not that Rihanna looked fat.
It's that Sean Kingston looks a little pregnant.
It's not that Rihanna's fat, it's just that Chung Kingston
looks constantly pregnant. Yeah, you know, no, did not say
anything negative here. So this song made 17 year old
(05:26):
Kingston the first person born in the 90s to get a top 100
song. So which is really crazy to
think about because he was 17 when it came out.
Wow. Which is funny because he looked
35. He did look.
You look like a grown ass man. 17 going on 36, he did not look
good for his age. Probably the weight Kingston,
(05:47):
whose real name is Keshawn Anderson.
Oh wow, I I did not know that. No, you do.
Was born in Miami, but he grew up in Kingston, Jamaica and then
came back to the United States. So that's where he gets Sean
Kingston, his stage name. Does he have the Jamaican
accent? I've never heard it, but I have
not listened to an interview with him actually.
(06:09):
So the Kingston was discovered on YouTube and was signed
quickly to Sony Records. They appreciated his sound and
knew that they could mold him toa more marketable artist.
So they're like, hey actually you're shitty but we'll make you
great. Kingston did quite a lot over
the years. Besides Beautiful Girls, he
topped the charts with Eenie Meenie which is the song that he
(06:30):
sang with Justin Bieber. It's actually cause she's
favorite Sean Kingston song. No we were talking about this
before the episode. This songs awful.
He hates this song. After that song in 2010.
He did some things here and there but he never really had
another big hit. There were a lot of rumors of
albums or who was going to be onhis upcoming albums but nothing
(06:50):
really stuck. One noteworthy thing he did as
of late was he Co wrote Chris Brown's song Sensational in two
in 2023, which I hate to admit is actually I really like that
song. I think it's very.
Well, at least he chose to do iscome back with someone who's not
controversial. Right.
You know, so that's, you know, that's really good for his brand
(07:11):
image. Well, you know, Rihanna beat
Sean Kingston in 2007 with the most downloaded song Umbrella.
So he was like, let me let me work with someone who's beat her
so. Maybe Chris Brown just thought
Sean Kingston was Rihanna from the Super Bowl halftime show.
(07:40):
Never. Know, you know, I might have
been it. I might have been it.
Now, it's always kind of sad when you see someone
skyrocketing to fame and then that kind of fizzles out.
But honestly, I didn't know about this until Kashawn brought
it up. Apparently Sean Kingston does
have a sexual assault violation allegation against him.
(08:00):
So that is probably what a pretty big damper in his career.
So Kingston, his career kind of went away, but for that brief
moment of time, he did have a taste for the finer things in
life. And unfortunately, that taste
did not go away as his fame dwindled.
Earlier this year, in May 2024, it was revealed that Kingston
(08:24):
and his mother, Janice Turner, were up to no good.
All the alleged crimes that happened are between October
2023 and March 2024. So like hyper recently?
Yes, this is a very, very, very recent crime happened this year.
In February 2024, Ver Ver Entertainment filed a lawsuit
(08:45):
against Kingston. They claim that he did not pay
for the items that he had purchased from them.
Apparently, Kingston did not complete payments on a $150,000
entertainment system that he bought from the company, which
included a 232 inch screen TV. It's like a, it's like a wall.
Literally my TV at home is 65 inches and that's not it's not
(09:09):
small. What's yours?
65, yeah. Yeah, it's a small TV.
Yeah, that's a, that's a good size for ATV.
It's. You don't need a bigger TV than
that. That's insane.
You. Don't need it, but.
Come on. Come on.
Come on, imagine. I can watch Rihanna on the Super
Bowl halftime show. It can be the entire.
And you can see Oliver on the screen if it's that big, yeah.
(09:33):
None of the belly's getting cut out.
Is a beautiful woman I just. Want to say.
I just want to say. That I just want to say that
Rihanna slander. So Kingston had convinced the
company to accept a lower down payment on the Internet payment
system and then just never completed payments on it.
The suit In the suit, it also alleges that Kingston misled the
(09:55):
company into thinking that he had an ongoing relationship with
Justin Bieber and that the two of them would make promotional
material for the company, which is why they allowed him to have
a lower down payment in the 1st place is that.
No, no, no. When I say we have an ongoing
relationship, I mean like he texts me like you up at 2:00 AM
and but but it's not like serious.
We're just like, you know, it's ongoing, but.
(10:16):
It's ongoing, but. Like, but we're just.
When it's convenient. Yeah, we're just kind of, we're
still feeling it out, Yeah, you know.
I know too much about that now. This is this now.
This is kind of like on the company for not checking up on
this because Kingston and Bieberhaven't like produced a song
together since 2010, which is the year they released to eenie
(10:39):
meenie ver ver Entertainment is an eenie miney.
Wait, eenie meenie miney MO factchecker?
They're not checking their facts.
Obviously. Justin Bieber has no involvement
with his stupidity. He has enough on his plate and
is so successful that he doesn'thave to stoop to this so he can
buy whatever TV he wants. I bet his son Jack already has a
(11:03):
232 inch screen TV. Justin Bieber has a son.
Yep, him and Hailey Bieber had ababy this year named Jack.
Oh my God, A. Little baby.
I'm glad one of us around here reads like U.S. magazine or
whatever. What's the?
What's the? What's 1 of the ones where?
They have people. Sure.
E-news. Sure.
I read them all. One of us visits TMZ.
(11:24):
OK. I don't watch TMZ but.
I'm at their website. I don't know, they can put news
out. They do, according to the
attorney, Dennis Card, who has acivil case against Kingston.
He says sorry, Card says. He tells a story.
He's basically got a script. He says that he works with
Justin Bieber and that he obviously puts on a big show
(11:47):
here. This is a rental house.
He doesn't own it. And he lures people into using
his celebrity into having them release things without him
paying for it. And then he simply never pays.
Now, Vera Vera Entertainment is not the only company to be
scorned by the mother and son duo.
It's said that they have fooled multiple businesses and have
stolen items from a variety of places, including $86,000 from a
(12:10):
luxury mattress store. And I want to.
Know. It's like I think it's one bed,
it's 1 custom made bed. Jesus Christ.
For $86,000 my bed. I don't even know how much my
bed was. My bed was $300.00 on Amazon.
(12:31):
It came in a box. Good enough, right?
Best. Mattress I've ever had in my
life, really. Absolutely.
I need a new mattress. I I cannot imagine spending that
much money on a mattress. My best friend dated this guy
once who spent $8000 on a king size mattress and I thought that
was absurd. That's yes, that's a lot of
money. So I can't even imagine what
(12:52):
How. God, that bed mother better be
fantastic for $86,000. This is such an old person
convert. I know, I know, I know.
I'm 32 now. But I but I but I'll be damned
if I don't want that fucking purple fucking mattress that's
got all that, that like holds the egg or whatever.
I don't know what it is. But I know.
It's I know it's like 20 grand and I want it though.
(13:15):
Sean Kingston has also stolen 159,000 from a Cadillac Escalade
dealer and almost $500,000 from a jewelry store.
Dennis Card is also quoted saying Kingston likes having
bling, he likes showing off. He's a showman.
My client has a $150,000 television sound system that's
(13:36):
in there meaning his house and also $1,000,000 worth of watches
in there, $80,000 custom bed that was ordered.
This is an organized, systematicfraud.
So not only did Kingston and hismother steal items, but they've
also allegedly been stealing people's identities.
