“Why don't you take a seat?” said a soothing Magnum, extending his mile-long arm toward my armchair. “You need to calm down a bit, buddy.”
“I am calm,” I muttered. “I'm real f**king calm. What the hell do I have to be nervous about, anyway? The fact that I'm facing three hundred years?” I shrugged and took my seat. “That's not so bad in the general scheme of things, is it?”
“You're not facing three hundred years,” replied Magnum, in the tone a psychiatrist would normally use to coax a suicidal jumper off the edge of a bridge. “At worst, you're facing thirty years… or maybe thirty-five.” Then he paused, pursing his lips like an undertaker. “Although there's an excellent chance the government's gonna try to supersede you.”
I recoiled in my seat. “Supersede me? What are you talking about?” Of course, I knew exactly what the f**k he was talking about. After all, I had been under criminal investigation for the better part of my adult life, so I was an expert in these matters. Still, I thought that somehow, if I made supersede me sound like an entirely outlandish concept, it would make it that much less likely to happen.
“Let me clarify things,” said the Yale-man. “Right now you're being charged with securities fraud and money laundering, but only on four stocks. Chances are they'll try to add on other charges—or supersede you, as the term goes. Don't be surprised if they try to indict you on the rest of the companies you took public. There were thirty-five in all, right?”
“More or less,” I said casually, entirely numb at this point to the sort of bad news that would make the average man pee in his pants. Besides, what was the difference between thirty years and thirty-five? They were both life sentences, weren't they? The Duchess would be long gone, and my children would be completely grown up—married, most likely, with children of their own.
And what would be my fate? Well, I would end up one of those toothless old men, the sort of worthless wino who embarrasses his children and grandchildren when he shows up at their doorstep on holidays. I would be like that old jailbird Mr. Gower, the druggist from It's a Wonderful Life. He had once been a well-respected man in his community, until he poisoned an innocent child after receiving a telegram that his son had died in World War I. Last time I'd watched the movie, Mr. Gower had just been sprayed in the face with a bottle of seltzer and then kicked out of a bar on his ass.
I took a deep breath. Christ—I had to rein in all these stray thoughts! Even in good times my mind had a habit of running away from me. I said, “So tell me what my options are here. I mean, the thought of doing thirty years in jail doesn't exactly thrill me.”
“Wellllllll,” said Magnum, “the way I see it—and feel free to chime in here, Nick—you have three options. The first is to fight this thing to the end, to go all the way to trial and win an acquittal.” He nodded his head once, letting the word acquittal hang in the air. “And if we do win, then that'll be that. This will all be behind you, once and for all.”
“No double jeopardy,” I added, feeling both proud and disturbed at my expertise in criminal law.
“Exactly,” offered the Yale-man. “You can't be tried twice for the same crime. It'll be a case people talk about for years. Something that'll make Greg and I big wheels around town.” Then he paused and smiled sadly. “But I strongly advise you against that course. I think it would be a big mistake to take this thing to trial. And I say this as your friend, Jordan, not as your attorney.”
Now Magnum took over: “Understand, buddy, as a law firm we make much more money advising you to go to trial—probably ten times as much in a case like this. A trial as complicated as this would drag on forever—more than a year, probably—and the cost would be astronomical: ten million plus.”
Now the Yale-man chimed in: “But if we do go to trial and you end up losing, it's going to be a total disaster. A disaster of biblical proportions. You'll get thirty years plus, Jordan, and—”
Magnum, overlapping: “—and you won't do your time in a federal prison camp, playing golf and tennis. You'll be in a federal penitentiary, with murderers and rapists.” He shook his head gravely. “It'll be hell on earth.”
I nodded in understanding, keenly aware how the feds housed their criminals. It was according to time: the more time you faced, the higher your security risk. Anything under ten years, with no violence in your background, and you qualified for a minimum-security prison. (Club Fed, so to speak.) But if your sentence was greater than ten years, they locked you in a place where a jar of Vaseline was more valuable than a truckload of weapons-grade plutonium.
