AIG's Joseph Cassano In Westport, CT: BACK On U.S. Soil

The former AIG exec dubbed "The Man Who Crashed The World" by Vanity Fair is back in the U.S.

Reuters broke the news that Joseph Cassano, the former head of AIG's infamous financial products unit, has returned to the United States. (Check out Cassano in our "Where Are They Now?" retrospective on "Financial Crisis Financiers".)

Since his return, Cassano has apparently been laying low in a home described as "modest." Reuters reporters snooped around Cassano's Westport, Connecticut home but found no sign of him with either the editor of the local paper or with a worker at the local golf course.

Did Cassano return to Connecticut because of pressure from his mounting legal troubles? The Wall Street Journal reported recently that Cassano and other AIG execs could face a grand jury in Brooklyn. The NY Post also reported that Cassano will almost certainly be deposed in the coming weeks.

Here's Reuters on Cassano's stateside return:

"On recent visits to Cassano's house, which is about an hour's drive from AIG's Manhattan HQ, there was little sign that it is the residence of a man who received hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation from the company over the 21 years he was there.

The home, which the bespectacled Cassano bought in 1993 for about $750,000, according to real estate records, is most notable for how modest it is compared with some of the far grander houses nearby. The records show it only has two bedrooms, although it does have four bathrooms, an in-ground pool, a bathhouse and two fireplaces.

Instead of the flashy BMWs that dot the driveways in the town, which is part of an area known as the "Gold Coast" because of the area's prosperity and concentration of hedge funds, the couple still make do with the his-and-her Jeep Cherokees they bought 12 years ago and which are parked out front."

WestportNow, which bragged that it respected Cassano's privacy and that "it did not report of [Cassano's return," still took the opportunity to dish this tidbit on its website:

"[Reuters], in a lengthy report on Cassano's move, did not say when the son of a Brooklyn, N.Y. police officer returned to Westport, where he has been a registered voter since 1995. But neighbors told WestportNow late last month they noticed his return when they saw a moving van outside his home."

According to a FundRace search at the address listed in Reuters' piece, Cassano and his wife, Ellen Hooker, each donated $2,300 to President Obama's 2008 election campaign.

Read Reuters' full story on Cassano's return.

Or check out "Where Are They Now? Financial Crisis Financiers".

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Comments

[vascopyjama]

11:30 PM on 10/01/2009

Why was this man not arrested at the border crossing?

[FreedomCorpse]

06:29 PM on 09/30/2009

They forgot the part after "returned to the US" saying 'after safely storing his ill-gotten gains in various accounts and investment switcheroo thingies at banks and institutions outside the US'

[KriTiKiT]

11:24 AM on 09/30/2009

deport financier thieves, send them to those islands where they hide their money they STOLE

[thePOlitkalkos]

09:46 AM on 09/30/2009

Where is the change, Obama? Where is the REFORM?

Job loss equates to home loss No jobs, no recovery. Why so many people out of work even with the stimulus spending? Why are more jobs still being shipped overseas? There is no such thing as a jobless recovery; that is n3ocon jargon.

good articles... http://www.iamned.com

meanwhile, the stock market is surging and everyone is too busy to counting their money to show any initiative.

[Peter Noble 2]

01:45 AM on 10/02/2009

Well put.

[ISO9001]

06:25 AM on 09/30/2009

I can make weapons out of just about anything.

[KriTiKiT]

11:30 AM on 09/30/2009

and my long native american arms make it easy for me to disarm anyone

[bobsee]

06:03 AM on 09/30/2009

AIG should never have been bailed out. It was the Fed who pushed hard for their bailout because most of the money was owed to the same Fed bankers for the credit default swaps. They new all along that they could not cover them but also knew that they would be bailed out. This is plain robbery by the Fed.

[truthmatterstoo]

01:35 AM on 09/30/2009

the only place suitable for him is a family plot

[Nicholas Roy]

01:18 AM on 09/30/2009

Lynch this punk!

[janeycat]

01:05 AM on 09/30/2009

my cardboard box address is
Janeycat
1008 Car Horn Ln # 57
Under the Bridge,USA
13779

[Exfl]

11:02 PM on 09/29/2009

I wonder how many homeless people could be housed if America's wealthy made available their second, third, fourth....n homes and vacation retreats. As I recall, John McCain has seven - or was it 12. Maybe he could loan one to the Arizona family.

[kgb999]

01:00 AM on 09/30/2009

Or sell one and pay off 9 or 10 average mortgages that are underwater.

[calgary]

01:15 PM on 10/01/2009

There was a saying in China many years ago " if you work, you make $36, if you don't work, you make $36". China tried the system that everybody is paid the same and the net effect is that everybody is poor but equal.

[chayefsky]

11:00 PM on 09/29/2009

Let's see....Westport, CT. An affluent community. I wonder what a "modest home" goes for there. Would it be under one million dollars?

[kgb999]

01:01 AM on 09/30/2009

The article said $750,000.

[BigPictureReg]

12:28 AM on 10/02/2009

That $750,000 purchase was 13 years ago.

[BigPictureReg]

12:29 AM on 10/02/2009

16 years ago, not 13.

[justfine]

10:55 PM on 09/29/2009

I'm hardly a fan of Cassano or anybody else connected with AIG (or most any hedgie or IB for that matter), but this article is way off base re. his home. I've lived in Westport 30 years and began visiting here over 40 years ago.

The house is on a beautiful private road, not a gated community, but a truly lovely road, albeit one with mixed homes and residents. If he paid that amount in '95, it's probably worth 2.5mm or so today. Not a big deal here.

The Gold Coast here refers to a completely different area on the Long Island Sound (although Minuteman Hill is a 2 minute walk from the beach). I think the article erroneously refers to the entire coastal area including Greenwich, CT which is home to many, many hedge funds as well as their owners/partners. Greenwich is a far cry from Westport, in proximity to NYC as well real estate values and social standing. Westport is relativity hip, Greenwich is not, at all.

Regardless, Cassano is the worst kind of trash.

[Tiggy]

10:54 PM on 09/29/2009

Seeing that he lives such a "modest" life, he should have plenty of the money left for the taking! Serve up some justice, put him in jail and take all of his money...better yet, put him on the street with a card board box amongst those who reside there courtesy of him.

[janeycat]

12:53 AM on 09/30/2009

dont forget to check his mattresses for cash

[truthmatterstoo]

01:36 AM on 09/30/2009

what just 100 million hidden in paper bags? This man should never be able to walks the streets in America

[deepfreezevideo]

10:48 PM on 09/29/2009

Not under arrest yet?
Property not seized under asset forfeiture laws yet due to it being acquired during the commission of a crime?
America, do you need any more proof that the rule of law has failed?
Do you need any more proof that there is no such thing as a government anymore?
You may be asking yourself, "how can there be no more government when there are all these government agencies, law enforcement, etc?"
I didn't say that the structures no longer existed, I am saying that they are no longer a government.
We don't have a government, we have OWNERS and MASTERS, and Cassano is clearly one of The Master's pets, and The Master's Pet NEVER gets punished.
Only us yard dogs do. Get used to it, dawg.

[Solex]

07:05 AM on 09/30/2009

Especially one yard dog named Polanski. What he did was wrong-sick, but why him now and not Cassano?

[rasharp]

09:47 PM on 09/29/2009

THERE IS A FAMILY in Arizona that needs a place to share, he could fly them over.