Janice Turner used someone's identity to steal over $200,000
(13:56):
from Bank of America and over $100,000 from the First Republic
Bank. She also wrote a bad check for
$44,000 that directly benefited Kingston.
Kingston also has an identity theft charge for defrauding the
online banking platform Novo outof $5000.
Now, this is not, again, not thefirst time Kingston and his mom
(14:19):
have gotten in trouble for fraud.
The pair have a long history of schemes.
Most of these are in the form ofcivil suits.
So in 2015, the duo were sued bya custom watchmaker for $356,000
for an unpaid bill. What's crazy to me is that like
they're getting all these like super high end luxury things and
(14:41):
like obviously they're they're duping these people into like,
oh, we'll pay later. Oh, we'll pay later.
But like his celebrity status isn't that high.
So I don't know why they're letting him get away with their
shit. Beautiful Girls was just such a
hit night it was. It was the second most
downloaded song in 2007. They're like, I heard the song
(15:03):
and just it. It made me suicidal when it was
over. You know, so just maybe they're
just in, you know, they remembergoing to middle school dances
and just, yeah, it's nostalgia. It is.
You know, so they're like, sure,Sean Kingston, you can get a
great deal on these watches. You'll surely pay me back.
(15:23):
You're a you're a reputable person who definitely didn't
commit that gang rape you were accused of.
Here's he's just an eenie meenieminey Moe.
Lover. Here's your Rolexes, Sir.
Mr. Kingston Who knows? I.
Don't know they were also sued in 2018 by a New York jeweler
(15:43):
for over $300,000 because they did not pay for 9 items that
they ordered. And there are also claims that
Kingston failed to pay Dreamwatch, which is a Malaysian
company, for two items that he ordered which were a Richard
Mill model, RM-65 point, O1 automatic and a Patek Philippi
(16:05):
caliber, which these are watchesactually, not guns.
Huh. I googled them because I was
like, they these can't be watches, these have to be guns.
I. Don't know my chalk unite.
I know nothing about the luxury.What watch world so.
Me neither. Yeah, I don't even have a watch.
(16:25):
I know Rolex, that's it. I don't, I don't.
I couldn't name you another luxury watch.
Maker Does an Apple Watch count as a luxury watch?
Don't think so, Timex. That one takes a licking, keeps
on ticking. That was there.
That was their famous tag line was.
I've never even heard that. Takes a lick and keeps on
(16:45):
ticking. One time my aunt bought me an
Eminem watch from Kmart and that's the only watch I've ever
had and I don't even like Eminem's like that so.
It's no Patek Philippe calibre, but yeah.
Yeah, you know, I guess unfortunately the honestly these
names are so ridiculous they like remind me of Ipas with
their stupid names. Yeah, like Hop Thunder.
(17:10):
Skunky Wonky. Juicy squeeze?
Yeah, turn me over and flip me inside out.
Yeah, bath water after too many bath bombs.
Yeah. Yeah, that was actually pretty
good. I've I'll have to try it.
I'll have to try it. Apparently, Kingston told the
company that he would wire them funds for the watches, but the
(17:31):
wire transfer never came. He told them that he couldn't
send the funds because his account had been frozen.
Of course, this is when the civil suit was filed.
When the civil suit was filed, Kingston ignored it.
The lawyers representing Dreamwatch also stated that the
watches weren't the only thing that Kingston was on the hook
for with them with the company. He also took out a small loan of
(17:53):
$4000 with them and told them that he would pay it back at the
same time that he paid for the watches.
Why? Why did they give him the loan?
Hey, why are you getting a loan from the watch company?
Yeah, I will say this is the stupidest way to commit crime.
It's just with your name completely openly and just and
(18:16):
just like basically just not paying for things.
Like obviously at some point if you just ghost all of your
debtors, it's gonna come back toyou.
You're. Gonna get in trouble.
There's no tact, there's no nuance.
You're just. No, he's not even really trying
to be sneaky. He's just.
Just kicking a can that like, obviously at some point it's
(18:38):
gonna catch up with you. Yeah, you're gonna get caught.
Dreamwatch agreed to the $4000 loan, and they deposited the
money into Kingston's crypto account.
Kingston said that his mother would pay the loan, but the
payments were never received. Didn't do his crypto so they
gave him a loan in cryptocurrency.
Yeah. OK, this is shady.
(18:59):
Actually I don't even trust thiswatch this watch place.
Well, this was like this had to be some sort of bribe or
something that they are not calling alone like.
What is this? Probably what it that's what it
has to be. There's absolutely no way that
this is like this has any red tape to it.
This random watch manufacturer is like, sure, we'll give you,
we'll give this random citizen a$4000 loan in the form of
(19:21):
cryptocurrency to a crypto wallet.
Yeah. Not sketchy at all.
That makes sense. No, doesn't make sense.
In 2020, TMZ reported that therewas a warrant out for Kingston's
arrest due to another unpaid jewelry bill.
The police ended up not going after Kingston at the time, and
it's more than likely due to theCOVID-19 pandemic.
(19:42):
So 2020 would have been a reallygood time to commit crimes.
I should have been doing that instead of starting a podcast
with you. Well, podcasts are usually
crimes, just in a different way.That's.
True. A crime against.
Your ears. Yeah, a crime against humanity
is what I was going to say, but yeah.
Yeah, you're right. We're looking at you, Joe Rogan.
Kind of just any podcast that started by two random guys.
(20:05):
Yeah, most at like 99% of the time, it's probably going to be
a crime against humanity. Yeah.
Fair. However, Kingston did find
himself on probation for trafficking in stolen prop.
Wait, sorry. However, Kingston did find
himself on probation for a trafficking and stolen property
charge. He committed the crime in 2020,
(20:25):
but he wasn't sentenced to probation until October of 2023.
Now Kingston and his mother wereable to outrun the authorities
for some time, but in it, maybe his washed up fame helped him
with that. But it all came to an end on May
23rd, 2024. Sean Kingston was performing in
at Fort Irwin, which is an Army based in the Mojave Desert that
(20:48):
is in California. I'm sure all the, I'm sure all
of the people in the army that were like, yeah, we're getting a
concert. It's Sean Kingston.
Wait a minute, is that pregnant Rihanna?
Yeah, they'd freak out over pregnant Rihanna.
They would love pregnant Rihanna.
Sean Kingston is going to be a disappointment in them for sure.
Definitely will we His mother was arrested on the same day in
(21:11):
Florida at Kingston's mansion that he rented.
Kingston's lawyer describes the raid of the mansion and the
arrest of the his mother to thatof the Gestapo in Nazi Germany,
saying that they were extremely forceful and aggressive.
It was said that they even threwa dog over the fence in order to
enter the property. Now you now my dad always says
(21:34):
if you can kick it over a fence,it's not a dog.
It's, it's still, it's still a dog, Mr. Kern, I'm sorry to tell
you. So the SWAT team, they're they
did call SWAT team. The SWAT team raided the mansion
and Turner was arrested. Kingston was shipped back to to
Florida and the two of them remain in custody to this day.
Kingston's bail is set at $100,000 and his mother's is set
(21:58):
at $160,000. She tried to negotiate a lower
bail but it was denied. She got a higher bail than John
Kingston. Yeah, which is funny.
Kingston's attorney says that there was no criminal intent.
I don't know how there wouldn't be criminal intent.
They knew exactly what they weredoing and they knew it was
wrong. I guess they just, they're just
(22:18):
arguing that they just didn't have the money to pay it back.
I guess. Which I guess is not.
