Matthew Steeples updates readers on John Goodman’s return to jail
The conviction of John Goodman in West Palm Beach earlier this year was a tragedy for all concerned but the twists and turns that have followed have been quite something else.
John Goodman in court prior to returning to jail on Friday 12th October 2012
Goodman, who sold his family business, Goodman Manufacturing, for $1.43 billion in 2004 and who also founded the International Polo Club Palm Beach, was found guilty of the offences of DUI Manslaughter and vehicular homicide on 23rd March.
In February 2010, Goodman had crashed his Bentley Continental GTC at speed into a Hyundai Sonata and in the process catapulted it into a canal. Whilst the driver, Scott Wilson, was left to drown, Goodman fled the scene of the accident and later claimed he did not know he’d hit another driver. On the night in question, Goodman had settled a $272 bar bill for himself and friends at The Players Club in Wellington, Florida at 12:52am and had later drunk more alcohol after the accident in a “man cave” to “alleviate [his] pain.”
Scott Wilson’s Hyundai after it was retrieved from the canal into which John Goodman’s Bentley catapulted it
In May 2012, Goodman was sentenced to 16 years in jail but shortly afterwards was released on a $7 million bond pending appeal. At exactly the same time, a juror in the case, Dennis DeMartin, self-published a “tell-all” book, Believing in the Truth, in which he revealed that he conducted drinking experiments to see if he could get drunk after three vodka and tonics. After DeMartin was called in for questioning by Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Jeffrey Colbath, he stated:
“I’m only human. I made a mistake, just like John Goodman made a mistake… What can I say? I’m getting senile.”
John Goodman has spent most of the year under house arrest at his hacienda at 3665 120th Avenue, Wellington with his girlfriend, whom he also adopted as his daughter to protect his wealth, Heather Laurso Hutchins (also known as Heather Colby). In a further twist, Goodman was caught at the property by two of the $2,000 a day off-duty deputies employed to monitor him at 11pm on Wednesday in an upstairs bathroom with a small mirror. He was allegedly using it to pry open his ankle monitor and disable it with water.
Though Goodman claimed he had hit the monitor on a shower door accidentally, Sheriff Ric Bradshaw of West Palm Beach County commented:
“I think he thought, you know, in my estimation he thought that was going to disable it. [It] doesn’t work like that… He paid the price for it because he’s back in the ‘Gun Club Hotel’ [Palm Beach County Jail]. That’s where he’s going to stay.”
“Think about what’s going on in America right now. You know you’ve got celebrities and people with a lot of money, they get arrested, they break the law. And, after a while they just think the rules don’t apply to them.”
“Well, guess what? That don’t happen here. He gets treated just like every other person that’s in my custody. He violates the rules, he’s back in jail.”
As a result, John Goodman will now temporarily remain in jail until the 26th November.
We await the next twist in this case with anticipation.
A most curious tale of playboys, socialites, lawyers and real estate moguls
This week the mystery buyer of Clarendon Court, the former marital home of Claus and Martha “Sunny” Von Bülow (1932 – 2008), was revealed as a restaurateur and real estate mogul named Paul Roiff. Separately, the New York Post reported that Mr Von Bülow’s former lawyer, Alan Dershowitz, had purchased an apartment in Sutton Place, New York at the same time as a postal worker was on trial for killing his sister. The lives of the rich and famous are never anything other than dramatic.
The front elevation of the former residence of Claus von Bulow: Clarendon Court, 626 Bellvue Avenue, Newport, Rhode Island, RI 02840The rear elevation of Clarendon Court, 626 Bellvue Avenue, Newport, RI 02840An aerial shot of Clarendon Court from the Atlantic Ocean
8-bedroomed Clarendon Court on Bellvue Avenue in Newport, Rhode Island is best known for the events surrounding the utilities heiress Martha Crawford Von Bülow falling into a 28-year coma there and her husband subsequently being tried, convicted and then acquitted for her attempted murder, but this fine residence has much else in its past as well.
