IF YOU’RE LOOKING for a place where misadventure could begin, you can’t go past Mbargo. The nightclub’s streetfront is painted a purple so bright you’ll see it in your dreams. Strings of giant sequins shimmer in the breeze. Its phonically inventive name is spelt in silver letters that climb its three-storey terrace facade. Inside are strips of burning neon, a few booths, floorboards so marinated in drink that they have an ingredients list. Bristol is a student city on England’s south coast crowded with music and nightlife and street art. This is Banksy’s home town, and the tourism board suggests in rather strong terms that ‘you would be a fool not to see his amazing work firsthand’. The same organisation describes Mbargo as ‘intimate’, which is fair for a place where you can catch an STI standing up. Students cram into its modest dimensions while people with names like DJ Klaud battle for billing with £1.50 drink deals over seven sloppy nights a week. To get a sense of the story about to come, consider that it’s the kind of place open until two o’clock on a Monday morning, and that at two o’clock on a Monday morning, Ben Stokes still thought it had closed too early.
The Ashes of 2017–18 had disciplinary bookends. It was after that series that Australia’s two leaders went off the rails in South Africa. It was a few weeks before that Ashes tour that England’s biggest star windmilled his way into his own disaster.
In the early hours of 25 September 2017, Stokes and teammate Alex Hales were barred from re-entering Mbargo after a night out on the piss. A Sunday thrashing of an abject West Indies in an ignored series at the fag-end of the season apparently required ample celebration. After arguing with the bouncer and hanging about at the door for a while, they wandered off to find a casino in the hope of more drinking. They’d barely made it around the corner before getting in the middle of a conflict between four locals. As is said on the internet, it escalated quickly.
The 26 September reporting was bloodless. Withholding names, police stated that a man ‘was arrested on suspicion of causing actual bodily harm’ while another went to hospital with facial injuries. England’s director of cricket Andrew Strauss separately confirmed that Stokes was the arrestee, adding that he had been released without charge and that Hales had gamely offered to ‘help police with their enquiries’. Administrators had a good chance of hiding behind that investigation, and the next day Stokes was named in the upcoming Ashes squad as expected. But that night the video emerged.
Bristol student Max Wilson had shot it on his phone, then offered it to The Sun. What he thought was playing hardball was actually lowball: his opening price of £3000 was snapped up by a tabloid that would have paid ten times that. The Sun went on to make a mint by syndicating the rights worldwide. From a window above the fray, the vision showed six men on the street below performing the muddled choreography of a melee. One was right at the centre of it. One was waving a bottle, one dipped in and out, one tried to calm it. Two others floated around the edges. The central figure was unmistakable: red hair burning even in the streetlight as he launched into a series of blows against two of the men, falling to grapple with them on the ground, then following both across the street, swinging punches the whole way. Hales trailed behind, repeatedly and impotently shouting ‘Stokes! Stop! Stokes! Enough!’ The ECB could fudge issues that existed only in thickets of legalese, but not those captured in moving colour. Stokes was stood down from the next West Indies match, then suspended indefinitely. It emerged that he had broken his hand during the fight, something he’d done twice before while punching objects in dressing rooms.
The response in Australia was fierce: Stokes was a thug, a lowlife, a selection that would disgrace England. It was not entirely coincidental that a ban for England’s best player would be handy for the Aussie team, but there was also a cultural split. In England, plenty of people still minimise pub fights as lads letting off steam. In Australia, heavy media coverage as a succession of young men were killed had inverted that tolerance. The discourse now saw any punch as potentially deadly and accordingly reckless. This was more poignant in a cricket context given that David Hookes, the dashing Test batsman and state coach, was killed in 2004 by a pub bouncer’s fist.
The PR situation was bad for Stokes as details emerged of the injuries to the men he’d hit, and that one was a young war veteran and father. Stokes wasn’t officially removed from the Ashes squad through October but stayed behind when his teammates left, hoping for police to dismiss the matter in time for a late dash to Australia. His annual contract was renewed on the due date in case that came to pass. Then 29 October brought a twist in the tale.
‘Ben Stokes praised by gay couple after defending them from homophobic thugs,’ ran the headline. Kai Barry and Billy O’Connell had emerged. Not entirely out of nowhere: while Stokes had made no public comment, this story in his defence had initially been leaked to TV host Piers Morgan after the fight, as soon as the video appeared. Police body-camera footage played in court would later show that Stokes had given the same story to the arresting officer on the night. But no-one knew the identities of the fifth and sixth men in the video, and police appeals had turned up nothing.
It was The Sun again with the breakthrough. Kai and Billy were perfect for a readership not keen on nuance. ‘We couldn’t believe it when we found out they were famous cricketers. I just thought Ben and Alex were quite hot, fit guys,’ said Kai, who was memorably described as a ‘former House of Fraser sales assistant’. The paper had the pair do a full photo shoot: layering the fake tan, showing off chest waxes, mixing Ralph Lauren and Louis Vuitton into a range of outfits. Their best shot had them standing back to back, heads turned to the camera, in a mirror-image Zoolander moment.
Suddenly The Sun was the England team’s best friend. ‘Their claims could lead to the all-rounder being cleared over the punch-up and freed to play in the First Test in Australia next month,’ it gushed, then gave a tasting platter of quotes: ‘We were so grateful to Ben for stepping in to help. He was a real hero.’ ‘If Ben hadn’t intervened it could have been a lot worse for us.’ ‘We could’ve been in real trouble. Ben was a real gentleman.’ Would it be known forever as Kai and Billy’s Ashes? No. While the Bristol boys provided spin for Stokes’ reputation they didn’t influence the police. With charges still pending there was little choice – not given Strauss had previously sacked Kevin Pietersen for being annoying. Stokes remained suspended through the Ashes and a one-day series in Australia, and lost the vice-captaincy. It was January 2018 before the Crown Prosecution Service laid a charge.
That charge surprisingly came in as affray, a crime that can carry prison time but is classified as ‘a breach of the peace as a result of disorderly conduct’. The men he had punched, Ryan Ali and Ryan Hale, faced the same count, charged as equal participants in a fight rather than Stokes being charged with assaulting them. Alex Hales was not charged, despite being seen in the video to aim several kicks when Ryan Ali was lying on the ground. Given the underwhelming standing of the offence, Stokes was cleared by the ECB to tour New Zealand, and kept playing until his trial in August 2018, which he missed a Test to attend. None of the three defendants would be convicted.
The reasoning behind the charges was never released and was attributed vaguely to ‘CPS lawyers’. The service gave the case to Alison Morgan, a prosecutor of a class known as Treasury Counsel who usually handle serious criminal matters. Morgan had a scheduling clash and never ended up court for the case, but in 2018 and 2019 she would go on to win damages and admissions of libel from The Daily Mail, The Times and The Daily Telegraph variously for incorrectly reporting that she had been responsible for the inadequate and inconsistent charging decisions.
Morgan’s successor on the case was Nicholas Corsellis QC, who on the first day of trial was permitted by the CPS to request two assault charges be added against Stokes. ‘Upon further review,’ claimed a CPS statement, ‘we considered that additional assault charges would also be appropriate.’ This was patent nonsense from the service that eight months earlier had chosen the lesser charge. Any lawyer knows that no judge will allow new charges once a trial has begun, because the defence hasn’t had time to prepare. But such a request could deflect criticism of the prosecution service by technically making the judge the one who disallows the charge.
Working through the story from the trial and the tape is complicated. You had a Ryan and a Ryan, a Hale and a Hales, a Billy and a Barry and a Ben. You had several versions of events as to who knew whom, who was drinking with whom, who had insulted whom and who had merely engaged in ‘banter’, a word that in modern Britain has to do an unconscionable amount of lifting. The reporting had constantly mixed up the Ryans as to who had which injury, who was in hospital, who had played which part in the fight, and whose mum had which stern words to say about it.
Let’s agree that from now Ryan Ali is Ryan One, the firefighter who ended up with a fractured eye socket and a cracked tooth. Ryan Two can be Ryan Hale, the soldier who scored concussion and facial lacerations. Mr Barry and Mr O’Connell are best known per The Sun as Kai and Billy. In scorecard parlance we’ll leave the cricketers as Stokes and Hales.
Amid the confusion, Stokes and his lawyers built his case in a straightforward way. The UK legal definition of affray is ‘if a person threatens or uses unlawful violence or force towards another person, which causes another person of reasonable firmness present at the scene to fear for their safety’. That means it doesn’t account for violence that harms a target, but violence that might frighten a theoretical bystander. The wiggle room for Stokes was with ‘unlawful’, because the charge excuses violence in defending oneself or others.