But why are you getting $300,000of watches if you can't pay it
back? I mean, fair, I don't know what
the legality of that is. Like if you can't pay something
back, do you just go to jail? Like if it's financed?
No, they just repossess the stuff right you.
Don't go to jail. You don't go to jail.
So I guess they're arguing that there's, like, fraud with the
(22:41):
Justin Bieber thing where he like, yeah, he lied to them to
secure these, like, favorable financing.
Deals. Yeah, I think that's what it
was. All right, fair enough.
In total, the mother son team son in total, the mother son
team has scammed have scammed companies out of $1 million,
(23:02):
which is a lot of money. It's exactly $1 million worth of
money. Yeah, Now, Sean Kingston is not
the only musician to commit a financial crime by a long shot.
But today we're going to look atanother musician who rocked the
financial world with his crimes.I hope I'm going to say this
(23:22):
guy's last name, right, But Robert Mawhinney, better known
as Rob Tall University. What I'd better known as Who is
this man? What are you better known as?
Who the fuck is Rob? I don't know if I have to say it
(23:45):
like that. Do I have to say Rob Tall
University or can I just say RobTall?
Cap said it all like big letter,like long letters, so you have
to. Wait and there's wait.
That's how he writes it. There's like 5L.
'S I Yes, I counted it. I got it from the Justice
Department website. Oh, I thought that this is what
I'd like. The indictment is also Alias is
(24:07):
also known as Rob Tall and I guess it's only multiple LS.
So for those of you who can't see it, I guess it would have to
be. Tall there's.
There's more L It's not tall, it's tall.
Yeah, he was the frontman for a band that you've never heard of,
Lights Over Paris. Oh, lights over Paris.
Lights over Paris. Oh my God, their So their third
(24:29):
album's a little played out, butthe first two were bangers.
Yeah, I know. I'm making it up.
A little bit. So this guy had his own
financial scandal lights over Paris, or LOP as fans call them.
They were a pop punk band, I don't know what genre they would
actually fall into. The band was struggling to take
(24:51):
off even to this day their name has obviously faded into
oblivion. They have one single on Spotify
that came out in 2011 called I'mNot A Gangsta which has almost
94,000 streams. Actually.
The song isn't horrible but I probably won't listen to it
again. But Winnie knew that his band
(25:13):
could be something great and honestly in 2011 it could have
been really popular because you had bands like Red Shell Ray
with their hit with Tonight Tonight.
That band is called Hot Shell Ray, not Red Shell Ray.
Really. Yeah.
I thought it was red shell ray. No, it's hot shell Ray.
I'm 100% positive because I think I still follow them on
(25:37):
Facebook. I still get updates from them
because I but. If I type in red shell ray, oh
it is hot shell ray. It is hot.
Shell ray? No, it was red for.
Sure. OK, well, I'll go back.
I still see their posts on Facebook.
It's sad. I'm like, I remember when you
guys had that that song and thenthat other song and what?
Other song I didn't even know about the other one.
They have it's. All I knew was tonight.
(25:58):
Tonight. They have.
Tonight they have one more, and I can't remember it right now,
but I'll immediately remember itafter this episode's done.
Perfect. All right, Well, you had bands
like Hot Shell Ray that were really popular with their hit,
like Tonight Tonight taking overthe charts.
So why couldn't Lights Over Paris do that too?
Mawhinney formulated a plan thatwould skyrocket his band into
(26:22):
stardom. He would just need to get a
loan. Now, Robert Mawhinney didn't
have much money. He had about $10,000 to his
name. He didn't have enough to get the
big loans that he needed. So he stretched the truth when
he went to the four major banks,went to four major banks, Co
America, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and Zions Bank,
(26:44):
and asked for millions of dollars in loans.
Now, despite only having $10,000in his bank accounts, he forged
documents from Charles Schwab saying that he actually had 7 /
7 million in his personal accounts and his personal net
income was about $5,000,000. His personal assets were 7.5
(27:05):
million, which included a studiothat did 12 million annually in
sales. Yeah, that's that's a legal Mr.
University you. Yeah, that's a that's a tall
crime. It's a tall tale because.
It's a Sean tale. Not real, Sir.
It's fake. It's a lie.
(27:27):
Maybe he should have just went in and asked for loans and she
played them. The music, If he really believed
in it right, he could have played them.
I'm not a gangsta. And then like this is a, this is
worth millions of dollars, give it to me.
Sharks, I come to you. Impresses play on the boom box.
I think Mark Cuban would go for it.
He'd be like, I'm not a gangstereither.
(27:49):
I mean Jesus, man. They play this song for every
Dallas Mavericks game. This is crazy.
Does he own them? Yes.
OK, very famously. You know, I don't know.
And magic, you know what? He went in there and he lied
about all this money. But you know what?
His plan worked well when he gothis money.
Now you're thinking, how could he get away with all this?
(28:09):
Well, the banks actually did do some checking.
And when they asked to see the studio that he claimed made $12
million a year, he took them on a tour because it was owned by
his friends, not by him. Mawhinney was able to get a loan
for $3,000,000 from Coamerica, $750,000 from Bank of America,
(28:30):
500,000 from Zions Bank and 2.4 million from Chase, OH.
Dang, Chase really dished out. They really did.
Between the years of 22,008 to 2011, he was loaned $11 million.
This is why we know so much about Lights Over Paris, because
he took all that money we know and he followed into a great
startup for his band. He did.
(28:51):
He really did. I'm sure that's how it wins.
So it is said that after the original loans, the bank, the
banks kept contacting him to seeif he wanted to borrow more
money. When the Banks were questioned
about it, they declined to comment.
Now, he did do exactly what he said he was going to do with the
money. He used it to help the band
reach, well, try to reach stardom, but it fell before they
(29:13):
reached orbit. Mawhinney spent the money on
promotional materials, music videos, plane tickets.
The band's first music video cost over $100,000.
Now there were some very unnecessary expenses as well,
such as the rental of a luxury LA apartment and a 700 sorry
$750,000 tour bus that had platinum tiles in the bathroom.
(29:38):
They're they're easy to clean 9 and I think you're
misunderstanding it's just sorrythey don't build up mold.
It's it's worth. Oh, well, you know what, then
that does make a lot more sense,yeah.
It's only 3/4 of $1,000,000. I mean drop in the bucket,
right? Really.
Compared to 11,000,000? I mean, yeah.
When your light, when your light's over Paris, you can do
what you want. I mean that when.
(29:59):
You 94,000 Spotify streams, you can do what you want.
You know what the fuck you want.So this bus wasn't saying it had
retractable awnings, a master suite, and they built it to look
like an airplane. It was honestly very ugly.
I looked at the pictures, it wasblue and a really ugly purple
like that Crown Royal purple. It was not.
It was not good. Do you want a private jet but
(30:21):
don't have nearly enough money to make one?
Don't worry, we'll put wheels onone and drive it around the
highways in the US. It is what?
A stupid idea. Really big on it.
It's really what? A stupid idea.
When people would ask Mawhinney about his money, he would tell
them that he inherited his moneyfrom his grandfather, Brian
King, a videographer for the band, recalls.
(30:42):
It was crazy. There was a lot of shopping,
there was a lot of booze, a lot of champagne and a hotel sweep
that ended up getting trashed atthe end of the trip.
And they had truly wild parties.He still quoted saying, I have
no idea where all the women camefrom.
He'd get a woman to sit in the middle of a buffet table and
hand people sushi off of her body.
(31:03):
That's not objectifying her at all.