Edward Collings Knight, Jr. (1863 – 1936)
Designed by the most prominent Ameircan architect of the “Gilded Age,” Horace Trumbauer (1868 – 1938), this Palladian style villa was commissioned in 1903 by Edward Collings Knight, Jr. (1863 – 1936), a sugar-refiner and railroad executive, and his wife, Clara. It was built on an acre plot with views of the Narragansett Bay and is most curiously termed “one of Newport’s finest cottages.” The mansion that was constructed for the couple is an almost exact replica of a proposed house by Colin Campbell at Chester-le-Street in County Durham, England and features Doric columns, quoins and an urn-embellished balustrade. It provided a suitable illustration of Mr and Mrs Knight’s wealth and status.
Claradon Court in the early 1900s
Edward Knight, who was once described as exhibiting “more talent at spending money than making it,” named the house Claradon Court in honour of his wife and shortly before it was completed in 1904, he acquired an additional six acres of land behind the plot with direct frontage to the Atlantic. Here, he had Trumbauer design a vast carriage house in an early Georgian vernacular as well as a series of high brick walls to protect the gardens from the ocean winds.
The coach house at Clarendon Court todayThe rear loggia was added by Mr & Mrs Knight at a later dateThis arch and walling was added to provide protection against the force of the AtlanticA more recent shot illustrates that the flower beds have been laid to lawn
The Knights engaged a Parisian decorator named Jules Allard to decorate Claradon Court in the English Georgian manner and after several seasons in residence added two wings onto the back of the house. Following Clara Knight’s death in 1928, her husband sold the estate, moved to a more modest Trumbauer designed house in neighbouring Middleton and remarried. His second wife, Marie Louise LeBel, is remembered as a “foul-mouthed, hard-drinking [woman], who thought nothing of killing a neighbour’s dog with a shot from her pearl-handled pistol.” Together they went on to spend the vast sum of constructing a $383,000 mansion in North Carolina as a hunting lodge. It is now the home of the Whalehead Club.
Colonel William Hayward with Major Arthur W. Little
The purchaser of Claradon Court was a First World War hero named Colonel William Hayward (1877 – 1944) and his wife, Mae (1880 – 1956). Whilst the colonel is remembered as the commander of the “Harlem Hellfighters,” a regiment that “never lost a man captured, a trench, or a foot of ground,” his wife was truly a character.
Born in Connecticut, Mae Cadwell had divorced her first husband Selden B. Manwaring of Hartford in 1914 to marry the older and richer Morton F. Plant of New York and New London, Connecticut. Morton Plant adopted her son by her first marriage, Philip “Paul” Morgan Manwaring Plant (1901 – 1941), and when he married the well-known actress Constance Bennett (1904 – 1965) in 1925 more controversy followed. The millionaire socialite Plant’s life is well documented not only as it was for him that the term “playboy” was originally created but also because of his bitter divorce from Bennett in 1929.
Following their purchase, Colonel and Mrs Hayward decided to have the name of Claradon Court changed to Clarendon Court to distance any lingering associations with Clara Knight and she is said to have filled the building with fine and decorative art. The colonel died in 1944 and his widow married for the fourth time, this time taking the president of the American Car & Foundry Company, John E. Rovensky, as her husband. After her death in 1956, Rovensky continued to use Clarendon Court until his own death in 1970 and even allowed it to be used as the set of the 1956 American musical comedy film High Society that starred Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly and Frank Sinatra.
Martha “Sunny” Von Bülow (1932 – 2008)Claus Von Bülow during one of his trials
In 1970, Clarendon Court’s most notorious chapter commenced when the utilities heiress Sunny Von Bülow and her husband Claus purchased the house as it was here in December 1980 that Mrs Von Bülow fell into the irreversible coma that she was to remain in until her death in December 2008. The story of Claus Von Bülow’s trials for the attempted murder of his wife is well known and the 1990 film Reversal of Fortune, starring Jeremy Irons, Glenn Close and Ron Silver, is most definitely a true masterpiece.