This interpretation hinged on the beginning of the video, where Ryan One waves a beer bottle about and takes a swing at Kai. The version from Stokes was that he was minding his own business walking down the street when he heard homophobic abuse. He intervened verbally and was threatened verbally by Ryan One – something that Ryan One denied but that couldn’t be proved or disproved. In fear for his safety Stokes had to nullify that threat by bashing Ryan One before it went the other way. He registered Ryan Two in his peripheral vision as another possible threat, and again had only one recourse.
Stokes also had to convince the jury to disregard testimony from Mbargo’s bouncer that he had been looking for a fight. A solid lump of a man, Andrew Cunningham had not enjoyed his patron’s attempts to get back into the club after the bouncer declined an offer of a bribe. ‘He got a bit verbally abusive towards myself. He mentioned my gold teeth and he said I looked like a cunt and I replied, “Thank you very much.” He just looked at me and told me my tattoos were shit and to look at my job.’ Cunningham described these words as coming in ‘a spiteful tone, quite an angry tone’, and said that Stokes still seemed angry as he walked away.
These were details the doorman had nothing to gain by inventing, but each of them Stokes denied. By his own accounting he had drunk a beer at the game and three pints at his hotel, then ‘potentially had some Jägerbombs’ along with half a dozen vodkas at the club. He insisted that after all of this he was not drunk.
If I may take a moment here to call upon the wisdom of experience – a person who cannot definitively say whether they have had any Jägerbombs has definitely had some Jägerbombs. A Jägerbomb is an experience that does not pass one by. Further to that, a person who says they have ‘potentially’ done something has definitely done that thing and doesn’t want to admit it. A person who has had between 15 and 24 standard drinks in one evening is shitfaced. A person who tries to bribe a bouncer £300 – three hundred quid! – to get into Mbargo – Mbargo! – is beyond shitfaced.
If Stokes admitted that he was drunk then the prosecution could say he was out of control. He claimed clear recall of assessing a threat, feeling fear and deciding to protect himself with force. He confidently denied details from the bouncer’s testimony, like using the word ‘cunt’ or mentioning gold teeth. Yet on other details he claimed a ‘significant memory blackout’. He didn’t remember the punch that saw Ryan One taken away by ambulance. He didn’t remember what the Ryans had said to Kai and Billy, only that those words were homophobic. With no head injury, as one of the few people who hadn’t been hit, he had supposedly suffered this memory loss despite being sober.
The version from Kai and Billy was compatible but vague: they had been walking along, they ‘heard … shouts’ of abuse from an unspecified source, then Stokes ‘stepped in’ and thus they avoided possible harm. They claimed to have been bought a drink by Stokes at Mbargo, although CCTV showed them meeting outside. The overall implication from both accounts was that the cricketers had been pals with Kai and Billy, while the Ryans as per The Sun’s headline were a roving band of thugs.
The reality though is that the Ryans were the ones hanging out with Kai and Billy at Mbargo. Police discussed CCTV from inside the club in questioning and at trial. On that footage the four Bristolians bought drinks for one another, danced together, and Kai was noted to have variously touched Ryan Two’s crotch and Ryan One’s buttock. Ryan One told police that all of this was taken lightheartedly and wasn’t a problem. Indeed, when the Ryans called it a night the other two left with them.
This much is clear from footage out the front of Mbargo, which shows Kai and Billy exit the club and start talking with a subdued Hales and a demonstrative Stokes, who are stuck outside. The vision was played in court to determine whether Stokes was antagonistic towards Kai and Billy, as he appears to impersonate them and to throw a lit cigarette their way. More interesting is that after a few minutes the Ryans emerge, and all six actors in the fight video briefly form a prequel in the one frame.
Ryan Two pats Billy on the chest in friendly fashion with his right hand before clapping him on the back with his left. He moves past and does the same to Kai before leaving the shot. Ryan One stops to speak to Kai. They lean in for a moment, talking, then Kai turns and they walk out of frame together. Billy hangs around for a few seconds at the door and then looks after them and races to catch up. Stokes and Hales remain outside the club to remonstrate further with the bouncers. Whatever discord develops around the corner is between four men who left amicably together minutes earlier.
There’s no way to know what caused that friction. If Ryan One did use homophobic slurs, he might have been drunkenly obnoxious for no reason. He might have had an insecure macho response to some extra flirtation. He might have thought unkindness was funny – ‘banter’ once again. Or he might have said something that was misunderstood, as both Ryans insisted in court that they had not used nor had the impulse to use any abusive language.
What clearly didn’t happen was an attack by bigots on random passers-by. This kind of crime is regular enough that an audience understands the horror of it, and this is what was evoked by the public accounts of Stokes, Billy and Kai. All we know is that there was some verbal dispute among the Bristol locals, and that Stokes came along behind them and put himself in the middle of it. Ryan One responded to the interference aggressively and away they went. There are plenty of reasons to look sideways at the idea that Stokes was a saviour. Foremost, neither Kai nor Billy was called upon as witnesses in court. You’d think it would be ideal to have Stokes’ story backed up by those who benefited from his selflessness. But his defence team had developed the impression that the pair had shown a changeable recall of events amid a hard-partying lifestyle, and would be dismantled by the prosecution on the stand.
That raises the question of whether The Sun coached their quotes for the 2017 interview. Despite missing court, Kai and Billy clearly enjoyed the attention. In 2018 after the trial they did a follow-up spread in the same paper about how poor Ben had been mistreated. They got a television spot on Good Morning Britain and glowed about his heroism. In 2019 The Sun wheeled them out once more to say that Stokes should get a knighthood. In 2017 they had ‘never watched cricket’ but by 2019 were supposedly volunteering sentences like, ‘He saved us, now he’s saved the Ashes.’ Whether they were paid for these appearances is not known, but the chance to be famous for a day can be lure enough.
If you find this cynical, consider that on the night in question, the Bristol boys were so deeply moved and thankful for Ben’s intervention that they left him to be arrested and never attempted to find out who he was. Seconds after the video ended, an off-duty policeman reached the scene. You might think that someone grateful to a saviour would speak on his behalf. Instead, said Kai, ‘it all got a bit scary so we walked off. It was too much for me and we went to Quigley’s takeaway for chicken burgers and cheesy chips.’ They didn’t give their hero a thought for over a month while police issued multiple appeals for witnesses.
As for Stokes, he told his arresting officer that ‘his friends’ had been attacked. After three minutes of chat outside a nightclub, these friends were so dear to him that he has never contacted them again: not after the newspaper piece, not after the verdict. He didn’t want to see how they were or thank them for their support. He didn’t mention them by name in his solicitor’s statement after the trial.
The Stokes defence rested on Ryan One’s bottle, which he had carried out of Mbargo to finish a beer, not to use in a Sharks versus Jets amateur production. But once he turned it over to hold it by the neck it became a weapon. Intent and interpretation can change the material nature of things. Part of Stokes’ justification in court was that the bottle implied that the two Ryans might have ‘other weapons’ hidden away. You can understand how a jury could decide that created doubt.
Not being convicted, though, doesn’t give the contents of the video a big green tick. It does not, as his lawyer claimed, vindicate Stokes. Looking in detail, Ryan One is belligerent but his movements telegraph a bluff. Hales is the person he’s gesturing at, but they’re several metres apart when Ryan One cocks his arm ostentatiously, showing off the bottle rather than bracing to swing. He skips forward but Hales skips back and Ryan One doesn’t follow. Kai stretches out an arm to impede Ryan One, who has a drunken stumble, nearly eats pavement, then staggers towards Kai and hits him in the back. That hand is still holding the bottle, but his strike is a side-arm cuff on a soft part of the body. It’s all pretty tame.
This is where Stokes gets involved. Having moved across to protect Hales, he now takes three large steps to run around Kai and booms his first punch at Ryan One. They fall to the ground and the bottle clinks away. Stokes gets to his feet to punch down at the fallen man, while Hales arrives to kick him ineffectively then runs off across the street for some unknown reason. Ice-cream van? Stokes is soon back in the grapple having his shirt pulled up to show off his Durham tan. Ryan Two steps in for the first time to pull Stokes away, prompting a couple more random punches at this new target, then Stokes trips backwards over Ryan One and sprawls in the street. Hales chooses this moment to return and aim some solid kicks at the head of the man on the ground. Nothing so far is a triumph of moral philosophy or the pugilistic arts. But if it all stopped here, perhaps you could say it was somewhere approaching fair. Ryan One has behaved like a turnip and it’s not an entirely unjust world that would give him a whack across the chops. The antagonists have disentangled, Stokes has some distance, it’s time to dust off and go home. Ryan Two steps forward for this purpose with his palm raised in conciliatory style and says, ‘Settle down, stop.’