Mawhinney's kept spending more and more money, and his lawyer
says that he got into a situation that was beyond his
control. His lie had gotten too out of
hand and he didn't know how to stop it.
Mawhinney started defaulting on his loans because obviously he
had no way to pay for the money that he had loaned out and the
(31:23):
law was after him. On October 11th, 2011, Lights
Over Paris was supposed to play at the Roxy in LA.
Mawhinney never showed up and hesent ADJ in his place about
halfway through the show. The DJ was served papers
intended for Mawhinney because he was super far behind on his
rent and it would take another year for it all to come catching
(31:45):
back up with him. The lights over Paris began to
dim when Mawhinney was arrested in Miami.
I had some conflicting information about what he was
doing in Miami. Some said that he was on
vacation. Others said that he was arrested
at the airport when coming back from Buenos Aires.
Yeah, I think he was just, he was at a sushi restaurant and he
got arrested for taking all of his clothes.
Off Oh, that was probably what it was they.
(32:07):
Were like, excuse me Sir. It was the tuna rolls.
Yeah. He was being held without bond
because he was determined. They determined that he was a
flight risk because of his frequent travels abroad.
He was also sending a lot of money over to Cyprus for God
knows why. Now what he has next is truly
baffling. He gets arrested, pleads guilty
(32:27):
in Orange County, California, and then the very next day he
goes to a credit union and asks to borrow money one more time.
You miss 100% of the shots you don't.
Take That's right. Well, when he pled guilty to
four counts of making false statements and ended up serving
seven years at the Federal Correctional Institution in El
Paso, TX, it said that during his time in prison he practiced
(32:50):
his guitar, did yoga, and learned Spanish.
Oh my God, he's going to pull a Drake bell.
He's going to be Drake Campagna.What's Spanish for Mawhinney?
Did Drake Bell go to jail and doall those things?
So Drake Bell was accused and did plead guilty to.
(33:13):
Yeah, the assault. Yeah, well, sexual misconduct
that included a minor or something like like it got.
Down. It got downgraded.
It was just texts. But yeah, he became, he started,
he like learned Spanish, startedwriting music in Spanish and he
(33:33):
is a very popular pop artist in Mexico currently.
That's crazy. And he goes by the name Drake
Campagna. Campagna is Spanish for Belle.
I wanted to do a deep dive recently.
I went onto YouTube. I was looking up his songs and I
wanted to know how good his Spanish was.
So I watch interviews with him where he would have to speak
(33:53):
Spanish and you can't tell that he's like, he's not great, but I
mean, they're all right. I guess.
It's really weird seeing him because you're like this is the
guy, This is the guy from drinking Josh and this is he is
singing in Spanish. That's funny.
He's very white, obviously. Yeah, so white.
Wow, what a tragic life. So that's going to be Mawhinney.
(34:16):
That's Mawhinney. He's going to be the next
Spanish pop star. You watch out.
Well, he's already out of jail, but here we are.
Damn all these beautiful girls. They'll never see the lights
over Paris. Sean Kingston may not see the
light, and Sean Kingston may notsee the light of day in a very,
very long time. Sean Kingston's taste for the
(34:37):
finer things led him to a life of crime, and Rob Mawhinney's
lust for fame led him to his. Both Men committee committed
these crimes for their own selfish gains.
They'll no longer being topping the charts, only topping in
prison. AO what?
(34:58):
You think they're topping? Man, that's really cute.
Sean Kingston is totally not topping.
No, no one's topping him though,because he looks like you look.
He looked 35 and 17. He's got to look fucking six
years old now. He doesn't look good.
I'm sure he doesn't. He and his mom don't look that
much different in age. She's 61 and he's 34.
(35:21):
I don't know what Rob Mawhinney looks like, so not.
Attractive, but he like had thatpop punk thing going for him.
So thank you so much for listening to this episode.
And if you liked what you heard and you want more and you can
check us out on social media. We are on facebook.com/white
collars red hands. We're on X at white collars pod.
We are on Instagram at white collars under score bed hands.
(35:42):
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(36:04):
of mouth is a great way to get information out and you could
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That's what we want for Christmas.
If you want an unfree way to support us, you can do so by
going to our website, clicking on that merch tab.
It'll take you on over to T public.
It is the Christmas season or the holiday season I should say.
And you can buy us. You can buy eight different
(36:25):
gifts for every night of Hanukkah.
Someone you love? What?
Has Hanukkah started? Not yet, but you can prep.
You don't think they prep? No, I was saying that we might
already be in it. So I was like, well, don't
recommend it. Now, if they're halfway through,
if four of the candles are lit. There's four more days.
Then to buying merch you cannot commit, you know.
And I guess that's true, all right.
(36:46):
And and if you hear of white collar Crime Story and you were
like, Oh my gosh, 900 Shawn should totally cover that,
please send it our way. You can do that by DM ING our
socials, emailing us at Whitehall collars, redhands.com.
We try to do a fan submitted episode every single season and
yours could be next. And I think that's it.
You say recommend to a friend? Yes, sorry, I zoned out there
(37:07):
for a little bit. Well, thank you so much for
listening, and we'll see you next time on another episode of
White Collars, Red Hands. Music.
Wall Street veteran Bernard Madoff has been arrested and
charged with running a $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
Congress wants to know what caused the Enron meltdown, and
while the collective rage currently is focused on low
comp. Tyco CEO Dennis Koslowski was
convicted of looting hundreds ofmillions of dollars.
This is one of the biggest fraudcases ever.
(00:23):
Their president's a crook. Well, I'm not a crook.
Find out more on this week's episode of White Collars, Red
Hands. In 2022, it was estimated that
there were 103,017 people in theUnited States who are considered
professional musicians. Now, there are more real
(00:45):
musicians, or I should say, there's more musicians than that
in the United States. But the large majority of those
people will never reach stardom.Most of them will never be a
household name or even be able to live off their wages as
musicians. But what if your dream was so
big that you'd do anything to achieve it?
(01:05):
What if you tasted stardom for abrief, fleeting moment and
wanted to hold on to the glory? Today we look at two different
musicians who committed fraud tomake their dreams come true.
Find out what happened on this week's episode of White Collars,
Red Hands. I played the trumpet in middle
school. AM.
(01:26):
Am IA musician. Technically, yes.
OK, I tell my students to draw, that they're artists.
OK, so we all lie to ourselves. I'm putting that on the resume.
I I think I was second chair trumpet in 7th grade.
A real life trumpeteer here everyone.
I am a musician and then I learned to play the euphonium.
(01:48):
So I don't even know what that is.
It's like a big trumpet or a small tuba.
It comes in two different shapes.
All right, you fucking nerd. Yeah, it is the least sexy
instrument. You can play.
I've never even heard of it, what was it called?
The euphonium. The euphonium.
Is it called a baritone? Oh, that I know it OK.
Yeah, but do you know the instrument or do you just know
that the baritone is like a range of singing?
(02:09):
No, I know it because my brotherplayed the tuba.
So. Oh, yes, that's what I'm saying.
It's a smaller tuba. Yeah.
Or a bigger trumpet. Comes in two shapes, yeah.
Well, we're actually not talkingabout trumpets or tubas at all
today. And if you want, I mean if you
want this to be about. That you know what?
We're going to find a tuba scandal.
I'm a musician. Look at my resume.
I like I have experience in trumpet and euphonium.
(02:32):
Welcome back to another episode of White Collar's Red Hands.
I'm Kashan and I'm Nina, and technically I played the
saxophone, so I would have been a musician as well.