Considered a couple of “exceptional taste,” the Von Bülows were described as having filled Clarendon Court with exceptional 18th and 19th century English furniture. They also significantly improved the grounds by hiring the landscapers Innocenti & Webel to create an elegant allée to the sea by removing a hillock that had always deprived the ground floor rooms of an ocean view.
The Von Bülow landcaped the grounds to create a better view from Clarendon Court towards the Atlantic Ocean
In 1974, Claus Von Bülow wrote of Clarendon Court in an article for the Bulletin of the Newport Historical Society:
“The author of this article has lived happily at ‘Clarendon’ for the past four years. As a European he has found much to admire in Newport, with its sense of history and its preservation of a unique architectural heritage. He hopes some future writer will cover the occupancy of his family at ‘Clarendon’ with as much wistful charity as he has endeavored to extend to its previous owners.”
Von Bülow, at that time, plainly could not have imagined the tragic event that was to follow in December 1980 and for what the house would indeed become best known.
The main staircase at Clarendon CourtA study at Clarendon Court
A committee managing Sunny Von Bülow’s affairs sold Clarendon Court in 1988 to a fine art and antique dealer named Glenn C. Randall and his wife Patricia for $4,300,000. The couple converted the service wing into a gallery for their collection and lived there until Mrs Randall died after a battle with cervical cancer in May 2010. The 12,800 square foot house and it’s 10,000 square foot coach house were placed on the market for $17,800,000 in October 2010 and whilst the price was subsequently was brought down to $15,800,000, it languished until being sold in July 2012.
The new master of Clarendon Court, Paul G. Roiff, is a graduate of Boston University and Suffolk Law School. He is the president of a real estate company named Heath Properties and also co-owns a number of restaurants in Boston including Mistral, Mooo, Teatro and Sorellina as well as a 63-bedroom hotel named XV Beacon.
Paul G. Roiff
Plainly publicity shy, Roiff, who also owns homes in Florida and Michigan, used one of his employees, Keith Beardsley, to purchase Clarendon Court on his behalf. He paid $13,126,000 for the estate.
Celebrity lawyer Alan DershowitzAlan Dershowitz’s new pied-à-terre at 45 Sutton Place, New York, NY 10022, USA
In another development, on the 25th September The New York Observer reported that the lawyer who became famous representing Claus Von Bülow, Alan M. Dershowitz, had bought a 3-bedroomed apartment in the “stronghold of old money,” 45 Sutton Place, for $1,680,000. Plainly Mr Dershowitz, who subsequently represented O. J. Simpson, has done well and is plainly now richer than his first “celebrity” client. He also owns a 6-bedroom residence in Cambridge, Massachusetts and was able to use his verbal talent to persuade the sellers of the Sutton Place co-op downwards from their original $2,290,000 asking price.
Separately, late last month, Dershowitz and his family were in court for the trial of a postal worker named Ian Clement. A 7-tonne truck driven by Clement had crushed and killed Marilyn, the 68-year old sister-in-law of Alan Dershowitz, in New York in July 2011. Dershowitz, a retired special referee for the New York court system, had been out for a bicycle ride with her husband, Nathan, a partner at Dershowitz, Eiger & Anderson.
Marilyn DershowitzThe scene of the fatal accident that killed Marilyn Dershowitz
Surprisingly and much to the distaste of the Dershowitz family, Clement, who had been charged with leaving the scene of a fatal accident, was acquitted by a jury on the 20th September. Of this, Alan Dershowitz commented:
“The facts clearly justified a guilty verdict… I think a stronger presentation might have brought about justice. Instead, we have an injustice.”