So Stokes punches him.
It’s roughly his fifth punch overall, and he really winds up into this one. He misses so hard that he stumbles away into the shadows of the shop awnings along the road.
Hales starts shouting for him to stop. Ryan Two backs into the street, still holding his palm up. Stokes closes on him from about five metres away, six large steps, to where Ryan Two is standing on his own. Stokes pushes him a couple of times, as Ryan Two keeps trying to placate him and saying ‘Stop.’ Stokes throws his sixth punch, largely missing as his target ducks.
Ryan Two keeps pulling away and reversing, into the middle of the street now. Stokes follows him, grabbing his sleeve to drag him back. By this point Ryan One has found his feet and walked around behind his friend. Both of them are in the same line of sight for Stokes, and both are backing away. Stokes aims his seventh and his eighth punches, which Ryan Two tries to deflect, as Hales walks up behind Stokes to grab him.
Stokes yanks away from his friend and switches to Ryan One instead, taking seven paces to grab him before throwing his ninth punch of the night. He grabs again; Ryan One blocks that arm and pushes himself back away from Stokes. Ryan Two again intercedes, putting himself between the two with his palms up and his arm extended.
Stokes throws his tenth punch, a right-hander at the face of Ryan Two, then shoves him backwards. Ryan Two backs away once more, four paces. Stokes follows, steadies, lines up, then launches his strongest punch yet, his eleventh, a proper right hook from a solid base, one that cracks across the man’s head and gives him concussion. Ryan Two ends up flat on his back in the middle of the street, his hands still outstretched for a moment in useless protest until they twitch and drop to the blacktop.
Stokes isn’t done. He once more shoves away the restraining Hales and follows Ryan One, who keeps backing away saying, ‘Alright, alright, alright.’ Five more paces from Stokes before another blow at the man’s head. Kai and Billy are now standing over the poleaxed Ryan Two. The video ends, but seconds later Stokes will punch Ryan One hard enough to knock him out too, before off-duty cop Andrew Spure arrives on the scene to bring down the curtain. When the body-camera footage kicks in some minutes later, Stokes is in handcuffs but Ryan One is still laid out in the street. Ryan Two has regained consciousness, folded his shirt under his friend’s head and is asking police for an ambulance.
‘At this point, I felt vulnerable and frightened. I was concerned for myself and others.’ This was how Stokes described that sequence to the court. An elite athlete with years of gym work and training to snap a bat through the line of a ball with astounding power and precision, swinging fists as hard as he can at men with none of those advantages. Punching so hard that he breaks his hand, and repeatedly shoving away a friend so he can punch some more. Frightened and threatened by two targets shouting ‘Get back!’ and ‘Stop!’
The off-duty officer testified that Stokes ‘seemed to be the main aggressor or was progressing forward trying to get to’ Ryan One, who was ‘trying to back away or get away from the situation’. The student who filmed the video can be heard on the tape at one stage exclaiming ‘Fuck!’ and testified that it was because ‘I felt a little bit sorry about the lad that had been punched and it looked like he had his hands up’. That tallied with the prosecutor’s depiction of ‘a sustained episode of significant violence that left onlookers shocked at what was taking place’.
The defendant stuck to his strategy. ‘No, my sole focus was to protect myself.’ All up, in the 33 seconds of footage after he falls over, Stokes takes 35 steps forward to keep hitting two men who keep trying to get away. Not once is he hit back.
After the verdict, Stokes’ solicitor positioned him as the victim. It had been ‘an eleven-month ordeal for Ben … The jury’s decision fairly reflects the truth of what happened that night … He was minding his own business … It was only when others came under threat that Ben became physically engaged. The steps that he took were solely aimed at ensuring the safety of himself and the others present …’ The statement was impossibly self-righteous and self-absorbed.
If there was anyone to feel sorry for it was Ryan Hale, the second of our two Ryans. He’s the one who emerged from the club with a friendly arm around the shoulder for Kai and Billy. He’s the one who interposed himself to end the fight, then kept putting himself back in the firing line, trying to calm an intimidating stranger while dodging blows. For his show of restraint he got laid out regardless, concussed in the street, then was issued a criminal charge equal to that of the man who hit him, and described in national media as a violent bigot in an untested story to support that man’s defence.
Lawyers for Ryan Two made a more convincing post-trial statement, noting that Kai and Billy, ‘neither of whom were relied upon by the prosecution or the defence team for Mr Stokes, have taken the opportunity to speak with various media outlets about the alleged homophobic abuse that they received in the early hours of September 25. Mr Hale has passionately denied this allegation throughout the course of this case,’ it continued.
‘It is upsetting to Mr Hale that although he was acquitted, the accusation that he was the author of such abuse remains. Both Mr Hale and Mr Ali were knocked unconscious by Mr Stokes, and although Mr Stokes has been acquitted of an affray, Mr Hale struggles with the reasons why the Crown Prosecution Service did not treat him as a victim of an unlawful assault.’Good question. Avon and Somerset police were the investigating force, and they were frustrated by the decision. Ryan Two was filmed clearly not hurting anyone, but police were instructed by the CPS to proceed with a charge. Hales (the cricketer) was filmed fighting but ‘a decision was made at a senior level of the CPS’ not to proceed. Police expected Stokes to be charged with assault but the CPS declined. It doesn’t take a wild cynic to think that placing the same lukewarm charge on three men for vastly divergent behaviour might ensure that none would be convicted, even as the trial would maintain the pretence that a defendant of influential standing had not been given a free pass.
A couple of years down the line, the original interview with Kai and Billy has disappeared. All traces have been scrubbed from The Sun website, its social media history, and even from the Wayback Machine internet archive. Given its headline of ‘homophobic thugs’ and text that names Ryan Two but not Ryan One, the libel liability isn’t hard to spot. Later interviews with Kai and Billy take the passive voice – they ‘suffered homophobic slurs outside a Bristol nightclub’.
The article that was once claimed to exonerate brave Ben Stokes now links only to a missing content page, with a picture of a dropped ice-cream cone and the phrase ‘legal removal’ inserted into the web URL. In terms of consequences, Stokes missed one tour. When he resumed his career in January 2018, the Australians hadn’t yet ruined theirs. Their year-long bans looked much more stringent. But the Stokes case dragged on in other ways. With no criminal liability, the Australians confessed promptly enough for the sporting world to give them the full length of the lash. Their situation was ugly but there was closure. Stokes got stuck in legal stasis, unable to be fully backed or condemned. Instead his issue was always present, a browser full of open tabs that the ECB swore they would read any day now.
Through 2018 Stokes was back but he wasn’t back, in the sunglasses and finger-guns sense. In his return one-day series he nearly cost England a match with 39 from 73 balls in Wellington. His first Test hit was a duck as England got rolled in Auckland for 58. At Trent Bridge while Stokes was injured, England posted a world record 481 against Australia. With Stokes three weeks later at the same ground they made 268. He crawled to 50 from 103, the second-slowest any Englishman had reached that milestone in 20 years. That span covered Alastair Cook’s whole career. It was apologetic batting, acting out responsibility via the scorecard. Stokes was creeping back into the team like he’d been kicked out in a blazing row and was hoping to tip-toe to the sofa.
It was December 2018 before the ECB disciplinary committee ruled on him and Hales. In a ‘remarkable coincidence’, wrote Simon Heffer in The Telegraph, ‘the punishment both players faced in terms of bans from playing at international level was covered by the amount of games they had already missed when dropped by England’s selectors, in the furore that followed the incident’. The verdict compounded the omissions around the case by not addressing the violence at its heart. Nor did Stokes, apologising only ‘to my team-mates, coaches and support staff’, and then ‘to England supporters and to the public for bringing the game into disrepute’.
The implicit next step was to rebuild that reputation. It might have been easier had his court defence not meant that he wasn’t game to admit any fault at all. It might have been easier if he or his advisers had been willing to change tack once the trial was done. Imagine a world where Stokes had stood outside court and apologised for overreacting, for the injuries he’d caused, and for the time and energy he had sucked out of other people’s lives. That would have been a show of responsibility beyond a scorecard. When the time came around to assess forgiveness, it might have meant forgiveness was deserved.