We're like, see, we're three fists the way to a really good
brass. Band.
Were you in choir? No, actually, funnily enough,
not like in elementary school when they made you and then
after that I was not in choir. No, I was definitely in choir.
(02:55):
I was usually in Alto, some. I think one year I was a soprano
too, and then one time we didn'thave enough boys, so I was a
tenor 1. Wow, you give off Alto energy
because you try too hard. Wow, get wrecked.
Bro. That was so rude.
(03:16):
You know it's true. Yeah, it is true.
That's why it's so rude. The baritones of the female
singing world. Without it, she would not have a
harmony. What, you just want to listen to
melody all day? Is what most people are there
for you? Right.
Anyways, what you all are actually is our episode today.
(03:39):
Today we're going to be talking about, like I said, two
different musicians who committed some fraud, One you've
definitely more than likely haveheard of and the other one
you've never heard of. All right.
Sean Combs. Sean Combs.
Sean, No, it's not about Sean Combs.
All right, fine. We're not doing that, no.
Diddy in this episode, you guys all right No Diddy, not Sean
(03:59):
Diddy Combs, but we are going tobe talking about Sean Kingston.
So the year is 2007 and you can't go anywhere without
hearing the song Beautiful girlswafting through every speaker
that you pass. That song was playing constantly
on the radio, in the grocery stores, in the mall, every
(04:21):
everywhere. Beautiful Girls was a hit.
The song had 26,000 downloads the first week that it came out.
Now remember, this is impressivebecause it was 2007.
Yeah, and most downloads weren'ttracked because they were giving
children viruses on Limewire. I was just saying because they
were on Limewire. Yeah, yes, it was the second
most downloaded song in 2007. The song beating it was
(04:43):
Rihanna's Umbrella. Oh wow, What?
And now I was just saying Rihanna looked a little bit like
Sean kicks in at the the Super Bowl performance because.
Sean is fat shaming. No, I'm sorry about that one.
(05:04):
You're fat shaming Rihanna. She was pregnant bro.
Yeah. You'll have her suicidal from
that comment. Sean Kingston looked a little
pregnant. It's not.
It's not that Rihanna looked fat.
It's that Sean Kingston looks a little pregnant.
It's not that Rihanna's fat, it's just that Chung Kingston
looks constantly pregnant. Yeah, you know, no, did not say
anything negative here. So this song made 17 year old
(05:26):
Kingston the first person born in the 90s to get a top 100
song. So which is really crazy to
think about because he was 17 when it came out.
Wow. Which is funny because he looked
35. He did look.
You look like a grown ass man. 17 going on 36, he did not look
good for his age. Probably the weight Kingston,
(05:47):
whose real name is Keshawn Anderson.
Oh wow, I I did not know that. No, you do.
Was born in Miami, but he grew up in Kingston, Jamaica and then
came back to the United States. So that's where he gets Sean
Kingston, his stage name. Does he have the Jamaican
accent? I've never heard it, but I have
not listened to an interview with him actually.
(06:09):
So the Kingston was discovered on YouTube and was signed
quickly to Sony Records. They appreciated his sound and
knew that they could mold him toa more marketable artist.
So they're like, hey actually you're shitty but we'll make you
great. Kingston did quite a lot over
the years. Besides Beautiful Girls, he
topped the charts with Eenie Meenie which is the song that he
(06:30):
sang with Justin Bieber. It's actually cause she's
favorite Sean Kingston song. No we were talking about this
before the episode. This songs awful.
He hates this song. After that song in 2010.
He did some things here and there but he never really had
another big hit. There were a lot of rumors of
albums or who was going to be onhis upcoming albums but nothing
(06:50):
really stuck. One noteworthy thing he did as
of late was he Co wrote Chris Brown's song Sensational in two
in 2023, which I hate to admit is actually I really like that
song. I think it's very.
Well, at least he chose to do iscome back with someone who's not
controversial. Right.
You know, so that's, you know, that's really good for his brand
(07:11):
image. Well, you know, Rihanna beat
Sean Kingston in 2007 with the most downloaded song Umbrella.
So he was like, let me let me work with someone who's beat her
so. Maybe Chris Brown just thought
Sean Kingston was Rihanna from the Super Bowl halftime show.
(07:40):
Never. Know, you know, I might have
been it. I might have been it.
Now, it's always kind of sad when you see someone
skyrocketing to fame and then that kind of fizzles out.
But honestly, I didn't know about this until Kashawn brought
it up. Apparently Sean Kingston does
have a sexual assault violation allegation against him.
(08:00):
So that is probably what a pretty big damper in his career.
So Kingston, his career kind of went away, but for that brief
moment of time, he did have a taste for the finer things in
life. And unfortunately, that taste
did not go away as his fame dwindled.
Earlier this year, in May 2024, it was revealed that Kingston
(08:24):
and his mother, Janice Turner, were up to no good.
All the alleged crimes that happened are between October
2023 and March 2024. So like hyper recently?
Yes, this is a very, very, very recent crime happened this year.
In February 2024, Ver Ver Entertainment filed a lawsuit
(08:45):
against Kingston. They claim that he did not pay
for the items that he had purchased from them.
Apparently, Kingston did not complete payments on a $150,000
entertainment system that he bought from the company, which
included a 232 inch screen TV. It's like a, it's like a wall.
Literally my TV at home is 65 inches and that's not it's not
(09:09):
small. What's yours?
65, yeah. Yeah, it's a small TV.
Yeah, that's a, that's a good size for ATV.
It's. You don't need a bigger TV than
that. That's insane.
You. Don't need it, but.
Come on. Come on.
Come on, imagine. I can watch Rihanna on the Super
Bowl halftime show. It can be the entire.
And you can see Oliver on the screen if it's that big, yeah.
(09:33):
None of the belly's getting cut out.
Is a beautiful woman I just. Want to say.
I just want to say. That I just want to say that
Rihanna slander. So Kingston had convinced the
company to accept a lower down payment on the Internet payment
system and then just never completed payments on it.
The suit In the suit, it also alleges that Kingston misled the
(09:55):
company into thinking that he had an ongoing relationship with
Justin Bieber and that the two of them would make promotional
material for the company, which is why they allowed him to have
a lower down payment in the 1st place is that.
No, no, no. When I say we have an ongoing
relationship, I mean like he texts me like you up at 2:00 AM
and but but it's not like serious.
We're just like, you know, it's ongoing, but.
(10:16):
It's ongoing, but. Like, but we're just.
When it's convenient. Yeah, we're just kind of, we're
still feeling it out, Yeah, you know.
I know too much about that now. This is this now.
This is kind of like on the company for not checking up on
this because Kingston and Bieberhaven't like produced a song
together since 2010, which is the year they released to eenie
(10:39):
meenie ver ver Entertainment is an eenie miney.
Wait, eenie meenie miney MO factchecker?
They're not checking their facts.
Obviously. Justin Bieber has no involvement
with his stupidity. He has enough on his plate and
is so successful that he doesn'thave to stoop to this so he can
buy whatever TV he wants. I bet his son Jack already has a
(11:03):
232 inch screen TV. Justin Bieber has a son.
Yep, him and Hailey Bieber had ababy this year named Jack.
Oh my God, A. Little baby.
I'm glad one of us around here reads like U.S. magazine or
whatever. What's the?
What's the? What's 1 of the ones where?
They have people. Sure.
E-news. Sure.
I read them all. One of us visits TMZ.
(11:24):
OK. I don't watch TMZ but.
