Bøker av Jerry Bader

In my business, you meet all kinds of people; some, let's call them civilians, are ordinary, what the politicians call "folks;" then there are the characters, the peculiar sorts, people with strange peccadilloes: what an old friend of mine might call, "people who scare the horses." Some, let's call them "the desperate: " come to me because they find themselves in a situation, sometimes of their own making and other times... well... let's just say, imposed upon them. In each case, they have secrets: something they'd like to hide from the authorities and me, things like felonies, misdemeanours, mishaps, or misunderstandings. These cases are always about one of two things: money or women, but sometimes neither money nor women come in the form you'd expect, which brings me to the case of "Finding Lunia."It all started one day when Jacob Lerner, a young Aussie artist nicknamed Garbo, walked into my office carrying a painting. Not just any canvas, but a masterpiece he claimed he'd found in the trash in a Montmartre back alley. If the artwork was the original, it was one of five masterpieces stolen from the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris on a warm Spring night in 2010 by the renowned second-story burglar, L'Araignée, The Spider.The painting is a Modigliani portrait of Lunia Czechowska, one of five expressionist masterpieces stolen by L'Araignée and supposedly dumped in the trash by a nervous associate who was supposed to hold onto the canvases for safekeeping, not that anyone in their right mind believed someone would throw one hundred million dollars worth of art into the trash. Usually, I am hired to find some lost, stolen or misappropriated object, but in this case, the item found me, or so my Aussie client claimed. If you believe the story that played out in a Paris courtroom in 2017, then it would make sense to believe the story told to me by Jacob Lerner. All I had to do was prove the painting wasn't a forgery. The trouble is twenty percent of the canvases in the world's most prestigious museums are fakes, and Modigliani is one of the most frequently forged artists. Money and women: this case involves both, but not necessarily in the ways you'd expect.Axel Webb, Private Investigator

Organized Crime Queens The Secret World of Female Gangsters From the bizarre world of female Japanese motorcycle gangs to the historic rise and fall of London's Forty Elephants, the history of female organized crime is both fascinating and strange. These are the stories, both true and legendary of the female crime bosses that broke the mould of feminine gentility. This is The Secret World of Female Gangsters. Most of society thinks of women as the gentler sex, the sex with more compassion and empathy, not prone to violence. The truth is history, and current events, are littered with stories of violent women who do whatever it takes to get what they want; women who either revel in, or accept as needed, whatever acts of torture, murder and depravity that are required to achieve their goals. We're not talking about mundane psychopaths that kill their children and their husbands; or homicidal maniacs that kill randomly without purpose, other than for some sexual or psychological gratification. We're talking about female organized crime bosses, leaders of highly structured, often successful criminal organizations. Most everyone knows about the high profile male mobsters; people like Lucky Luciano, Myer Lansky, Bugsy Segal, Arnold Rothstein, and Al Capone: men who became legends, rightly or wrongly, due to the public's insatiable appetite for literature, movies, and television stories based on their lives. But what about their female counterparts, they definitely existed and still exist. Their stories are both fascinating and cautionary. Their histories provide an alternative perspective on the equality of the sexes; everything has a price. We are talking about smart, capable, talented, ruthless women who under other circumstances might have become leaders in either business or politics; women who demanded respect, loyalty and a big payday; or else.

As teenagers in the early 1950''s, Sonny Vail; the unforgettable Annie; Liebowitz; and Balls McGregor fled their decaying South Bronx neighborhood, going their separate ways. Fast forward 25 years. They reunite as a hapless TV anchorman (Sonny), a fading Hollywood actress (Annie), a wealthy but troubled humanitarian (Liebowitz) and a hell-bent-for-action celebrity lawyer (Ballsy)--all with dueling obsessions. The author then wraps a bittersweet romance in a high-stakes comedy, a human comedy of betrayal and hope.Ballsy wastes no time sucking Sonny into Liebowitz''s latest project: Stop world hunger! Finding Annie, his first love, embedded with the plotters only adds to Sonny''s list of woes. Soon enough the boys hit the media with a Sting that would dazzle Newman and Redford. The outrageous hoax gives "Operation Feedbag" a green light and the plot zips ahead. Despite their stormy past, Annie plays a leading role in rescuing Sonny from death in a bloody tyrant''s bastille. Haunted by events gone wrong, Sonny banishes Iago, his inner-inner voice and long-time tormentor. Finally, during a Caribbean climax, Sonny Vail must take a giant emotional leap if he is to redeem himself and hold any hope of winning back the unforgettable Annie.