Click here for more about Skalnik’s long and wild career as a con-man.
Skalnik has been incarcerated off and on since the late 1970s until this year. He’s been called:
-“a con man extraordinaire”
- “a con artist of the highest degree”
- “a BIG con artist”
Here’s what he did to earn those titles. 👇
-“a con man extraordinaire”
- “a con artist of the highest degree”
- “a BIG con artist”
Here’s what he did to earn those titles. 👇
In 1976, he was arrested after he posed as a furniture salesman in Florida, and pocketed $700 from an unsuspecting customer. Even though the police found evidence that suggested he was running another scam, he only received probation.
In Houston, in 1978, he was arrested after he wrote a dozen bad checks, including one to buy his wife a microwave for Christmas.
That arrest violated his *earlier* Florida probation and sent him to jail in Houston (where his career as an informant began).
In 1981, he was arrested in Florida for grand theft and faced up to five years in prison. He told his fiancee he was an attorney who wanted to set up a new law practice. He persuaded her to take out $3,500 in loans to help him — money he promised to pay back but never did.
In 1982, Skalnik tricked a woman into giving him nearly $5,000 on the promise of starting a travel agency together, and then defrauded a couple out of more than $20,000. (This violated his probation and sent him back to jail.)
He was released again in 1985 and then allegedly:
-cheated an elderly woman out of tens of thousands of dollars for cars he never delivered
-conned a woman out of thousands w/ a phony real estate deal
-duped a jewelry-store clerk into taking another bad check for a $6k Rolex
-cheated an elderly woman out of tens of thousands of dollars for cars he never delivered
-conned a woman out of thousands w/ a phony real estate deal
-duped a jewelry-store clerk into taking another bad check for a $6k Rolex
He eventually fled to Texas and passed himself off as “J. Paul Bourne,” a high roller who was flush with oil money.
Posing as Bourne, he managed to buy $27,000 worth of jewelry with forged checks.
Posing as Bourne, he managed to buy $27,000 worth of jewelry with forged checks.
The law finally caught up with Skalnik when he served a full 10-year sentence after sexually abusing the daughter of his 8th wife.
Later, he went to Massachusetts and was arrested again for larceny and forgery after he stole thousands of dollars from unsuspecting clients who had hired him under the false belief that he was an attorney.
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