Greg plowed on: “Now, as your friend, I would be very upset knowing you were locked in a place like that, especially when there were other options open to you—better options, I would say.”
And Magnum kept right on talking, but I tuned out. I was already aware that going to trial wasn't an option. I knew that contrary to what most people thought, the sentences meted out for financial crimes were far worse than those for violent crimes. It was all in the amount: If investor losses exceeded a million dollars, the sentences were severe. And if investor losses topped a hundred million—as in my case—sentences were off the charts.
And there was more, starting with the fact was that I was guilty as sin. It was something Nick knew, Greg knew, and I knew too. For their part, Nick and Greg had represented me since the beginning— since the summer of 1994, when I'd made the fatal mistake of smuggling millions of dollars to Switzerland.
I had been under intense regulatory pressure at the time, starting with the SEC, which had become obsessed with my brokerage firm, Stratton Oakmont. I had started the place back in the fall of 1988, quickly discovering a wildly lucrative niche in the securities markets selling five-dollar stocks to the richest one percent of Americans. And just like that, Stratton became one of the largest brokerage firms in America.
In retrospect, things could have turned out much differently. Just as easily, I could have gone down the path of the straight and narrow—building a brokerage firm to rival Lehman Brothers or Merrill Lynch. As fate would have it, one of my first mentors, a true genius named Al Abrams, had a rather aggressive take on what constituted a violation of the federal securities laws. And Al was a careful man, the sort of man who kept ten-year-old pens in his drawer so when he backdated documents the ink would hold up to an FBI gas chromatograph. Al spent the better part of his day anticipating the moves of nosy securities regulators and covering his tracks accordingly.
And he was the one who'd taught me.
So, like Al, I had been careful too, covering my tracks with the zest and zeal of a sniper deep behind enemy lines. From the earliest days of Stratton, I was well aware that every trade I made, and every deal I consummated, and every word I spoke on the telephone would one day come under the microscope of a securities regulator. So, whether my actions were legitimate or not, they had damn well better appear to be that way.
In consequence, I had driven the SEC up the wall after they sued me in the fall of 1991, expecting an easy victory. They even went as far as setting up shop in my own conference room to try to intimidate me. Alas, things did not go as they planned: I ended up bugging my own conference room and setting the thermostat at alternating extremes—freezing them out in winter and burning them out in summer. Then I hired their ex-boss, a man named Ike Sorkin, to protect me, defend me, and undermine their investigation at every juncture. Meanwhile, between 1991 and 1994, I was making $50 million a year, as each of these young investigators (all of whom were making $30,000 a year) resigned in frustration and disgrace, and with terrible cases of frostbite or dehydration, depending on the season.
Eventually, I settled my case with the SEC. “Peace with honor,” my lawyer had called it, although, to me, it was a total victory. I agreed to pay a $3 million fine and then walk off quietly into the sunset. The only problem was that I just couldn't bring myself to leave. I had become intoxicated with wealth and power, hooked on an entire generation of young Long Islanders calling me king and the Wolf. The buzzword of the day was instant gratification, and the ends justifying the means was the instrument of its assurance. And just like that, Stratton spiraled out of control. And I along with it.
By the early nineties, the Wolf of Wall Street was bearing his fangs. He was my devilish alter ego, a persona far removed from the child my parents had sent out into the world. My sense of right and wrong had all but vanished, my line of morality having moved toward the dark side in a series of tiny, almost imperceptible steps, which together landed me firmly on the wrong side of the law.
The Wolf was a despicable character; he cheated on his wife, slept with hookers, spent obscene amounts of money, and viewed securities laws as nothing more than shallow obstacles to be hurdled in a single bound. He justified his actions using absurd rationalizations, as he buried Jordan Belfort's guilt and remorse beneath obscene quantities of dangerous recreational drugs.
And all the while the government kept coming. Next it was NASDAQ, refusing to list any company in which the Wolf was the largest shareholder. The Wolf's solution—as insane as it now seems—was to smuggle millions of dollars to Switzerland, using their legendary bank-secrecy laws to try to turn himself into the invisible man. Through a series of shell corporations, numbered accounts, and expertly forged documents, the plan seemed perfect.
