Their prices were insane... their book keeping stole millions! Crazy Eddie Antar and his cousin Sam Antar meet face-to-face decades after their business ended in scandal.
I worked for the Crazy Eddie Record and Tape Asylum in Union, NJ, and was fired on a trumped-up charge two days before my benefits were to go into effect (Since I was fired, I couldn't collect unemployment). After hours, the video department crew made bootleg copies of porn videos on the display VCR's, which they sold at a local flea market. When the chain closed, I celebrated. When Eddie Antar was busted, I partied.
I know a guy who served time with Eddie Antar. He says Antar had a serious cocaine problem before he went to jail. Crazy Eddie's started out with a great business plan; they ignored the "accepted norms" of electronics and charged less than their competitors, stayed open on national holidays, gave holiday discounts, etc.
These guys were doing a world-class ballet with the books since the late 1960's. They would report only half the income, and stash away the untaxed cash. Then they would re-invest that untaxed cash into the store. That's how they got the financing to open more stores than their competitors. Without any loans from banks, they appeared more profitable. Then they started reporting their income, so it looked like profits were rising. When they went public, it looked like they were doing really well.
Jerry Carrol has recently been doing the voice in the TV commercials for the Diamond Factory Outlet company. Jerry's toned it down and doesn't act crazy anymore, but he's still going strong today. They probably don't display his face, though, because he's been forever typecast as the Crazy Eddie guy.
Yeah really I wanna see the interview!!! I bet there was some hostility there LOL I remember Crazy Eddies...those commercials of him going apeshit will always be a part of my childhood =D
Reportedly the Antar family (Eddie and Sammy ran "Crazy Eddie") and the Jemal family (Lawrence Jemal founded "The Wiz") have a long-standing rivalry that goes back several generations.
The real Eddie was anything but insane. It wasn't until the scandal occurred when most people found out that Jerry Carroll was just a spokesman for the company, and not actually the owner. Eddie Antar is such a shifty-looking weasel, he was pretty shrewd not to appear in the commercials himself.
I worked for one of the court reporting companies that transcribed some of the stockholders' class action suit depositions...fascinating but disturbing shit...I think I used to buy records at the Coney Island Avenue store way back in the day...did buy a stereo from them even earlier...but this was all way before the major league scam (sticking me with inferior speakers was minor league)...wish I'd have known about the CNBC special...cool to be reminded, though....thank you
Selling "stolen" merchandise at flea markets doesn't surprise me. I remember the final days when the chain folded. People came expecting discounted items of brand name stuff. Instead all they found were off-brand crap ("Sankyo", "Panaphonic") and re-manufactured items without warranty. Everything was final sale. That was when I began to wonder when someone was going to prison.
Well, when I was buying my T Vs and Hi-Fi equipment from his Coney Island Avenue store in Brooklyn, I got good sevice, if anything broke, they'd send someone to fix it. But then again, this is at a consumer level
In the HISTORY of the US? Wow, you've clearly done your homework, haven't you? You must read a lot. /sarcasm What kind of corruption are we talkin about? The major lady issues like lewinsky, or are we talkin about little things like personal relationships with oil companies and starting wars, war crimes, wiretapping, torture, lying to the public, and possible war profiteering?