I'm at their website. I don't know, they can put news
out. They do, according to the
attorney, Dennis Card, who has acivil case against Kingston.
He says sorry, Card says. He tells a story.
He's basically got a script. He says that he works with
Justin Bieber and that he obviously puts on a big show
(11:47):
here. This is a rental house.
He doesn't own it. And he lures people into using
his celebrity into having them release things without him
paying for it. And then he simply never pays.
Now, Vera Vera Entertainment is not the only company to be
scorned by the mother and son duo.
It's said that they have fooled multiple businesses and have
stolen items from a variety of places, including $86,000 from a
(12:10):
luxury mattress store. And I want to.
Know. It's like I think it's one bed,
it's 1 custom made bed. Jesus Christ.
For $86,000 my bed. I don't even know how much my
bed was. My bed was $300.00 on Amazon.
(12:31):
It came in a box. Good enough, right?
Best. Mattress I've ever had in my
life, really. Absolutely.
I need a new mattress. I I cannot imagine spending that
much money on a mattress. My best friend dated this guy
once who spent $8000 on a king size mattress and I thought that
was absurd. That's yes, that's a lot of
money. So I can't even imagine what
(12:52):
How. God, that bed mother better be
fantastic for $86,000. This is such an old person
convert. I know, I know, I know.
I'm 32 now. But I but I but I'll be damned
if I don't want that fucking purple fucking mattress that's
got all that, that like holds the egg or whatever.
I don't know what it is. But I know.
It's I know it's like 20 grand and I want it though.
(13:15):
Sean Kingston has also stolen 159,000 from a Cadillac Escalade
dealer and almost $500,000 from a jewelry store.
Dennis Card is also quoted saying Kingston likes having
bling, he likes showing off. He's a showman.
My client has a $150,000 television sound system that's
(13:36):
in there meaning his house and also $1,000,000 worth of watches
in there, $80,000 custom bed that was ordered.
This is an organized, systematicfraud.
So not only did Kingston and hismother steal items, but they've
also allegedly been stealing people's identities.
Janice Turner used someone's identity to steal over $200,000
(13:56):
from Bank of America and over $100,000 from the First Republic
Bank. She also wrote a bad check for
$44,000 that directly benefited Kingston.
Kingston also has an identity theft charge for defrauding the
online banking platform Novo outof $5000.
Now, this is not, again, not thefirst time Kingston and his mom
(14:19):
have gotten in trouble for fraud.
The pair have a long history of schemes.
Most of these are in the form ofcivil suits.
So in 2015, the duo were sued bya custom watchmaker for $356,000
for an unpaid bill. What's crazy to me is that like
they're getting all these like super high end luxury things and
(14:41):
like obviously they're they're duping these people into like,
oh, we'll pay later. Oh, we'll pay later.
But like his celebrity status isn't that high.
So I don't know why they're letting him get away with their
shit. Beautiful Girls was just such a
hit night it was. It was the second most
downloaded song in 2007. They're like, I heard the song
(15:03):
and just it. It made me suicidal when it was
over. You know, so just maybe they're
just in, you know, they remembergoing to middle school dances
and just, yeah, it's nostalgia. It is.
You know, so they're like, sure,Sean Kingston, you can get a
great deal on these watches. You'll surely pay me back.
(15:23):
You're a you're a reputable person who definitely didn't
commit that gang rape you were accused of.
Here's he's just an eenie meenieminey Moe.
Lover. Here's your Rolexes, Sir.
Mr. Kingston Who knows? I.
Don't know they were also sued in 2018 by a New York jeweler
(15:43):
for over $300,000 because they did not pay for 9 items that
they ordered. And there are also claims that
Kingston failed to pay Dreamwatch, which is a Malaysian
company, for two items that he ordered which were a Richard
Mill model, RM-65 point, O1 automatic and a Patek Philippi
(16:05):
caliber, which these are watchesactually, not guns.
Huh. I googled them because I was
like, they these can't be watches, these have to be guns.
I. Don't know my chalk unite.
I know nothing about the luxury.What watch world so.
Me neither. Yeah, I don't even have a watch.
(16:25):
I know Rolex, that's it. I don't, I don't.
I couldn't name you another luxury watch.
Maker Does an Apple Watch count as a luxury watch?
Don't think so, Timex. That one takes a licking, keeps
on ticking. That was there.
That was their famous tag line was.
I've never even heard that. Takes a lick and keeps on
(16:45):
ticking. One time my aunt bought me an
Eminem watch from Kmart and that's the only watch I've ever
had and I don't even like Eminem's like that so.
It's no Patek Philippe calibre, but yeah.
Yeah, you know, I guess unfortunately the honestly these
names are so ridiculous they like remind me of Ipas with
their stupid names. Yeah, like Hop Thunder.
(17:10):
Skunky Wonky. Juicy squeeze?
Yeah, turn me over and flip me inside out.
Yeah, bath water after too many bath bombs.
Yeah. Yeah, that was actually pretty
good. I've I'll have to try it.
I'll have to try it. Apparently, Kingston told the
company that he would wire them funds for the watches, but the
(17:31):
wire transfer never came. He told them that he couldn't
send the funds because his account had been frozen.
Of course, this is when the civil suit was filed.
When the civil suit was filed, Kingston ignored it.
The lawyers representing Dreamwatch also stated that the
watches weren't the only thing that Kingston was on the hook
for with them with the company. He also took out a small loan of
(17:53):
$4000 with them and told them that he would pay it back at the
same time that he paid for the watches.
Why? Why did they give him the loan?
Hey, why are you getting a loan from the watch company?
Yeah, I will say this is the stupidest way to commit crime.
It's just with your name completely openly and just and
(18:16):
just like basically just not paying for things.
Like obviously at some point if you just ghost all of your
debtors, it's gonna come back toyou.
You're. Gonna get in trouble.
There's no tact, there's no nuance.
You're just. No, he's not even really trying
to be sneaky. He's just.
Just kicking a can that like, obviously at some point it's
(18:38):
gonna catch up with you. Yeah, you're gonna get caught.
Dreamwatch agreed to the $4000 loan, and they deposited the
money into Kingston's crypto account.
Kingston said that his mother would pay the loan, but the
payments were never received. Didn't do his crypto so they
gave him a loan in cryptocurrency.
Yeah. OK, this is shady.
(18:59):
Actually I don't even trust thiswatch this watch place.
Well, this was like this had to be some sort of bribe or
something that they are not calling alone like.
What is this? Probably what it that's what it
has to be. There's absolutely no way that
this is like this has any red tape to it.
This random watch manufacturer is like, sure, we'll give you,
we'll give this random citizen a$4000 loan in the form of
(19:21):
cryptocurrency to a crypto wallet.
Yeah. Not sketchy at all.
That makes sense. No, doesn't make sense.
In 2020, TMZ reported that therewas a warrant out for Kingston's
arrest due to another unpaid jewelry bill.
The police ended up not going after Kingston at the time, and
it's more than likely due to theCOVID-19 pandemic.
(19:42):
So 2020 would have been a reallygood time to commit crimes.
I should have been doing that instead of starting a podcast
with you. Well, podcasts are usually
crimes, just in a different way.That's.
True. A crime against.
Your ears. Yeah, a crime against humanity
is what I was going to say, but yeah.
Yeah, you're right. We're looking at you, Joe Rogan.
Kind of just any podcast that started by two random guys.
(20:05):
Yeah, most at like 99% of the time, it's probably going to be
a crime against humanity. Yeah.