The results are in for Match 10. The winner is…
Ananas “Agnes” Bayley, with a score of 72 to Guy Manuel-Mota’s 69!

Category	Winner	Point Totals	Comments
Popularity	BADD GUYS	18-12
Quality	Suburban Regalia	22-23	Reasoning
JoJolity	Suburban Regalia	22-24	Reasoning
Conduct	Tie	10-10

Amidst the sea of concrete snow that the stage had become, egged on by Agnes’ unusual encore request that Metra had agreed to, the killing intent of the self-styled villain and master mixologist had won out against the comparable brutality of the affable mercenary who had tried to take his life with just as much brutality.
The crowd, though annoyed by being utterly doused in carbonated everything, literally tossed around, literally watching their fellow partygoers exsanguinated and turned into meat puppets, did not allow it to ruin their fun, cheering on for Metra and her eclectic song choices. Agnes hopped off the makeshift surfboard he’d constructed, his opponent cut to pieces and speared and speared to hell, and it a testament to the sheer resilience of Guy-Manuel Mota that, even in such a gored, pulverized state, his opponent wondered if he was actually dead.
Regardless, he wasn’t getting back up, or reassembling, or pulling any more surprises or attempts to play possum. Realizing that it was over, Agnes was shaking. Breathing heavily. Hints of tears started to form in his eyes… but before he had a chance to cry, he arched back, laughing into a sea of concrete snow.
He’d won again.
“There you go, Metra, your show is saved or whatever,” he said with a mocking flippancy as she left the crowd to meet him backstage, “and I didn’t even kill any of these guys who paid to see you… They’ll just have to deal with sticky-wet clothes and some broken limbs.”
“Can’t believe this happened again… And I just had no choice but to keep singing and dancing.” Metra rubbed her hands on her arms, shaking her head. “I’m sick of this shit… I thought it was all almost over, but it’s just going to be forever in this city, huh?”
“Probably,” Agnes said, still half-laughing through a strained face, “just a constant, encroaching wave of ‘despair’ every waking moment… Way I see it, either you ride that shit as far as you can, or you let yourself drown. Doesn’t make a difference to me which you do.”
He glanced up at the ceiling then, cupping his hands. “Hey, fuckers! I won now! I beat the guy you sent! Get on the biggering or I’ll burn your casino down again!”
The game had, in fact, been won, and Agnes and Metra were the first to start to be free of its grasp, along with the spiked and bloodied separated bits of Guy, still pulsating ambiguously.
“He’s out for blood.” Tigran declared, warning the others Entertainment District highrollers observing, as he produced a deck of cards. “My Stand can’t hold him at that size much longer… But this whole place is about to be flooded with people, too. Duck into somewhere, and get away in the confusion.”
He spoke authoritatively, and even his sole superior, Fox, complied with his wishes after an urgent glance. “I… I’ll come for you! I promise I will!”
Tigran didn’t hear much more of that, then, beyond the sounds of Pork Soda’s Stand cry amplified by sonic boosts courtesy of Metra Doria. He fought impressively with little more than a deck of cards, but even then, could only buy his friends the seconds they needed to get away, live to gamble another day.
Tigran “Golden” Sins, User of ‘The Grid
Retired!
Face broken in nearly a dozen places by Agnes and TD/MD, the 48 year-old owner of Heartache Casino would be very quickly interned at Red Clay penitentiary, Metra insisting that her ally not kill him.
As thousands of confused concertgoers suddenly grew to full size and began to flood the halls of the Alexander Dickinson Amphitheater, the rest of his accomplices were able to escape the authorities yet again. Despite his extremely infamous protectiveness towards his face, he almost seemed to wear the damage with pride, knowing that this time, it represented having allowed the only man he considered greater than himself to run free yet again.
Red Clay Penitentiary - Industrial District
“Well, well, well, isn’t this a small world now? Tigran Sins, now in my care… Certainly less of a looker than I’d heard.” A dark-wavy-haired twenty-something sat snickering in the warden’s big swivel-chair, clad in a sleeveless velvet minidress, what of her flesh was exposed covered in flickering tattoos resembling closed eyes, flanked by uncanny-looking guards. “You don’t know me, but I’ve certainly heard of you… Of how you treated someone I hold dear very cruelly. Don’t you understand we’re all Stand Users trying to live our best life, Mr. Golden? I’m not the one who hurt you and threw you in here, and you’re not the one who said that I needed to be kept half-starved at all times so I couldn’t create anything.”
“Wh… Wait. Who the hell’re you?”
“Did my sweetheart never mention me, or do you just not pay attention to anyone but you and yours?” She leaned forward, bridging her fingers together. “I’m Palmer. I was a drama teacher at a small-town high school, but they kept overfunding football, one thing led to another, and now… I’ve got some serious vision.”
Tigran would be the last inmate admitted to Red Clay before a coup months in the making finally came to fruition.
Hey, yeah, Palmer! Remember that fun NPC? She was dating Mr. Jones and killed four people for him! Anyway, yeah, adjacent to him, an all-out meanspirited brawl in a sewer is taking place, feat. two chaotic clowns and two very frustrated young women.
What rotten luck this had been.
That leak, now of all days, when Being So Normal, Cairo Satori’s pet project that they had been slaving away at ever since setting foot in this series, had the deals with the devil that it had been built upon from the very beginning exposed for the world to see, and the city, which had loved every second of it before, had now been divided sharply between the loyal fans remaining and those protesting the entire thing, demanding the resignation of their producer, the cancellation of a show which had been picked up by so many streaming platforms, had already begun to make so much for the people who had made a livelihood of it all.
With the connection to Andrew Tiffany’s demise, even the oh-so-loyal Purple Flying Man resigned with only a short argument, and even the damage control removal of Caroline Jeffords, responsible for the worst of it, did little to contain the fact that Cairo knew about this, and Cairo allowed this to proceed nonetheless.
What, were they going to just throw it all away at the last minute? Ruin lives, tank companies, get how many people laid off? All over the failures of those close to them? Of course not.
“Cairo, dear,” the voice of that ever-troublesome producer, Million Dollars, muttered into a cell phone for them, “I’m going to need to go under the radar for awhile… People are beginning to look into my own affairs as well. But know that, as always, no matter what, you have my support. This show isn’t just a cash cow, Cairo… It’s an example. An example for the world to look to, and something for Stand Users to aspire to be better. I know you’re probably mad at us as well, but… You know that, don’t you?”
“Dollars… You’ve got a lot of nerve, trying to plead with me right now,” Cairo answered, tense in what had been their green room, sitting in the mall their producer had owned, “we definitely need to talk about our future… But we need to have one, too. Of course the show must go on… Nothing’s gonna jeopardize that!”
Free Viper Strip Mall, Suburban District
In recent times, the atmosphere at Free Viper was… somewhat dire. In fact, it had been on a rapid decline since that fateful day a couple months ago when Bert hijacked a ritual meant to challenge fate and did so, while murdering tens of thousands of people and injuring far more than that at the same time. Actually, Black Knight Penitentiary Album’s death and the realization that Remix was a serial killer came before that and weren’t very uplifting either, but what Bert did was somewhat hard to top.
Either way, the realization that he found one of the most morally bankrupt groups of people to team up with in Los Fortuna was one that Arthur Lifeson had reached not too long ago, and though it was somewhat of a painful thing to come to terms with, he had no choice but to do so and simply carry on. Bert had died, and the least Arthur could do from here on out would be to do his best to assist the city of Los Fortuna and bring justice to those who deserved it. The city certainly needed it, given all that was occurring right now.
For all the time Arthur spent in the city, he hadn’t gotten enough of note done yet… but that was soon to change. He had a plan in mind, one that would help keep the city and the world of stand users as a whole from devolving into further chaos. Before he could put it in place, however, he’d have to get some help.
Los Fortuna Shopping District, Sweet FA Mall - The Next Day
Nix Ripa had been in this city for months now, and in that time, all he had done was tear down walls, break buildings, break people who had dared to step all over the safety of others, of those too weak to bend fate to their whims.
It was despicable to him, and the icy Stand User was seething with hot rage. Those without the power to change the world themselves were pitiable, in their ways, yet at once, he knew they were not above help… That they needed to be driven higher, reach for the stars rather than wave to the heroes they saw in them!
