 |
 |
 |
|
|
Beth and Jonathan at a gas station picking up his Italian sports car shipped in from Italy.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| By Elizabeth Grzeszczyk December 12, 2005 |
|
| |
[Editor's note: With Ariel Sharon's son Omri willing to take the rap for corruption done in his father's name, it came as something of a disappointment to learn that Jonathan Kern, son of Cyril -- who transferred to the Sharons $1.5 million under circumstances most suspicious -- not only is refusing to make the same sacrifice for his dear Dad, but has cultivated a criminal career of his own, including brushes with the law in the United States and Israel. Jonathan's crimes may be more exotic and romantic than Omri's but, hey -- who knows? Maybe the next generation will soon find themselves in the slammer together. But wait -- we are getting ahead of our tabloid-worthy tale of identity theft and love in the fast lane.]
I traveled around the country on business, and Miami was my favorite destination. That evening I was dining alone at an outdoor cafe on South Beach when I noticed a nice-looking, well-dressed man climb out of a sleek forest green Jaguar in front of the restaurant. He surveyed the tables as though he was looking for someone he knew. He spoke to the hostess, she nodded and led him to the empty table next to mine. Shortly after he was seated, he introduced himself as Jonathan Palmer, speaking in a flawless British accent.
"There's a race car driver of the same name," I replied, thinking out loud.
"Actually, that's me," he said. Having traveled to many Formula One races around the world, I was well aware of Jonathan Palmer but I could not recall his face. I was excited that I would actually meet one of the racecar drivers in person.
Jonathan seemed captivated with me, and I reveled in the attention. One dinner led to another. I was very impressed with Jonathan's glamorous lifestyle. People fawned over him wherever we went. He was often on the phone making business calls, often speaking in fluent Italian and French.
One evening Jonathan suggested he change his plans and extend his trip in the States to be with me. I was flattered and swept off my feet that a famous racecar driver was interested in me! Is this how the rich and famous did things? Jonathan continued that because he was here on business for a British company, he had not brought his personal credit cards but his business manager in London would ship them to him shortly. Completely taken in by this time I offered to help him out financially in the interim.
Once we were back at my home in Connecticut, life became a whirlwind. A car dealership delivered a Mercedes-Benz for Jonathan's personal use. He drove either the Mercedes-Benz or the Mazda sports car he had shipped over from Italy to make frequent "business trips" into New York.
I was getting nervous about all the money I was loaning Jonathan, and wondering when his personal credit cards would arrive. Jonathan said in the interim, he would give me a check drawn on an Italian Bank to deposit into my checking account that would cover at least some of the expenses I had incurred on his behalf. When the check cleared a few days later, I relaxed.
A few weeks later I came home from work to find Jonathan had cleared out, both cars and all his belongings were gone. The additional funds he promised to wire into my bank account never came.
In a panic I now began making phone calls to numbers on my telephone bills that he had called. It was then that I learned he was not. Jonathan Palmer the famous racecar driver, and that I had been conned. The walls came crashing down.
After some detective work, I learned the imposter's name was Jonathan Nigel-Philip Kern and he had been arrested numerous times in Europe and Israel on charges relating to impersonating Palmer. I had been conned by a professional.
I searched through my phone bills and starting calling numbers. One of the first calls I made was to a phone number in England. I had taken several calls for Jonathan from a woman with a British accent who said she was Jonathan's mother. I called the phone number.
"This is Beth Grzeszczyk, your son Jonathan was staying with me recently, you used to call my home and ask for him. "
There was a pause.
"Yes, hello Beth, I remember speaking with you. "
"Your son told me he was Jonathan Palmer. Are you aware he's impersonating this man? "
"No, I'm not. No, he's not Jonathan Palmer. "
"You mean to tell me with all the publicity this story has received in England you didn't know your son was impersonating Jonathan Palmer? I find that hard to believe. " I was getting angry.
"Well, I did know he had done it a few times. "
"Then why didn't you warn me when you called my home? You knew what he was up to and you didn't even tell me? He's taken all my money! You're an accomplice if you didn't let me know. " I was fuming.
"Jonathan had told me he met a nice woman, " she said in a pained voice. "And I wanted to believe him. " she said.
Maybe she was telling the truth, or maybe not, but I felt sorry for the woman. She said how sorry she was again that her son had done this to me, and we hung up.