Fair. However, Kingston did find
himself on probation for trafficking in stolen prop.
Wait, sorry. However, Kingston did find
himself on probation for a trafficking and stolen property
charge. He committed the crime in 2020,
(20:25):
but he wasn't sentenced to probation until October of 2023.
Now Kingston and his mother wereable to outrun the authorities
for some time, but in it, maybe his washed up fame helped him
with that. But it all came to an end on May
23rd, 2024. Sean Kingston was performing in
at Fort Irwin, which is an Army based in the Mojave Desert that
(20:48):
is in California. I'm sure all the, I'm sure all
of the people in the army that were like, yeah, we're getting a
concert. It's Sean Kingston.
Wait a minute, is that pregnant Rihanna?
Yeah, they'd freak out over pregnant Rihanna.
They would love pregnant Rihanna.
Sean Kingston is going to be a disappointment in them for sure.
Definitely will we His mother was arrested on the same day in
(21:11):
Florida at Kingston's mansion that he rented.
Kingston's lawyer describes the raid of the mansion and the
arrest of the his mother to thatof the Gestapo in Nazi Germany,
saying that they were extremely forceful and aggressive.
It was said that they even threwa dog over the fence in order to
enter the property. Now you now my dad always says
(21:34):
if you can kick it over a fence,it's not a dog.
It's, it's still, it's still a dog, Mr. Kern, I'm sorry to tell
you. So the SWAT team, they're they
did call SWAT team. The SWAT team raided the mansion
and Turner was arrested. Kingston was shipped back to to
Florida and the two of them remain in custody to this day.
Kingston's bail is set at $100,000 and his mother's is set
(21:58):
at $160,000. She tried to negotiate a lower
bail but it was denied. She got a higher bail than John
Kingston. Yeah, which is funny.
Kingston's attorney says that there was no criminal intent.
I don't know how there wouldn't be criminal intent.
They knew exactly what they weredoing and they knew it was
wrong. I guess they just, they're just
(22:18):
arguing that they just didn't have the money to pay it back.
I guess. Which I guess is not.
But why are you getting $300,000of watches if you can't pay it
back? I mean, fair, I don't know what
the legality of that is. Like if you can't pay something
back, do you just go to jail? Like if it's financed?
No, they just repossess the stuff right you.
Don't go to jail. You don't go to jail.
So I guess they're arguing that there's, like, fraud with the
(22:41):
Justin Bieber thing where he like, yeah, he lied to them to
secure these, like, favorable financing.
Deals. Yeah, I think that's what it
was. All right, fair enough.
In total, the mother son team son in total, the mother son
team has scammed have scammed companies out of $1 million,
(23:02):
which is a lot of money. It's exactly $1 million worth of
money. Yeah, Now, Sean Kingston is not
the only musician to commit a financial crime by a long shot.
But today we're going to look atanother musician who rocked the
financial world with his crimes.I hope I'm going to say this
(23:22):
guy's last name, right, But Robert Mawhinney, better known
as Rob Tall University. What I'd better known as Who is
this man? What are you better known as?
Who the fuck is Rob? I don't know if I have to say it
(23:45):
like that. Do I have to say Rob Tall
University or can I just say RobTall?
Cap said it all like big letter,like long letters, so you have
to. Wait and there's wait.
That's how he writes it. There's like 5L.
'S I Yes, I counted it. I got it from the Justice
Department website. Oh, I thought that this is what
I'd like. The indictment is also Alias is
(24:07):
also known as Rob Tall and I guess it's only multiple LS.
So for those of you who can't see it, I guess it would have to
be. Tall there's.
There's more L It's not tall, it's tall.
Yeah, he was the frontman for a band that you've never heard of,
Lights Over Paris. Oh, lights over Paris.
Lights over Paris. Oh my God, their So their third
(24:29):
album's a little played out, butthe first two were bangers.
Yeah, I know. I'm making it up.
A little bit. So this guy had his own
financial scandal lights over Paris, or LOP as fans call them.
They were a pop punk band, I don't know what genre they would
actually fall into. The band was struggling to take
(24:51):
off even to this day their name has obviously faded into
oblivion. They have one single on Spotify
that came out in 2011 called I'mNot A Gangsta which has almost
94,000 streams. Actually.
The song isn't horrible but I probably won't listen to it
again. But Winnie knew that his band
(25:13):
could be something great and honestly in 2011 it could have
been really popular because you had bands like Red Shell Ray
with their hit with Tonight Tonight.
That band is called Hot Shell Ray, not Red Shell Ray.
Really. Yeah.
I thought it was red shell ray. No, it's hot shell Ray.
I'm 100% positive because I think I still follow them on
(25:37):
Facebook. I still get updates from them
because I but. If I type in red shell ray, oh
it is hot shell ray. It is hot.
Shell ray? No, it was red for.
Sure. OK, well, I'll go back.
I still see their posts on Facebook.
It's sad. I'm like, I remember when you
guys had that that song and thenthat other song and what?
Other song I didn't even know about the other one.
They have it's. All I knew was tonight.
(25:58):
Tonight. They have.
Tonight they have one more, and I can't remember it right now,
but I'll immediately remember itafter this episode's done.
Perfect. All right, Well, you had bands
like Hot Shell Ray that were really popular with their hit,
like Tonight Tonight taking overthe charts.
So why couldn't Lights Over Paris do that too?
Mawhinney formulated a plan thatwould skyrocket his band into
(26:22):
stardom. He would just need to get a
loan. Now, Robert Mawhinney didn't
have much money. He had about $10,000 to his
name. He didn't have enough to get the
big loans that he needed. So he stretched the truth when
he went to the four major banks,went to four major banks, Co
America, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and Zions Bank,
(26:44):
and asked for millions of dollars in loans.
Now, despite only having $10,000in his bank accounts, he forged
documents from Charles Schwab saying that he actually had 7 /
7 million in his personal accounts and his personal net
income was about $5,000,000. His personal assets were 7.5
(27:05):
million, which included a studiothat did 12 million annually in
sales. Yeah, that's that's a legal Mr.
University you. Yeah, that's a that's a tall
crime. It's a tall tale because.
It's a Sean tale. Not real, Sir.
It's fake. It's a lie.
(27:27):
Maybe he should have just went in and asked for loans and she
played them. The music, If he really believed
in it right, he could have played them.
I'm not a gangsta. And then like this is a, this is
worth millions of dollars, give it to me.
Sharks, I come to you. Impresses play on the boom box.
I think Mark Cuban would go for it.
He'd be like, I'm not a gangstereither.
(27:49):
I mean Jesus, man. They play this song for every
Dallas Mavericks game. This is crazy.
Does he own them? Yes.
OK, very famously. You know, I don't know.
And magic, you know what? He went in there and he lied
about all this money. But you know what?
His plan worked well when he gothis money.
Now you're thinking, how could he get away with all this?
(28:09):
Well, the banks actually did do some checking.
And when they asked to see the studio that he claimed made $12
million a year, he took them on a tour because it was owned by
his friends, not by him. Mawhinney was able to get a loan
for $3,000,000 from Coamerica, $750,000 from Bank of America,
(28:30):
500,000 from Zions Bank and 2.4 million from Chase, OH.
Dang, Chase really dished out. They really did.
Between the years of 22,008 to 2011, he was loaned $11 million.
This is why we know so much about Lights Over Paris, because
he took all that money we know and he followed into a great
startup for his band. He did.
(28:51):
He really did. I'm sure that's how it wins.