When Arthur Lifeson discovered and contacted him, he did not hesitate to make his way to the megamall in which this was all set to culminate. Rather than in the comfortable solitude of the Black Hill Estate, where he could train without disruption, he’d even spent the night in an alley nearby, wanting to be able to spring out first thing in the morning!
When he did, then, as if on schedule, the older bearded man who had requested his help stood at the foot of Sweet FA, looking himself quite regal with that increasingly modified Medieval Times getup.
“Sir Ripa… It is an honor to meet in person, with yet another warrior of great acclaim.”
“Heh… I’ve seen you around,” Nix answered, stretching off the sleeping-on-a-dumpster aches and forcing out his hand, which Arthur, in turn, grabbed firmly, the pair locking fingers tightly and staring one another down intensely. “Did a damn fine number on those guys at this very mall awhile back… And it takes some guts to drive out into the Middle Finger for any reason! The mountains are where I do my most intense training of all!”
“Aye, I regrettably was fooled into following the glorious allure of Being So Normal… I lack even your good reason, of how you and your fallen brother-in-arms, Sir Rains, apprehended a true villain in the process of this fight, and even a black knight who would have put a past companion of mine to shame with her depravity.” He looked towards the space and shuddered. “The show, it refused to show the truth, but the wounds from that grueling battle, the burns… They were excruciating. That witch Jeffords, nothing she’s touched can be trusted as a truth to show the world.”
“So we’re in agreement then!” Nix said, finally letting the handshake go as Arthur’s hand began to grow numb, rolling his arms around and turning to face Sweet FA. “I looked into this place, their mission statement, their show, their producer… Set a good example my ass! They just want the whole damn world to think there’s nothing better than being a Stand User! That the ground we walk on should be kissed just for what we’ve got! Well… I’m no goddamn celebrity!”
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” Arthur agreed, “and this mockery… It will not do good for the world to learn of us this way. A knight’s honor is not something we seek for glory, for congratulation, but because there is no greater purpose than to slay evil, to protect those who cannot for themselves!”
“Heh… I like you. After this, we’re sparring ‘til one of us can’t move!”
Nix led the way in there, then, Arthur feeling pause for a moment at the sheer intensity of his companion. This was not of fear, however, or of a sudden feeling of inadequacy at someone so much younger, yet so much more driven than him.
Nay, he had been filled with more righteous determination than ever, and with a battle cry that led to a family with two kids in a stroller staring his way, he ran in after him!
…
…
As soon as they reached the main foyer of the mall, both of them realized, in tandem, and Nix spoke first, “…this place is huge as hell! Where do we even go to smash shit up?”
“I… That. That is a good point! Perhaps we should conduct a map kiosk, one which says ‘you are here!’ Ugh, those are always a pain to read…”
“I’ll help you.”
Both turned, then, to see a very fashionable teenager, clad in a purple aviator cap and goggles, slim and bearing a dour expression on his face. All who had hung around Cairo would recognize the Purple Flying Man from someplace or another, as well as all the extremely online and influencer-following of Los Fortuna.
“This show… They’ve done so much to capitalize on my uncle’s death. They’ve actively stopped the truth of whatever might have happened to him from being investigated with their frameup… And this conflict, I have lost two of my brothers to it all over again.”
He paused, then, and the two men seemed to trust him.
“You won’t be able to erase the show completely… It’s already had a limited run in this city. But masters, extra footage, content they were going to actually send out… There’s a storage space nearby… Most of the show’s data is backed up, of course, but that’s where everything is being saved. If your wish is to sabotage Being So Normal, to ruin its international release before it can cause any more harm to the outside world, that is where you go.”
“So you’ve had a change of heart yourself… I am thankful to hear that, Purple One…” Arthur snapped his fingers, then, as if remembering his name. “Right, now I remember! ‘Afton,’ wasn’t it?”
Purple’s face faulted. “Erm… N-no, eheh. It, uh… It wasn’t that. I haven’t been anything but ‘Purple’ for a very long time.”
“No matter what you’re called, an enemy of this show’s from within is just what we need to make this a little less of a pain in the ass!” Nix declared. “Lead the way!”
A Series of Backstage Halls Deep Within Sweet FA
Acrobatic and stealthy as he was, after leading the way in for those who had sought out this quest to begin with, Purple hurried along deeper inward, well aware that it was likely this place would not be unguarded, and meaning to scout ahead, maybe even fight a bit if he absolutely needed to.
He really, really did not want to, and so far, it wasn’t reassuring to him that nobody had interrupted them. No show staff, no Stand Users, not even some rent-a-cop had yet gotten into the way of this.
As he made his way to a security room, quietly bemoaning the fact that he would never live down infiltrating a security room with that damned nickname Bad Apples had given him, his worst fears were confirmed.
His friend, his confidante, Cairo Satori was sitting in a swivel chair, watching screens displaying the entire mall and idly leaning their head into a metal baseball bat.
“Purp…” They spoke up without even turning to face him. “Wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon! I mean, with everywhere you’ve blocked me, privated your accounts… I was under the impression you needed some time away from the show.”
Purple hopped down, then, walking closer towards the chair, clearing his throat and pondering his words clearly.
“The show needs time away from the show, Cairo… You know damn well why I brought myself back. Come on. You know this isn’t right… It doesn’t have to be this, and even just delaying could save-”
“Delay, huh?” They stood, twirling that bat they’d always carried around. It didn’t worry Purple. He’d never seen them actually using it. “C’mon… You know it’s not that simple, buddy. I’m just trying to make sure everyone has a good time… Already, I’m cutting toxic people out of the show! Even when they’ll make it harder to make anything going forward, Caroline is gone! I’ll keep that producer on a really short leash! I am doing everything in my power to make sure that this goes well… C’mon, can’t you look on the bright side?”
“You… You already know my answer to that. You’ve betrayed my trust, Cairo. The trust of my uncle, of everyone you’ve worked with… Of this whole city!” He shifted in place, then, becoming a much more avian humanoid figure with its pose. “I am its lavender courage, and I am your friend! And as both, I cannot abide by-”
Cairo swang their bat, and as they did, the arms of a Stand emerged from their own hand and struck it as well, multiple times in quick succession.
By the time the bat impacted Purple, it was with enough force for the deeply resilient eternally-young ghost to be sent hurtling towards a wall, literally impacting it hard enough to leave an impression in its form, embedded and unconscious in a single swing. He was alive, and would walk this off, but he wouldn’t be getting back up today.
“Sorry ‘bout that,” they said, standing with the bat over their shoulder, ‘Peach Pit’ manifesting more fully by their side (drawn by the artist Boy George, as usual), “but I can tell we don’t have time to chat… I’ll send you a gift basket from the launch party, yeah?”
Then, their attention turned towards the others on the security room screens, addressing their Stand in the meantime, “uh, hey, Peach…”
“I’m on it,” the Stand answered, “Arthur Lifeson and Nix Ripa… I’m excited for this, honestly.”
“And you don’t need to know that I am to, honestly…” Cairo moved to press the intercom button.
“I heard violence!” Nix called out, balling his fists. “Purple found someone!” He began to rush forward, then, Arthur preparing to make a blade, only to be stopped by the crackling of an intercom button.
“Hello again! Wow, it really isn’t all that often that Being So Normal has repeat appearances, but that’s, what, twice in this promotional cycle alone?” Cairo’s voice rang through, then, and they continued, “I figured we’d see some trouble here, so I gave most of staff the day off… I knew it’d be types like you two who showed up, and honestly, I gotta say, despite the circumstances, I’m a bit psyched!”
“Cairo Satori!” Arthur spoke up then, waving his hands. “Put this madness to a close, before I have to put you to my blade! You need not fall victim to this any longer… To fight us is a waste of time!”
“Well, I’ve got time to kill, and nobody to talk to, now that my friend’s taking a bit of a nap. And besides, you think I’m gonna just let you destroy everything we’ve been working to build up because you don’t like a couple of the crew members? C’mon, have a reality check here! No way I’m gonna allow that… Especially not right now! Look, why not come talk to me after I’ve completely closed this Netflix deal?”
There was silence, then, and then they spoke up again.
“Oh, who am I kidding? We both know that this is only gonna end one way! If you wanna stop me from sending this show out for the whole world to know and love, and not just be another little piece of Los Fortuna’s super storied, super amazing history, then STOP me! I’m already sending Peach your way, and there’s no way the two of us will just get walked all over!”
