Runners-up: Mel Gibson and Rod Blagojevich are no strangers to this report, but Bret Carr is new–and classic.
Mel Gibson, 54, whose clue to insobriety included a tirade in which he told his Russian girlfriend, Oksana Grigorieva, 39, “If you get raped by a pack of n***ers, it will be your fault,” because she apparently looked too sexy. By many accounts he’s outdone his previous outburst, for which he made “Top Story” in the August 2006 edition of TAR, which not only described Gibson’s arrest, but also explained why relapses are so darned common in alcoholics. At the time Gibson said that pain is a necessary precursor to change. He admitted he was “completely out of control” when he was arrested and was “deeply ashamed” for having driven when he “should not have” and for exhibiting “belligerent behavior.” It’s all the same, Mel. You relapsed, yet again. It’s time to get serious about getting and staying sober before you destroy your life and, worse, the life of someone close to you or some stranger on the road. You’ve still got a chance to show the stuff that recovering addicts are made of. Four years ago I bet that your ultimate amends, should you get and stay sober for five or ten years, would go down in history as one of the most generous ever to those whom the addict in you so maliciously maligned. I’d really like to win that bet.
Rod Blagojevich and his wife Patti who, according to testimony of Internal Revenue Service agent Shari Schindler at his federal corruption trial, were buried under more than $200,000 in consumer debt when the former Illinois governor was arrested. Their extraordinary spending spree included more than $400,000 on clothes (just clothes!) mainly for themselves—and not for their children—in the seven years ending in December 2008. Blago spent over $205,000 alone with Oxxford, a high-end custom suit tailor. One might ask, what about spending on cars? He and his family relied on state cars and drivers. What about his legal bills? His campaign account is covering those. What about Rolex watches? I suspect he might have received any he has as “gifts.” Gee, I wonder why the IRS agent is testifying?
Bret Carr, who filed a lawsuit against a number of staff members and advisers to his late mother, Miami heiress Gail Posner, alleging “dark intrigue.” When Ms. Posner died in March at age 67, her Chihuahua Conchita and two other (less-favored) dogs inherited the right to live in her $8.3 million Miami Beach mansion, prepaid with a $3 million trust fund. Carr claims the targets of the lawsuit drugged his mother with pain meds and conspired to steal her assets by inducing her to change her will and to get her to hire a publicist to promote Conchita as “one of the world’s most spoiled dogs,” with a four-season wardrobe, full-time staff and diamond jewelry (which explains, I suppose, why so large a trust fund, complete with house was required to care for the dogs). Now, what could possibly explain something that wouldn’t be believed if it was fiction? How about this: Mr. Carr explains that, although his relationship with his mother is portrayed in the lawsuit as a bit unstable, they had a close relationship during “the sober phases of her life”? Or that her father, corporate takeover artist Victor Posner, had a “checkered” career that included a no contest charge to tax evasion charges in 1987? Or that the clan has, according to The Wall Street Journal, “long been haunted by drug and alcohol addiction [and] claims of sexual abuse allegedly committed by Victor Posner”? The case is reminiscent of Leona Helmsley, who also left a fortune to her dog and whose story is briefly recounted in the “under watch” section of the September 2007 issue of TAR.