David Copperfield. The name invokes thoughts of mystery, magic, and suspense. Most of us are familiar with him (you’d have to be living under a rock not to be) and many of us admire his work and talent. But now, a cloud of suspicion hangs over him, as accusations of sexual assault loom in his future. The charges were brought this summer by a Seattle woman, who claims the incident occurred in the Bahamas. Glenn Miller, chief superintendent in charge of the detective unit of the Royal Bahamas Police force, told CNN he had no official reports of any incident involving Copperfield. Hmmm. (The Gorilla finds that to be odd.) Be that as it may, the FBI is investigating the case, which is based in Seattle, Washington. It was not specified exactly what type of allegations have been made. A source for CNN cited that at least a dozen FBI agents stormed Mr. Copperfield’s Las Vegas, Nevada warehouse, seizing a computer hard drive, a digital camera, and $2 million dollars in cash, which was being kept in a safe. They also searched the Hollywood Theater at the MGM Grand Hotel, where the famous magician performs. There is speculation that Copperfield’s employees were given instruction (by him via signal) to profile specific attractive women in the audience, gathering personal information, such as where they reside and if they would be interested in participating in show if Copperfield were to come to their city. Supposedly, the employees went so far as to ask the women if they enjoyed vacationing in the Bahamas (where Copperfield ironically owns a $50 million piece of property and where THIS incident allegedly occurred.) In a statement earlier this week, Copperfield’s attorney, David Chesnoff made this statement: ”Mr. Copperfield’s reputation precedes him as an impeccable gentleman, so we’re obviously disturbed that those kind of allegations are being made, but we believe that that’s a common event now, unfortunately, for celebrated people to be to be falsely accused. Copperfield has been recognized as a highly respected celebrity and master of illusion and was even named a “living legend” by the Library Of Congress. According to Forbes, the magician made $57 million in 2005! Is this a case of someone taking advantage of this man’s celebrity, status and money, or a real true act of irresponsibility and indiscretion on the part of someone who thinks he is above the law?
Oct 25
October 27th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
Seems to me that this is a classic shake down attempt. The woman waited, what, 6 weeks before reporting the alledged crime? And in the USA instead of the Bahamas where it alledgedly occured? Sounds pretty shaky to me.
And what about the FBI raid on the wharehouse? What was the probable cause for such drastic action? And they seized the $2Million in the safe. I hope someone from Copperfield’s organization got a receipt.