Arthur shut his eyes in frustration, but Nix shook his shoulder. “We knew from the start it’d come to this. C’mon… Any more talking this through will be a waste of all our breaths.”
“Yeah! This pre-battle stuff goes on way too long, I swear! So much to cut down in post without missing the meat of it… But enough talking shop, yeah? Let’s get to what we’re here for… You wanna say it with me? …no? Okay, suit yourself!”
“OPEN THE GAME!”
Location:
A hallway to several storage rooms in Sweet FA Mall. The area here is 40 by 80 meters with each tile being 2.5 by 2.5 meters. The white tiles are completely out of bounds for this match. The light magenta tiles are the main hallway, the purple tiles are side hallways, and the red tiles are the rooms. Each room has a number associated with it for convenience, as shown by the purple numbers. The ceiling is 8 meters tall. The doorways are denoted by the dotted lines between the rooms and hallways.
The players start at the left end of the hallway and Cairo starts in the security room (room 5) to the right of the bottom center. Cairo’s Stand starts in the middle of the main hallway.
The grey X marked circles are security cameras on the ceiling that connect to the monitors that are represented by the yellow notched rectangles in room 5. The light blue rectangles in the main hallway are 4 meter tall metal shelves that house stage set up equipment such as stepladders, light fixtures, microphones, extension cables, construction tools, and anything else needed to set up or tear down a stage. All shelves are bolted to the ground.
The yellow stars are disks, tapes, harddrives and other recordings of the footage shot by Cairo’s show.
The walls are drywall while the floor is ceramic tiled.
Now onto the different rooms:

• Room 1: Contains racks and cardboard bins of merchandise. The brown rectangles are cardboard bins of plushies and hats. The red circles are racks of clothing merchandise.
  
• Room 2: Contains a mountain of chairs and other furniture within a 5 meter tall metal storage fence as represented by the light blue rectangle and the junk inside it. Each side of the fence has a chain locked door.
  
• Room 3: Contains various cooking appliances and peripherals. The white rectangles are 4 meter tall metal storage shelves and the magenta rectangles are 5 meter tall metal storage containers. Basically any appliance that doesn’t fit on a shelf is put into one of the three containers.
  
• Room 4: Contains two long tables as represented by the grey L-shaped rectangles. On these tables are neatly laid out items that were used in Round 2 Match 4, this means Riot Shields, Fireworks Cannons, Magnetic Ray Guns, Grappling Hook Guns, smoke bombs, Tar filled paintball guns, mannequins, body armor, skateboards, net launchers, fire extinguishers, step ladders, marbles, bowling balls, trampolines, shovels, steel chairs, and blankets. Only the crystal ball is missing. The blue circle is a barrel of fencing foils and the yellow rectangle is a banged up motorcycle that while not completely totaled is in pretty bad shape.
  
• Room 5: The security room. It is rather bare, only housing the monitors set-ups to the security cameras and three swivel chairs to go with them.
  

Goal: RETIRE your opponents!
Additional Information:
As a reminder, White Tile areas are out-of-bounds for this match. If you willingly traverse through them you will be retired by a pair of mall cops.
Here is a shortened version of Cairo’s character sheet with all relevant information, the full sheet is linked below
Name: Cairo Satori
Age: 21
Gender: None, whose business is that anyways?
Species: Human
Occupation: Beloved Media Icon
Equipment: The newest smartphone, two sets of wireless earbuds for communicating directly with [Peach Pit] quietly, a bag of weed mints, and a baseball bat.
User Stats:
Strength: 3 (Too much effort to get properly strong- Cairo can throw as much effort into a hit as they need to in order to finish someone off after being brought to near-retirement by [Peach Pit], and that’s about the maximum they need.)
Agility: 2 (Never had to run after or from anything.)
Endurance: 2 (Not one to hold up under sustained pressure for very long, hoping to duck back from any conflicts except where absolutely necessary.)
Conduction: 2 (Able to personally carry their Stand’s damaging energy through them, and has a general knowledge of how to apply it.)
Vibing: 3 (It's for vibe checks- the necessity of finishing an opponent off personally, in a fast and hard strike. The full force of their strength, loaded into one moment rather than a series of fests. Also, they do have good vibes.)
Stand Name: [Peach Pit]
Stand Appearance: On the bulkier side of stand builds, Peach Pit has some resemblance to a knight in plate armor- big, dark metallic pauldrons, a chestplate, an assortment of straps and buckles, etc. The surface of the stand looks very much like a sunset with its colors flipped around. Its face is smooth except for a simple minimalist icon of the sun, and the rest of the head is mostly covered by a knight's helmet as well. A gradient of sorts goes from the head of the stand down to its armored feet, starting with an orange-red and ending in black with white specks like stars in the night sky.
About/Oddities: The stand is dangerous, outright. The manifestation of an incredible will for a very specific life gave it incredibly high offensive might, and although Cairo has depleted its very low ‘potential,’ nothing else has decreased in the slightest.
Additionally, [Peach Pit] is sentient, and thinks of itself as a close friend and bodyguard to Cairo. Despite being able to dish out high damage, it is very much a friendly, calm and collected individual, having respect even for those it has to fight. As such, [Peach Pit] leaves RETIRING opponents up to its user completely. An enemy can be beaten down, but will still be able to pull together and carry on albeit impeded until Cairo personally finishes them off. This isn't simply a choice- if instructed to keep pressure on an opponent who's down but not out, its strikes can indefinitely inflict serious pain and yet never be quite enough to injure a foe to the point where they're considered RETIRED.
Due to the bold weakness in this, for how combat inefficient and easily hurt its user is, Peach doesn't have full damage transference. Instead, it can be destroyed repeatedly- Cairo takes one instance of C power damage upon its destruction, and it can be resummoned from Cairo's position after ten seconds.
Peach's presenting identity has been influenced by Cairo's insistence against defining things that way, to the point of being comfortably seen subjectively as anything. Peach will respond to any pronouns without questioning it.
Stand Stats:
Power: A(The stand can exert a great amount of power in its attacks)
Speed: A (Its movements are very fast and its attacks can travel just as quickly)
Range: B (50 meters)
Durability: E (Subpar durability, however when destroyed the user takes C power damage and the stand can be summoned back to Cairo’s side after 10 seconds.)
Precision: C (Generally decent in its movements, but its projectile attacks only move in a straight line once fired and can only be stored within conductive materials. In non-conductive materials it would keep traveling)
Ability: Peach Pit lacks a complex ability, as far as one would expect. Rather than intricate effects, its hits themselves can simply be conducted through material similarly the way that electricity does, with distinct variation based on the conductivity of the material. Within conductive material, damage is stored up much like a battery - the moment someone touches the "battery", the damage transfers directly to it on the point of contact. This means that if Peach were to punch a metal rod and someone were to touch it, they would feel the full brunt of Peach's attack the moment they do so. A battery remains charged for up to fifteen seconds, and at any point if it hasn’t been touched and discharged already, Cairo can pick any direction from where the battery is in contact with non-conductive materials to activate the next type of attack.
Within non-conductive material, either deployed through battery or direct strike, damage "travels", moving forwards in a straight line at A speed in the same direction it came from. This wave of damage can be seen as it travels, with slight shimmers of light and a crackling sound emanating from where it's currently positioned.
Damage cannot travel further than B range from Cairo.

Team	Combatant	JoJolity
Black Hill Regalia	Arthur Lifeson and Nix Ripa	“The thing in Hayato's hand was definitely a handy cam. It doesn't seem to be in this room right now...” This show is a sweet-sounding idea, but it’s so corrupt to its core that you can’t allow it to spread any further than it has. Destroy as many physical backings of the recordings Cairo has made for their show as you can over the course of your strat!
Being So Normal	Cairo Satori	“I even took a video of the cat-like plant you've got in the attic!” This show… You know it’s been an unsavory road, one you wish you could have managed differently, but the good it can do, the way the world might finally begin to understand the ugly and wonderful truths of Stand Users and appreciate them more as a part of their lives… You will celebrate that. Take creative inspiration from actions that took place in matches related officially to ‘Being So Normal!’ That is to say, these 5 matches, R1M5,R1M23,R1M29,R2M4, and R3M8!

Link to the Official Player Spreadsheet
Link to Match Schedule
As always, if you would like to interact with the tournament community and be among the first to get updates for the tournament, please feel free to PM a member of our Judge staff for an invite to our Official Discord Server!