But from the very start it also seemed to be jinxed. The problems began when my chief money courier was arrested in the United States with half a million in cash, and the problems ended (in disaster) when my Swiss banker was arrested a few years later, also in the United States, at which point he began cooperating against my money courier.
Meanwhile, a young FBI agent named Gregory Coleman had become obsessed with the Wolf, vowing to take him down. In what would turn into a game of cat and mouse that became legendary within the FBI, Coleman followed my paper trail halfway around the world and then back again. And, finally, after five years of dogged legwork, he had connected enough dots to secure an indictment.
So here I was, six days post-arraignment, a victim of my own recklessness and Coleman's persistence. And there was Magnum, moving onto option two, which was a plea bargain. “… And while I can't promise you an exact sentence, I don't think it'll be more than seven years, or maybe eight at the most.” He shrugged. “Let's use eight to be conservative.”
“No f**king way!” I snapped. “Let's use seven and be optimistic, for Chrissake! They're my years—not your f**king years—so if I want to use seven of them, that's my f**king prerogative!”
The Yale-man said, “Okay, seven years is a fair number to work with. It's eighty-four months, before deductions, and—”
I cut off the Yale-man: “Ah, good, let's talk about my deductions! And feel free to exaggerate if you like. I promise I won't sue for malpractice.”
They both smiled dutifully, and then the Yale-man continued: “The first deduction is for good time. You get fifteen percent for each year served. So, that's fifteen percent off eighty-four months—” He looked up at Magnum. “You got a calculator?”
“Forget the calculator,” sputtered I, the math whiz. “It's seventy-one and a half months. But let's call it seventy-one, just to be fair. What's next?”
The Yale-man went on: “Well, you get six months in a halfway house, which is almost like being home. That brings you down to sixty-five months.”
Now Magnum chimed in: “And then there's the drug-treatment program, which”—he let out a chuckle—”given your past history you'd definitely qualify for.” He looked over at Nick. “He could probably teach the course, Nick, right?”
“One would think,” replied the Yale-man, with a starchy shrug. “You'd make an excellent teacher, Jordan. I'm sure you'd make the class very interesting. Anyway, you get twelve months off for the drug program; so now you're down to fifty-three months.”
Magnum said, “You see what I'm saying here, Jordan? It's not nearly as bad as you thought, right?”
“Yeah, one would think,” and I took a moment to consider my fate. Four and a half years—well, it was certainly better than going to trial and risking becoming Mr. Gower. I would serve my time in Club Fed, playing tennis and golf, and be released around my fortieth birthday. I would have to pay a hefty fine, of course, but I still had enough money squirreled away to emerge from jail a wealthy man.
And then all at once it hit me: I might even be able to sell this package to the Duchess! Perhaps she would stay if she knew I was facing only four and a half years… although I could reduce that a bit, tell her that I was facing only four years. How would she know I was lying? Maybe I should say forty-eight months. Which sounded shorter? Probably forty-eight months, or maybe I would say forty-seven months and then follow it up with “That's less than four short years, baby!”
Wow, what a pleasant ring that had to it! Less than four short years, baby! It would be no more than a hiccup, something that could happen to any man of power. Yes, I would explain that to the Duchess, and she would understand. After all, I had been a terrific provider over the years. So why should she waste her time searching for a new gold mine when the gold mine she already had would be back in operation in less than four short years, baby!
“… could always cooperate,” said Magnum, raising his eyebrows two times in rapid succession. “Now if you go down that road, you might not even spend a day in jail; you could get straight probation. Although you'd probably have to do a year or so.”
I had been too busy fantasizing about the backstabbing Duchess, so I'd missed the first half of what Magnum said. Apparently he had now moved on to option three: cooperating, also known as ratting. Call it what you will, I chose to ignore the latter part of Magnum's sentence prediction, and I said, with a trace of hope in my voice: “I won't have to do even a day in jail?”
