L.A. Times Staff Writer on Pellicano: “There Could Be a Cool Efficiency to How He Operated”
Rachel Abramowitz, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer:
[W]here’s Anthony Pellicano when you need him?
I’m not advocating for a return of the gumshoe, now convicted of 76 counts of racketeering and wiretapping, but he definitely had a well-defined spot in the Hollywood food chain — fixer, interlocutor between celebrities and the populace, the man to call when your one-night stand, your nanny, your personal assistant, your housekeeper, yoga instructor, chakra cleanser, what-have-you decides to sue for slights real and imagined. Or decides to sell your intimate secrets to Us magazine and the tabloids.
Obviously Pellicano was a bully, ready to smear the less powerful with impunity. But there could be a cool efficiency to how he operated. During his recent trial, out came testimony about a college student who was impregnated by a rich financial type. Pellicano arranged for her abortion, drove her to the clinic and handed her a $120,000 check when it was over.
Unpleasant, yes, but more unpleasant than a protracted lawsuit, where all the combatants end up covered in slime?
I’m not so sure.
“[T]here could be a cool efficiency to how he operated.”
Oh, my.
That certainly is a cavalier way to describe the actions of a man who wiretapped people, threatened them, and turned their lives upside down.
Lawsuits are no fun. But if Rachel Abramowitz isn’t sure about which is worse — resolving disputes in a courtroom according to the law, or being one of Anthony Pellicano’s victims — maybe Abramowitz should talk to Anita Busch, or Bo Zenga, or Garry Shandling, or any of Pellicano’s numerous other victims.
I have a feeling we haven’t heard the last of this.
During his recent trial, out came testimony about a college student who was impregnated by a rich financial type. Pellicano arranged for her abortion, drove her to the clinic and handed her a $120,000 check when it was over.
Why does Ms. Abramowitz seem to think that this sort of thing would have to be handled by a private eye, and not just any old lackey to the “rich financial type”?
JVW (78155f) — 6/4/2008 @ 6:23 pmAbramowitz shows the allure of thuggery and violence to those who don’t really have to confront the consequences.
Twit.
SPQR (26be8b) — 6/4/2008 @ 6:25 pmIf he were so cooly efficient he wouldn’t be headed for the slammer.
David Ehrenstein (fc61c1) — 6/4/2008 @ 6:48 pm[T]here could be a cool efficiency to how Germans operated gang showers and ovens.
Perfect Sense (b6ec8c) — 6/4/2008 @ 6:58 pmWell, technically, just offing a problem reporter IS efficient…
*rolls his eyes*
I can’t believe these people don’t die of laughter as they write this stuff…
Scott Jacobs (d3a6ec) — 6/4/2008 @ 6:59 pmI thought one of his subjects was a Times reporter. They are turning on their own.
Alta Bob (53a695) — 6/4/2008 @ 7:03 pmSharks are efficient.
Using your connection to muscle to also make what’s emphatically the final payoff (“Don’t come back for more, Sugar”) is efficient.
The former I can see grounds for describing as cool, in a brutal sort of way. “Callous” would be the modifier I’d choose for the latter, though.
Beldar (25ee73) — 6/4/2008 @ 7:33 pmThey turned on Anita a while ago…
Scott Jacobs (d3a6ec) — 6/4/2008 @ 7:34 pm…and, Mussolini made the trains run on time.
Twit!
Another Drew (8018ee) — 6/4/2008 @ 8:00 pmWell, that’s two votes.
SPQR (26be8b) — 6/4/2008 @ 8:06 pmSPQR…
Another Drew (8018ee) — 6/4/2008 @ 8:14 pmI seconded your pronouncement only because what I really feel about this writer would probably get me set down for a while.
Maybe we should put Pellicano in charge of Amtrak.
Rob Crawford (6c262f) — 6/5/2008 @ 4:51 amAw, man. I should read the other comments first.
Rob Crawford (6c262f) — 6/5/2008 @ 4:51 amWhen Dashiell Hammett’s Continental Op (unknown to anyone but himself) replaces morphine with sugar during an elaborate plan to help someone overcome addiction, he is described as “A monster. A nice one, but a monster just the same, without any human foolishness like love in him…”
The Continental Op (the “good” gumshoe) is coolly efficient, but he does so toward moral ends or to resolve a moral dilemma.
The Op helped someone overcome addiction…Pellicano (in the example) paid someone off to be quiet. I’ll take the Op anyday over the Pelican.
Christian Lindke (2c3270) — 6/5/2008 @ 12:10 pmJVW wrote: Why does Ms. Abramowitz seem to think that this sort of thing would have to be handled by a private eye, and not just any old lackey to the “rich financial type”?
Excellent point. Especially someone with Pellicano’s tawdry reputation.
I didn’t follow the trial blow-by-blow; do we know for a certainty that said college student wanted the abortion? Or that once a price on the life of the unborn child was fixed, that Pellicano wasn’t enlisted to make sure the deadly deed was done before hush money was issued?
L.N. Smithee (530e8d) — 6/5/2008 @ 1:20 pmBeldar said it in #7:
Using your connection to muscle to also make what’s emphatically the final payoff (”Don’t come back for more, Sugar”) is efficient.
nk (be56c0) — 6/5/2008 @ 1:37 pm‘…not just any old lackey to the “rich…”‘
Didn’t we use to call such attorney’s?
Guess the legal profession is absorbing some ethics from somewhere (can’t be by osmossis in Hollywood, though)?
Another Drew (8018ee) — 6/5/2008 @ 5:26 pmHey, I resent that … I’ve been lackeying to the middle class.
SPQR (26be8b) — 6/5/2008 @ 5:27 pmSPQR…
Another Drew (8018ee) — 6/5/2008 @ 5:35 pmYou forget, under Dem definitions, anyone with a job is “Rich”, and thus deserving of confiscatory taxation.
As a tool of the Rich, you must suffer along side them.
Got to preserve the dialectic, you know.