Trump has been in Russia's pocket a long time here is more reading for those interested in the history.
Trump was over a billion in debt and the Russians bailed him out.
► Trump was first compromised by the Russians in the 80s. In 1984, the Russian Mafia began to use Trump real estate to launder money. In 1987, the Soviet ambassador to the United Nations, Yuri Dubinin, arranged for Trump and his then-wife, Ivana, to enjoy an all-expense-paid trip to Moscow to consider possible business prospects. Only seven weeks after his trip, Trump ran full-page ads in the Boston Globe, the NYT and WaPO calling for, in effect, the dismantling of the postwar Western foreign policy alliance. The whole Trump/Russian connection started out as laundering money for the Russian mob through Trump's real estate, but evolved into something far bigger.
► In 1984, David Bogatin — a convicted Russian mobster and close ally of Semion Mogilevich, a major Russian mob boss — met with Trump in Trump Tower right after it opened. Bogatin bought five condos from Trump at that meeting. Those condos were later seized by the government, which claimed they were used to launder money for the Russian mob. (NY Times, Apr 30, 1992)
► [Felix Sater](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Sater } is a Russian-born former mobster, and former managing director of NY real estate conglomerate Bayrock Group LLC located on the 24th floor of Trump Tower. He is a convict who became a govt cooperator for the FBI and other agencies. He grew up with Michael Cohen--Trump's former "fixer" attorney. Cohen's family owned El Caribe, which was a mob hangout for the Russian Mafia in Brooklyn. Cohen had ties to Ukrainian oligarchs through his in-laws and his brother's in-laws. Felix Sater's father had ties to the Russian mob. This goes back more than 30 years.
► Trump was $4 billion in debt after his Atlantic City casinos went bankrupt. No U.S. bank would touch him. Then foreign money began flowing in through Bayrock (mentioned above). Bayrock was run by two investors: Tevfik Arif, a Kazakhstan-born former Soviet official who drew on bottomless sources of money from the former Soviet republic; and Felix Sater, a Russian-born businessman who had pleaded guilty in the 1990s to a huge stock-fraud scheme involving the Russian mafia. Bayrock partnered with Trump in 2005 and poured money into the Trump organization under the legal guise of licensing his name and property management.
► In July 2008, the height of the housing bust, Trump sold a mansion in Palm Beach for $95 million to Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch. Trump had purchased it four years earlier for $41.35 million. The sale price was nearly $54 million more than Trump had paid for the property. Again, this was the height of the recession when all other property had plummeted in value.
► Semion Mogilevich was the brains behind the Russian Mafia. Mogilevich operatives have been using Trump real estate for decades to launder money. That means Russian Mafia operatives have been part of his fortune for years. Many of them owned condos in Trump Towers and other properties. They were running operations out of Trump's crown jewel.
► So many Russians bought Trump apartments at his developments in Florida that the area became known as Little Moscow. The developers of two of his hotels were Russians with significant links to the Russian mob. The late leader of that mob in the United States, Vyacheslav Kirillovich Ivankov, was living at Trump Tower
► According to a Bloomberg investigation (3/16/2017) into Trump World Tower, “a third of units sold on floors 76 through 83 by 2004 involved people or limited liability companies connected to Russia and neighboring states.”
► In 2013, Federal agents busted an “ultraexclusive, high-stakes, illegal poker ring” run by Russian gangsters out of Trump Tower. They operated card games, illegal gambling websites, and a global sports book and laundered more than $100 million. A condo directly below one owned by Trump reportedly served as HQ for a “sophisticated money-laundering scheme” connected to Semion Mogilevich.
► The Russia Mafia is part and parcel of Russian intelligence. Russia is a mafia state. That is not a metaphor. Putin is head of the Mafia. So the fact that they have been operating out of the home of the president of the United States is deeply disturbing.
► Rudy Giuliani famously prosecuted the Italian mob while he was a federal prosecutor, yet the Russian mob was allowed to thrive. Now he's deeply entwined in the business of Trump and Russian oligarchs. Giuiani appointed Semyon Kislin to the NYC Economic Development Council in 1990, and the FBI described Kislin as having ties to the Russian mob. Of course, it made good political sense for Giuliani to get headlines for smashing the Italian mob.
► A lot of Republicans in Washington are implicated. Boatloads of Russian money went to the GOP--often in legal ways. The NRA got as much as $70M from Russia, then funneled it to the GOP. The Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee lead by McConnell got millions from Leonard Blavatnik. In the 90s, the Russians began sending money to top GOP leaders, like Speaker of the House Tom Delay. Craig Unger's book alleges that most of the GOP leadership has been compromised by RU money.
► At the Cityscape USA’s Bridging US and the Emerging Real Estate Markets Conference held in Manhattan, on September 9, 10, and 11, 2008, Donald Trump Jr. was frank about the tide of Russian money supporting the family business, saying "...And in terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets."
► Eric Trump told golf reporter James Dodson in 2014 that the Trump Organization was able to expand during the financial crisis because “We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.”
► It's believed that Russian oligarchs co-signed Trump’s Deutsche bank loans.
► Alex Navalny has insinuated Paul Manafort passed along Trump's campaign information to the Kremlin via Kilimnik. In a 25-minute Youtube video (Russian with subtitles), Navalny shows footage of Deripaska with Russian deputy prime minister Sergei Prikhodko on his yacht in Norway in August 2016. Based on that footage, he alleges that information about the Trump campaign must have passed between the two. Senate Intelligence Report I believe concluded Paul gave the information to known Russian asset but that we have no proof this asset gave the information to the Kremlin? Im hoping someone in the comments has some more on the Paul Manafort accusation to perhaps clear this bullet up in a future edit.
​
Trump now gleefully takes cues from Putin:
► Trump went against American intelligence on North Korean missiles. He told the FBI he didn't believe their intelligence because Putin told him otherwise. “I don't care, I believe Putin"
► Trump met in secret with Putin at the G20 summit in November 2018, without note takers. 19 days later, he announced a withdrawal from Syria.
► Trump refused to enforce sanctions legally codified into law - and in some cases reversed standing sanctions on Russian companies.
► He has denounced his own intelligence agencies in a press conference with Putin on election meddling - and publicly endorsed Putin's version of events.
► Demanded Russia get invited back into G7
► Pushed the CIA to give American intelligence to the Kremlin.
► Withdrew from the Open Skies treaty
​
EDIT -
First want to say thanks for taking the time to read the post. Please take the time to also VOTE this election. Also thank you various users for the rewards and support.
On to actual edits :)
Firstly I've removed the link to Trump / Russian bounties allegations. Which was the last point in the post originally due to its lack of factual evidence.
Second I've changed a few points wording.
Third I've added a new bullet at the end that was passed a long to me yesterday by another user in another thread about Trump and his campaign manager.
Fourth I'd like to point out that this post is a collection of points from various other users in other threads and I personally don't want to take any credit for this post as I'm just carrying the torch with this post of several users before me who compiled many of these points.
​

Prior to this year, it’s no exaggeration to say that the only game I’d played in full since about 2010 was the original BioShock. Not really sure why I stepped away from gaming - probably just some usual combination of life getting in the way and dodgy prioritisation. Then, like many others, I became acquainted with a boatload of surplus indoor time this year, and chose to find my way back with an N3DS and a Switch. Turns out I really missed it. I’ve been slowly playing through a variety of titles I missed the first time around, as well as various others I’ve stumbled across along the way.
In compiling this list, I have learned that my gameplay times are crushingly slow, people have extremely strong opinions about the Paper Mario series and actually it turns out a really poorly specced PC was holding me back from gaming all this time. Would love to hear what others thought of this selection of games, especially those who hold dissenting opinions about my DNF list (I expect plenty in support of Xenoblade, lol). Be warned this is all through the lens of someone who is plainly just thrilled to be back in the fold and has zero concerns spending way more time than necessary to complete games! I suspect I have more patience and rosier-tinted glasses as compared to the average weathered gamer, so would also be interested to hear how my experiences stack up in the wider gaming context.
The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds Total play time: ~30 hours
Zelda factored little in my adolescent years, and apart from renting OoT a handful of times for the 64 (and spamming bombs in SSB) this is pretty much the only Zelda experience I've had. It's kind of a blessing and a curse, from what I can tell: I have none of the hangups but equally none of the emotional connection that often seems to accompany the franchise. I really only played this because it had been given to me and came highly recommended.