So it is said that after the original loans, the bank, the
banks kept contacting him to seeif he wanted to borrow more
money. When the Banks were questioned
about it, they declined to comment.
Now, he did do exactly what he said he was going to do with the
money. He used it to help the band
reach, well, try to reach stardom, but it fell before they
(29:13):
reached orbit. Mawhinney spent the money on
promotional materials, music videos, plane tickets.
The band's first music video cost over $100,000.
Now there were some very unnecessary expenses as well,
such as the rental of a luxury LA apartment and a 700 sorry
$750,000 tour bus that had platinum tiles in the bathroom.
(29:38):
They're they're easy to clean 9 and I think you're
misunderstanding it's just sorrythey don't build up mold.
It's it's worth. Oh, well, you know what, then
that does make a lot more sense,yeah.
It's only 3/4 of $1,000,000. I mean drop in the bucket,
right? Really.
Compared to 11,000,000? I mean, yeah.
When your light, when your light's over Paris, you can do
what you want. I mean that when.
(29:59):
You 94,000 Spotify streams, you can do what you want.
You know what the fuck you want.So this bus wasn't saying it had
retractable awnings, a master suite, and they built it to look
like an airplane. It was honestly very ugly.
I looked at the pictures, it wasblue and a really ugly purple
like that Crown Royal purple. It was not.
It was not good. Do you want a private jet but
(30:21):
don't have nearly enough money to make one?
Don't worry, we'll put wheels onone and drive it around the
highways in the US. It is what?
A stupid idea. Really big on it.
It's really what? A stupid idea.
When people would ask Mawhinney about his money, he would tell
them that he inherited his moneyfrom his grandfather, Brian
King, a videographer for the band, recalls.
(30:42):
It was crazy. There was a lot of shopping,
there was a lot of booze, a lot of champagne and a hotel sweep
that ended up getting trashed atthe end of the trip.
And they had truly wild parties.He still quoted saying, I have
no idea where all the women camefrom.
He'd get a woman to sit in the middle of a buffet table and
hand people sushi off of her body.
(31:03):
That's not objectifying her at all.
Mawhinney's kept spending more and more money, and his lawyer
says that he got into a situation that was beyond his
control. His lie had gotten too out of
hand and he didn't know how to stop it.
Mawhinney started defaulting on his loans because obviously he
had no way to pay for the money that he had loaned out and the
(31:23):
law was after him. On October 11th, 2011, Lights
Over Paris was supposed to play at the Roxy in LA.
Mawhinney never showed up and hesent ADJ in his place about
halfway through the show. The DJ was served papers
intended for Mawhinney because he was super far behind on his
rent and it would take another year for it all to come catching
(31:45):
back up with him. The lights over Paris began to
dim when Mawhinney was arrested in Miami.
I had some conflicting information about what he was
doing in Miami. Some said that he was on
vacation. Others said that he was arrested
at the airport when coming back from Buenos Aires.
Yeah, I think he was just, he was at a sushi restaurant and he
got arrested for taking all of his clothes.
Off Oh, that was probably what it was they.
(32:07):
Were like, excuse me Sir. It was the tuna rolls.
Yeah. He was being held without bond
because he was determined. They determined that he was a
flight risk because of his frequent travels abroad.
He was also sending a lot of money over to Cyprus for God
knows why. Now what he has next is truly
baffling. He gets arrested, pleads guilty
(32:27):
in Orange County, California, and then the very next day he
goes to a credit union and asks to borrow money one more time.
You miss 100% of the shots you don't.
Take That's right. Well, when he pled guilty to
four counts of making false statements and ended up serving
seven years at the Federal Correctional Institution in El
Paso, TX, it said that during his time in prison he practiced
(32:50):
his guitar, did yoga, and learned Spanish.
Oh my God, he's going to pull a Drake bell.
He's going to be Drake Campagna.What's Spanish for Mawhinney?
Did Drake Bell go to jail and doall those things?
So Drake Bell was accused and did plead guilty to.
(33:13):
Yeah, the assault. Yeah, well, sexual misconduct
that included a minor or something like like it got.
Down. It got downgraded.
It was just texts. But yeah, he became, he started,
he like learned Spanish, startedwriting music in Spanish and he
(33:33):
is a very popular pop artist in Mexico currently.
That's crazy. And he goes by the name Drake
Campagna. Campagna is Spanish for Belle.
I wanted to do a deep dive recently.
I went onto YouTube. I was looking up his songs and I
wanted to know how good his Spanish was.
So I watch interviews with him where he would have to speak
(33:53):
Spanish and you can't tell that he's like, he's not great, but I
mean, they're all right. I guess.
It's really weird seeing him because you're like this is the
guy, This is the guy from drinking Josh and this is he is
singing in Spanish. That's funny.
He's very white, obviously. Yeah, so white.
Wow, what a tragic life. So that's going to be Mawhinney.
(34:16):
That's Mawhinney. He's going to be the next
Spanish pop star. You watch out.
Well, he's already out of jail, but here we are.
Damn all these beautiful girls. They'll never see the lights
over Paris. Sean Kingston may not see the
light, and Sean Kingston may notsee the light of day in a very,
very long time. Sean Kingston's taste for the
(34:37):
finer things led him to a life of crime, and Rob Mawhinney's
lust for fame led him to his. Both Men committee committed
these crimes for their own selfish gains.
They'll no longer being topping the charts, only topping in
prison. AO what?
(34:58):
You think they're topping? Man, that's really cute.
Sean Kingston is totally not topping.
No, no one's topping him though,because he looks like you look.
He looked 35 and 17. He's got to look fucking six
years old now. He doesn't look good.
I'm sure he doesn't. He and his mom don't look that
much different in age. She's 61 and he's 34.
(35:21):
I don't know what Rob Mawhinney looks like, so not.
Attractive, but he like had thatpop punk thing going for him.
So thank you so much for listening to this episode.
And if you liked what you heard and you want more and you can
check us out on social media. We are on facebook.com/white
collars red hands. We're on X at white collars pod.
We are on Instagram at white collars under score bed hands.
(35:42):
We're on TikTok at white collarsred hands and we are on YouTube
at white collars red hands. If you want another way to
support us for free. We would love it if you left a
review. Of course we love A5 star
review, but an honest review works as well.
We can, you can do that on Applepodcast as well as Spotify.
Another freeway you can support us is by telling a friend word
(36:04):
of mouth is a great way to get information out and you could
tell your friends to listen. Thank you so much.
That's what we want for Christmas.
If you want an unfree way to support us, you can do so by
going to our website, clicking on that merch tab.
It'll take you on over to T public.
It is the Christmas season or the holiday season I should say.
And you can buy us. You can buy eight different
(36:25):
gifts for every night of Hanukkah.
Someone you love? What?
Has Hanukkah started? Not yet, but you can prep.
You don't think they prep? No, I was saying that we might
already be in it. So I was like, well, don't
recommend it. Now, if they're halfway through,
if four of the candles are lit. There's four more days.
Then to buying merch you cannot commit, you know.
And I guess that's true, all right.
(36:46):
And and if you hear of white collar Crime Story and you were
like, Oh my gosh, 900 Shawn should totally cover that,
please send it our way. You can do that by DM ING our
socials, emailing us at Whitehall collars, redhands.com.
We try to do a fan submitted episode every single season and
yours could be next. And I think that's it.
You say recommend to a friend? Yes, sorry, I zoned out there
(37:07):
for a little bit. Well, thank you so much for
listening, and we'll see you next time on another episode of
White Collars, Red Hands. Music.
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