Page 32 - 201212 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - December 2012

Psychic accused in $25 million fraud Psychic accused in $25 million fraud says she is portrayed 'as some kind of monster' Rose Marks says clients, including novelist Jude Deveraux, were friends who valued her advice South Florida Sun Sentinel It started with a simple psychic reading for a famous author, then spiraled into a $25 million fraud operated by a South Florida family of fortune tellers for more than 20 years, federal prosecutors say. Rose Marks and eight members of her family are accused of preying on vulnerable and gullible clients who walked into their storefront psychic businesses in upmarket neighborhoods in Fort Lauderdale and New York City. In her first public comments about the federal charges, Marks, 61, told the Sun Gypsy group in the U.S., and the women are Marks and investigators. Sentinel she did nothing wrong. traditionally fortune tellers, experts say. Marks said her relationship with "I'm innocent," Marks said. "I gave my Fortune telling is legal but prosecutors Deveraux developed as a fuzzy blend of life to these people — we're talking about say the Marks committed fraud by refusing to customer-turned-employer and friend. clients of 20 years, 30 years, 40 years. We're not return clients' money and valuables, as Within months, Deveraux "wanted me talking about someone I just met and took all promised. to exclusively be her assistant, her consultant, their money and ran off." The family's lawyers, led by Fred her muse," Marks said. Offering a rare glimpse inside the secret Schwartz, want the charges dismissed, alleging "We came to an understanding that if I'm world of so-called Gypsy fortune tellers, Marks serious misconduct by the government. supposed to shut down my business and just said she used her psychic abilities, Romani Prosecutors have not responded to the work with her exclusively, then it would be, you beliefs and common sense to help customers she allegations but have dropped more than half of know, expensive. She would have to pay me for thought were her friends. the initial 61 charges and cut $15 million from 24 hours a day at her beck and call." Prosecutors have laid out their the alleged loss after one judge called the Marks claimed when Deveraux asked allegations in a 28-count indictment accusing investigation "slipshod." her fee, she jokingly suggested $1 million per the family of operating a money-laundering, Marks' family emigrated from Greece in year and Deveraux agreed. mail and wire-fraud conspiracy that fleeced the late 1800s or early 1900s. They adhered to In her defense against the charges, clients from around the world — including best- Romani culture and beliefs, such as paying Marks maintains that she worked seven days a selling romance novelist Jude Deveraux. dowries and having arranged marriages, but week for years as a personal assistant and life "[Investigators] turned them around and also tried to assimilate into American life. Their coach for Deveraux and helped her research twisted their minds and portrayed me as some ancestors traveled in horsedrawn caravans a seven novels that deal with supernatural themes. kind of monster," Marks said of her former hundred years ago, but Marks grew up in a "I was her inspiration and gave her clients in an interview in late December. loving home near Newark, N.J. insight on Romani mysticism and beliefs in the Marks was the family matriarch and Her father, Steve "Boyo" Eli, was a afterlife and religion and the psychic world and ringleader of a conspiracy that included her well-to-do landowner and respected Romani the spiritual world." daughter, two sons and their spouses, judge who mediated disputes within the Gypsy Deveraux, who lives in South Florida, granddaughter and sister, prosecutors say. community over land, inheritances, divorces has written more than 60 books since the 1970s, All but one family member deny the and dowries, Marks said. Her mother was a more than half of which made the New York allegations and the main defendants are psychic. Times bestsellers list. She did not respond to scheduled for trial in April. One son, Michael Rose Marks attended public school but requests for comment. She previously told the Marks, pleaded guilty to mail and wire-fraud followed the Romani tradition of dropping out Sun Sentinel that prosecutors warned her not to conspiracy last month.The women used in third grade. She said she entered an arranged, discuss the case publicly before she testifies at assumed names and several called themselves and very happy, marriage at 16 or 17, and lived trial. Joyce Michael at their stores near The Galleria in Virginia until she moved to Broward County Prosecutors say Deveraux lost $17 mall and the 17th Street Causeway in Fort in 1998. million because of her connection with Marks, Lauderdale. She and her late husband also opened a though they haven't said how much went In Marks' family, the paranormal was Manhattan store — on West 58th Street near directly to her. That figure includes money the norm, she said. She insists she has psychic Central Park and across the street from the Deveraux paid her ex-husband in an expensive abilities — "a gift from God" inherited by the famous Plaza Hotel — with signs touting divorce settlement that investigators said Marks women of her family for hundreds of years. astrology, the "laws of attraction" and advised her to sign. Marks calls it intuition or insight and clairvoyant services. The spell was broken in early 2008, explains it as the power to use parts of the brain It was there Marks met multimillionaire authorities said, when two Fort Lauderdale most people can't reach. Her first psychic vision author Deveraux, who walked into the store in detectives knocked on Deveraux's hotel room was at age 9, she said, when she accurately January 1991 and had a psychic reading. door in Boca Raton and told her she was the predicted her grandmother's sudden death. "It Deveraux, now 65, began seeing Marks five or victim of a fraud. Deveraux told the Sun was scary," she said. six times a week for hours at a time, Marks said. Sentinel in 2011 that she was "days away from Her grandmother had herself predicted Deveraux was breaking up with her husband suicide" at the time. Marks' father would die at age 72 — and he did. and sought guidance about that and her The family are Vlax Roma, the biggest romantic interest in another man, according to (Continued on Page 37)