Magnum shrugged. “I said it's a possibility. Not a guarantee. Once you become a cooperating witness, the sentencing guidelines are thrown out the window. The judge could do whatever he wants. He could give you probation, he could give you a year, or, theoretically, he could throw the book at you. Now, in your case, you have Judge Gleeson, who's the perfect judge for this sort of thing. He understands the importance of cooperation, so he'll be fair with you.”
I nodded slowly, sensing daylight. “So he's pro-defense?”
“No,” replied Magnum, bursting my bubble. “He's not pro-defense, and he's not pro-government. He's straight down the middle. He pretty much dances to his own tune. He's one of the smartest judges in the Eastern District, so no one's gonna pull the wool over his eyes, not you or the U.S. attorney. But that's a positive, because if you do the right thing, John will be fair with you. That much I can promise.
“By the way, don't call him John in the courtroom, unless you want to be held in contempt.” He smiled and winked. “Just call him Your Honor, and you'll be fine.”
Now the Yale-man chimed in: “Greg knows John as well as anybody. They used to work together at the U.S. Attorney's Office. They're friends.”
Wait a second. Did he just say friends? My lawyer is friends with the judge! It was music to my ears.
It all made sense now. I had always known that Magnum was the perfect lawyer for me. I'd even looked past the fact that standing next to him made me feel like a shrimp. And in the end, look how well things had worked out! By sheer coincidence, my lawyer was friends with the judge, which meant he would wink at the judge ever so subtly just as the judge was about to announce my sentence, at which point the judge would nod back at Magnum just as subtly and then say, “Jordan Belfort, in spite of the fact that you stole a hundred million bucks and corrupted an entire generation of young Americans, I'm sentencing you to twelve months’ probation and a one-hundred-dollar fine.”
Meanwhile, the Duchess would be sitting in the courtroom-dressed to the nines and counting her lucky stars that she had decided to abandon her search for a new gold mine. After all, the Wolf's gold mine was about to reopen for ore extraction, simply because his lawyer was friends with the judge!
I smiled warmly at Magnum and said, “Well, this is some pretty good news, Greg.” I shook my head slowly, breathing a sigh of relief. “Why didn't you say you were friends with the judge in the first place? It's a terrific development. Really terrific, if you catch my drift!” I winked at Magnum conspiratorially and rubbed my thumb and first two fingers together, as if to say, “Just tell me how much cash you need to pay off the judge!” Then I winked again.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” exclaimed Magnum, in a tone deep enough to wake the dead. “John is not like that! He's completely legitimate. He's the kind of judge who might end up on the Supreme Court one day. Or at least the Court of Appeals. Either way, he won't do anything improper.”
Fucking killjoy! I thought. My own lawyer won't go to bat for me. Instead, he's trying to take the wind out of my sails. I resisted the urge to tell him to go f**k himself, and I said, “Well, I wouldn't want to do anything to jeopardize anyone's career aspirations. Anyway, I don't think I'd make a very good cooperating witness, so it's a moot point.”
Magnum seemed taken aback. “Why do you say that?”
“Yeah!” added a stunned Yale-man. “I couldn't disagree with you more. You'd make an excellent cooperating witness. Why would you think otherwise?”
I let out a deep sigh. “For a lot of reasons, Nick, not the least of which is that I'm at the very top of the food chain. Anybody I cooperate against will be a lesser figure than me. Not to mention the fact that most of the people the government would be interested in are my best friends. So, tell me, how the f**k am I supposed to rat out my best friends and maintain even one ounce of self-respect? I wouldn't be able to walk around Long Island with my head up. I'd be a leper.” I paused, shaking my head in despair. “And if I decide to cooperate, I have to come clean about all my crimes, tell them everything, right?”
They both nodded.
I said, “That's what I thought. So, basically, I'll be pleading guilty to the whole ball of wax, which means my fine is gonna be enormous. I'll be totally wiped out”—which would mean bye-bye, Duchess—”starting from scratch again. I don't think I could handle that right now. I've got a wife and kids to think about. I mean, what's better: spending four years in jail, while my family lives in the lap of luxury, or spending a year in jail, while my family wonders where their next meal's coming from?”