Next I called a number in New Jersey. It turned out to be that of a woman named Rene, Jonathan's cousin. I told her who I was and she said Jonathan had mentioned that he was staying with me. She didn't know where he was now. She said she wanted to meet me. We agreed I would meet her the following week in Manhattan when I got back from a business trip.
At the end of the following week, I took the commuter train from Milford, Connecticut into Grand Central Station in Manhattan. It looked like it would be a long walk from Grand Central to Rene's apartment, but since I didn't have the money to shop or the inclination to sightsee, I might as well spend the time walking. Besides I was nervous about meeting Rene. After an hour's walk, I reached Rene's apartment building, rang the bell to her apartment and she buzzed me in. Rene answered the door and ushered me in with a warm handshake. She was a petite woman in her seventies but still had brown hair. She had on a teal beret jauntily tilted on her head. Rene gathered up her purse and we left the apartment as she said she wanted to take me to lunch in a deli around the corner.
There were rows of booths on either side of the restaurant with tables in the middle. We sat in a booth off to the side. It was still noisy, but I was enjoying the energy, and watching everyone. They seemed to be all business, as though it was critical that they eat lunch quickly and get back to the office. Rene recommended the corned beef on rye so we each ordered that and iced tea.
"Jonathan comes from a very wealthy family you know, " she said as she pulled off the top piece of rye bread to examine her sandwich.
"No, I didn't know. " That explained his arrogance though.
"Jonathan parents are divorced. His father, Cyril Kern is my cousin. Jonathan and his family lived in Israel when he was a child -- Jonathan is fluent in Hebrew. Cyril Kern is a businessman and now lives in South Africa. I am still a good friend of his mother, Doreen Kern. She is a sculptor in England. Jonathan has ruined her life. "
"Did you know we're Jewish? "
"No, Jonathan didn't mention it. "
"Jonathan used to visit my husband Alphonse and I in Italy when he was a child. He was a spoiled child. When we would take him into the city, he would point to things he wanted and tell us to buy them for him saying his father would pay us back. He's been in and out of jail since he was in his twenties. He was supposed to see a psychiatrist when he was younger. He did go for a short time, then quit going. "
So he had started out as a juvenile delinquent.
"You know, he didn't care for you at all. Jonathan visited us one Sunday, I think he said you were in San Francisco. My husband and I had him over for dinner. We had just finished renovating our home in New Jersey. I spent a lot of time preparing for his visit. Did he mention how nice our home is?"
"No, he didn't mention it. "
She seemed perturbed. What did she expect? Jonathan didn't care about anyone.
"Jonathan told me you could go jump in a river for all he cared. "
I winced.
"I don't tell you this to hurt you, my dear, but I can see you still have feelings for him, and I want you to know he's no good. " She took another bite of her sandwich.
Yes, perhaps Rene was right. I hadn't realized I still had feelings for Jonathan. Even though I now knew what he was like, I couldn't fall out of love with him overnight.
"You're lucky you got out when you did. If he had stayed with you much longer, you would have lost everything, your job, your home, your car. In six months he'll either be dead or in jail. "
When the bill came, Rene took it -- she wouldn't let me pay for lunch. Jonathan would have, I thought.
I walked her back to her apartment.
We said our good-byes. I turned and started to walk back to Grand Central Station. So many questions were forming in my head. If Jonathan came from a wealthy family, why then did he resort to such deceptive lengths to get money? Surely he could have been a millionaire by now if he had followed in his father's footsteps. I was beginning to get a clearer picture of this man.
Later I would read in an article in The Guardian Limited in Great Britain that Kern's first offense was impersonating a policeman at age eighteen. The article went on to report that Kern had dishonestly obtained a veritable fleet of fast cars over the years. Kern insisted his impersonations "started out as a lad's prank but got out of hand when people actually believed me". The article also stated Kern has convictions in Bermuda, France, Trinidad, Tobago and the United States.
Somehow I got through the following months, but little did I know the worse was yet to come. Unbelievably, a year after I deposited the Italian check Jonathan had given me into my checking account; it was detected as forgery and returned to the bank. This put me over the edge financially, and I had to declare bankruptcy. In a short time, I also lost my job, my car was repossessed; and my life had hit rock bottom.