Both the Von Bülows and the Dershowitz family have endured loss and a huge amount of media attention since the events of the early 1980s. Perhaps these most recent moves will bring with them a new chapter for both Clarendon Court and Mr Dershowitz himself. Meanwhile, Claus Von Bülow, though not quite as wealthy as he was in his days at Clarendon, prospers in London and is considered one of the city’s “finest wits.” How fortunes do indeed revolve.
Contact Alan M. Dershowitz at: Hauser Hall 520, 1575 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts, MA 02138. Telephone: +1 (617) 495-4617. View his official website at: http://www.alandershowitz.com/or follow him on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/alandersh
The agent for Glenn C. Randall in the sale of Clarendon Court was Paul Leys of Gustave White who can be contacted on +1 (401) 848-6706 or by email at:[email protected]
This father of six and his gang were amongst the most notorious and sadistic criminals in South London in the 1960s. Using scrap metal and slot machine businesses as fronts, they ran fraud, protection rackets and received stolen goods. They were best known for nailing those who displeased them to floor and then made them mop up their own blood. This process was known as “taking a shirt from Charlie,” since afterwards a clean shirt was provided for the victim to return home in. Richardson, however, maintained the torture stories were a myth. In his twilight years, Beckenham based Richardson mellowed and spent his time campaigning on behalf of young offenders.
“The Queen of Mean” was a chain-smoking hotelier and real estate tycoon with a reputation for tyrannical behaviour. She took the view that “only the little people pay taxes” but was investigated and convicted of federal income tax evasion in 1989. Sentenced to 16 years, she served just 19 months in prison and 2 months under house arrest. Worth some $8 billion, Helmsley left her Maltese dog, Trouble, $12 million in trust.
A German who used many aliases but whose biggest pretence was to give the impression he was a member of the Rockefeller family. The Man in the Rockefeller Suit gives the best account of his exploits but it is for the 2009 parental kidnapping of his child, Reigh Storrow “Snooks” Mills Boss, by a Harvard graduate named Sandra Boss that he is best known. Jailed for four to five years after being convicted for kidnap, he was subsequently also charged with the 1985 murder of a Californian man named Jonathan Sohus. Whilst this fantasist of the first order rots in the clink, his former wife has built a new life in Knightsbridge, London.
John B. Goodman sold his family business, Goodman Manufacturing, for $1.43 billion in 2004 and founded the International Polo Club Palm Beach. This socialite and protégé of the $7 billion Ponzi-schemer Sir Allan Stanford, claimed: “I don’t know what happened” when put on trial for smashing his Bentley into a Hyundai driven by Scott Wilson in 2010. Bizarrely, he attempted to adopt his girlfriend as his daughter to save his fortune and after spending years under house, John Goodman was finally jailed for 16 years for killing Wilson in December 2014. Here is a case of an individual some called a “generous and decent man” who truly screwed up.
Best known for her role as Flick Scully on the soap Neighbours, this Australian born actress, singer and model struck gold when she married the British property tycoon Nick Candy. Her foray into music as Holly Valance brought success with Kiss Kiss but she subsequently fell out with her manager and had to pay him $350,000 in damages. She’s now most likely to be found on London’s social circuit or out shopping.
She told “The Mother Of All Lies” when she arranged for her degenerate boyfriend to help her kidnap her own daughter, Shannon, in 2008. She hid the poor child under a bed and basked in the media attention. Not being very bright was what resulted in her being caught and resultantly she failed to collect a reward of some £50,000. Matthews was jailed for eight years but released in April 2012. Goodness knows what this simpleton will do next.
This British pop singer started out with her equally bizarrely named cousin, Dappy, in a hip hop group named N-Dubz. They’ve since fallen out very publicly on Twitter and now she sings lines such as: “Forgive us for what we’ve done, Cause we young, we young, we young.” Frankly, no forgiveness is necessary: Tulisa, please stop “living on the edge of life,” making sex tapes of your “intimate moments” and instead just silence yourself.
