I played tennis three hours a day, and I’d write for maybe 12.
When you’re in jail, you have a lot of time to think about your mistakes. I was about to call it quits and then I went into the prison library and stumbled upon The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe, and I was like, “That’s how I want to write!” The third night he goes, “You’ve got to write a book.” So I started writing, and I knew it was bad. We used to tell each other stories at night, and I had him rolling hysterically on the floor. He was in the process of writing his book. But it was minimum security, and after solitary it was like a boys’ club - and who’s my bunkmate? Tommy Chong from Cheech & Chong. When I arrived at Taft, they lost my paperwork, so I spent five days in solitary. Read more My Miserable Night at Jordan Belfort’s Groupon Sales Seminar Rather than focus on this, however, the stocky 51-year-old, who now lives with his girlfriend, Anne Koppe, preferred to describe his roller-coaster life since leaving prison, in a long conversation with THR in early February. “If they have a judgment against me, they can freeze my assets.”
“It’s the most idiotic thing ever,” he insists, allowing a rare flash of anger to ruffle his practiced charm. (It has acknowledged Belfort “has continued to pay $3,000” a month.)īelfort denies he is still obliged to return half his income. In an October filing, the Justice Department said that he had stopped paying restitution “at the rate of 50 percent of his gross income, as set forth in the judgment.” The government withdrew its filing days later. But even after eight years of freedom, he can’t quite escape his past: Prosecutors recently claimed he had failed to make court-mandated payments toward the $110.4 million he owes his victims.
This has been the best-selling author and motivational speaker’s headquarters for much of the time since he was released from prison in Taft, Calif., having served 22 months for fraud and money laundering.
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