Eventually, the tide began to turn. In light of the check bouncing after a year, the Milford Connecticut Police reopened the case and charged Jonathan Nigel-Philip Kern with criminal impersonation, felony forgery and felony larceny. My story appeared in The New Haven Register, Associated Press picked it up, and later Unsolved Mysteries contacted me to do a segment on Kern. I traveled to Los Angeles to film the segment and appeared on the show along with the real race car driver, Jonathan Palmer. I was encouraged with the publicity my story was receiving. This was a venue for making more and more people aware of Jonathan and his scams.
Officer Kelly from the Milford Police Department called me the following week. He went over the leads he had received from the Unsolved Mysteries hotline. One of the callers was from a man in Los Angeles, he said he was a relative of Jonathan's and he knew for a fact Jonathan was out of the country. He said I had called him almost two years ago. Yes, that would be Steve, the man Jonathan told me was the former Formula One Grand Prix race car driver, Stefan Johannsen.
One call came from a woman named Dianne in New Jersey. She said she was Jonathan's cousin. She said her mother and Jonathan's father were brother and sister. Dianne said that Jonathan had even ripped off his own family members.
I called Dianne back and told her who I was. She said Jonathan was persona non grata at their homes. Dianne said that the woman I had met in Manhattan, Rene, was the first cousin of her grandmother, whom they affectionately called Booba. Booba was her mother, Pauline's, and Jonathan's father Cyril's, mother. She said that Rene had been a well-known opera singer in Italy and in New York.
Dianne told me that Jonathan's mother was divorced from his father, Cyril Kern, former chairman of Reldan, a successful fashion company in England. Cyril Kern now lived in South Africa and was a close personal friend of Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. I knew Jonathan had come from money because he played the part of a millionaire so well.
Another tip was from a caller who saw an article about Kern in a newspaper in Tel Aviv, the Yediot Achranot, the article was dated June 14, 1996. Kern had been arrested and in police custody for taking money from a woman.
I was contacted by one of Kern's victims who told me she had been in touch with a woman in Israel who had seen my story there on a rerun of the TV news show, Hard Copy. The woman in Israel had information that when Kern appeared before a judge on similar charges to mine, the judge told Kern he would be released if he promised to leave Israel and never come back.
Two years later the company I worked for transferred me to Germany. Shortly after I moved there I learned that Jonathan had been arrested and was scheduled to appear in court in Paris. I dashed to Paris, France to speak. Through a translator I told the court how he had conned me and there were three felony warrants for his arrest in the U.S. I had completely blown his defense that he had mended his ways. He lost his appeal and was swearing loudly at me as he was led out of court in handcuffs. I felt drained and exhilarated at the same time.
I've recently published a book on my experience: I Fell in Love with a Con Man. My book chronicles my harrowing, though fascinating ordeal. It begins when I meet Kern on a business trip in South Beach, Florida and climaxes when I surprise and enrage Kern by testifying against him at his court appeal in Paris, France. Since the web page for my book has gone online, I've received emails from people around the world who inform me of Kern's whereabouts and activities. One email to me from a reporter in South Africa led to an article in The Sunday Times. The article quoted Cyril Kern as saying "My son and I are estranged and have not spoken to each other for many years. When someone is 48 years old, there is very little one can do to control them."
Emails from people in London inform me Kern is heavily into drugs and has a reputation for not paying for escort services he uses. I've also received emails that Kern is presently running an import business, Dream Designs of London, LTD, The Coach House, High Street, Elstree, WD6 3EZ, London, England, Phone: 44(0) 20 8953 0242, www.DreamDesignsLondon.com
So while I'd like nothing better to forget this entire incident, my conscience won't allow me. I feel it is my responsibility to do everything in my power to let other people know about Kern, and hopefully prevent him from conning other women.
Beth's book, I Fell in Love with a Con Man, is available from Amazon for $13.95.
[Editor's update: On December 12, Omri Sharon requested a delay in his sentencing for involvement in illegal campaign financing, reportedly so that he can run his father's election campaign. Although he is no doubt busy, maybe he can get in touch with Jonathan and pick up some tips on romance and race car driving so that he can better capture the hearts and minds of the Israeli electorate.]
|
|
 
|
|
|
|
Click on the blue headline to read a Talkback comment and respond to it. Click on the  icon to send a private email to the talkback writer. The icon appears only if the writer has decided to be contacted. If no popup window appears, please make sure your popup blocker allows israelinsider.com.
|
|
| |
|
|