But this was about as good as introductions get - sure, it helped that this was essentially the first console game I'd played in its entirety in over a decade, but the game is clearly exceptional by all accounts. It seems I love a good gameplay mechanic where it doesn't tip into gimmickry, and the wall merge system I found novel, baffling and satisfying without ever being too frustrating.
I obviously can't speak to the nostalgia aspect of it, but coming to it fresh was a charming experience. It's pretty hard not to be at least casually familiar with aspects of Zelda lore, and I liked that there weren't any lengthy cutscenes (looking at you, Ōkami) or tedious tutorials to slog through. The storytelling is a little naff but not distractingly so, and for me the pretty predictable ending was offset by the fun final boss battle. And you sure do feel good solving some of those puzzles.
I'm not yet game to branch out into the open world of BotW, but I'm pretty glad my maiden Zelda foray was this one instead. More games ought to allow one to become a painting.
Highlights: big bomb flower lols, boss battles that were satisfying / a great relief to complete
Ōkami HD Total play time: 50:57:29 Completion %: 50/100 stray beads
I remember seeing promo material for this game back when it was first released and thinking the brush mechanic was dope - a hype disproportionate to the amount of PS2 I owned (none). So regardless I was probably always going to be predisposed to like this game.
This was the first game I finished on the Switch and I enjoyed it immensely. The art style is killer and helps it look great for a game of its age into the bargain, the brush mechanic and the puzzle element it introduces feels integrated rather than gimmicky, and the storytelling is rich and humorous. I know others have commented that the game is overly long, but I enjoyed being in the world enough that it never felt a slog. (This coming from someone who has played 100+ hours of Picross but…)
I will agree that the combat system was pretty whatever, though. I am a pretty rubbish gamer by conventional skill standards and even I found this game wildly easy, but I think that also speaks to my enjoyment of the game as an all-round narrative experience rather than pure mechanics. An additional dishonorable mention for having to fight Orochi no less than three times?! Sure, going back in time was a pretty neat narrative arc and I could forgive repeating the fight in that context, but by the Ark I was sure they had to be taking the piss.
Unlocking the additional skins gives this game some replay potential for me, especially the photorealistic wolf, laughable only in hindsight. The existence of about twice as many stray beads as I collected also means I may dip in and out in future, but mostly I have minimal desire to bring my dragon-head-whacking count up to 48. Nevertheless, a pretty inimitable experience, even if it took me a decade and a half to get there.
Highlights: the dang art style, drawing an emoji face for my demon mask and seeing it show up again in Sei-an City
Paper Mario: Sticker Star Total play time: ~30 hours
I can understand the criticism of this game: the combat system sucks and makes traversing through the world often not very fun, the characters are unmemorable, the necessity of having certain stickers to win certain fights is infuriating, the plot is generic, the lack of levelling up is nonsense. None of that stopped me from enjoying this game, though! Take that! As always, this was probably helped immensely by the nostalgia I carry for the original Paper Mario on the 64 and the fact I hadn’t really had any other Mario games to compare it to for a long time.
The super vitriolic abuse it seems to cop online feels a bit disproportionate but. From poking around the series, it looks like one that people are particularly vocal about, with the only correct answer being “TTYD is the best game in the series and all other future titles will be held against this specific benchmark”. Honestly I’m just glad I played this game without the knowledge of what the gaming community thought of it, because I don’t think this is a genuinely bad game.
Kirby: Planet Robobot Total play time: ~20 hours Completion %: 81%
Evidently I rather enjoy the cute-thing-in-a-mech-suit genre, between this game and Gato Roboto. But I have very fond memories of playing The Crystal Shards and am a Kirby main (lol) in SSB so I could probably be coerced into playing literally any Kirby game. I don’t have too much to say about this game; I think anyone familiar with the franchise will understand pretty much how it plays, but the mech suit mechanic is a heap of fun, with copy abilities possible both in and out of the suit.
There were some little details that I thought were quite fun: the collection of stickers that you can use to decorate your mech was bonus entertainment, the variety of gameplay styles in the final boss battle, the remote control Kirby in the casino levels. It looks great, it’s charming, and as mentioned, I like an idiosyncratic feature that isn’t gimmicky, and I think the mech suit ticks that box. I picked up Extra Epic Yarn off the back of this, too - it just looks so dang sweet.
What the Golf? Total play time: 08:24:56 Completion %: 97% Total strokes: 11656 Games I subsequently want to play: Superhot
If there ever was a time for escapism, the middle of a pandemic seems to be a pretty good candidate, and I am certainly guilty of using this game as a bit of a feel-good salve. But what the golf, it was a grand old time, and I think we can all use the laughs it provides. I bought the game off the expectations set by the trailer and was happily not disappointed.
This is a pretty straightforward game by all standards: simple overworld, three levels per stage, emphasis on silly in "silly physics". It feels like the schtick should get old pretty fast, but there's enough sly nods and references (and straight-up gameplay duplication) to keep it fresh and consistently funny. Caveat: pun disdainers avoid.
It's the perfect game to dip in and out of - none of the stages are particularly long, and while some of the pacrown levels can be a bit frustrating, you're not at all forced to complete them in linear fashion. Nevertheless, I played this game in pretty lengthy stints, so the format isn't a barrier in that sense either.
I know this is a fairly new game to the Switch, but it's been out on PC for a while it seems. I bought it only having seen it in the eShop, so if there was a hype train, it did not make a stop at my station.
Highlights: the Superhot levels, WHAT?, the constant anticipation of what a button press would do in a new level
Ori and the Blind Forest Total play time: 14:44:46 Completion %: 96% Total deaths: 488
It’s something of a classic, and evidently with good reason - I think I would have played this game for its art alone, but of course its reputation has since come to precede it. It runs really smoothly on the Switch, and the platforming is tight and enjoyable. Not sure how common it is in the wider world, but I really liked the save mechanic - as a chronic saver, I rather appreciated being responsible for setting my own save points, especially when it came to some of the more challenging sequences. I expected to struggle a lot with this one but I found the challenges fair, even the escape sequences, much as I may have wanted to burn down the Ginso Tree on the first few attempts.
Feels like most people who’ve had an eye on it have played it by now, and there’s plenty of reviews out there for those on the fence to decide either way, but personally I’m very glad to have played and finished it. I’ve since been told that both the sequel and Hollow Knight eclipse this game, though I do have some idea of what to expect from both. Now if Will of the Wisps could just get a Switch port...
Mosaic Total play time: ~3 hours
I’d been wanting to pick this game up because a friend of mine had a hand in its creation, but I kind of could not have picked a worse time for it. Without spoiling anything, the premise of the game is being stuck in a very boring corporate dystopia, and a lot of the gameplay revolves around the repetition of your daily routines. Obviously this kind of experience can already be a little harrowing at the best of times, but in the middle of a global pandemic where time feels completely immaterial it was often a bit much.
Certainly the gameplay won’t be for everyone; there is a lot of walking around in this game, and you can interact with various depressing billboards and your smartphone in ways you think might have some kind of a purpose but ultimately formally contribute nothing to your game - so in that sense, it’s kind of a bang on expression of its premise, though its messaging can be a little on the nose at times.
If you’re into the visual style and can get down with the premise, this is a unique gaming experience which is both lovely and deeply unsettling at times. If you’re at all curious, the website gives a fairly clear mission statement of the game.
Gato Roboto Total play time: 05:23:28 Completion %: 78%
Short and sweet, this one, and looks and feels great. I’d never really picked myself as one for metroidvanias, but this game came onto my radar after Ori and I was looking for a shorter, punchy game in a similar style, and this delivered on expectations.
As mentioned, I’m kind of crap at games, so the difficulty for this one felt about right for me. There were a handful of times the boss battles threatened to tip into frustration, but mostly it was just my timing being off (second stage of the mouse battle in the heater core comes to mind) as well as in the earlier parts of the game where I had just been lax in picking up healthkits.
I’ve seen some complaints about it being too much of a Metroid clone, but you can’t get down with that criticism if you’ve never played Metroid *taps head*. Its short length seems to be another frequent comment, but if you’re going in with expectations suitably managed then I think there’s not too much to fault otherwise. But of course this is coming from someone who has played basically no metroidvanias in their life lol.
And finally, my DNF list:

• Katamari Damacy; abandoned after ~4 hours Heartbreaking for this to be on my list, but I am part of the small percentage that gets enormously motion sick from this game. A huge shame, because it’s one of those games I’ve wanted to play for literal decades now - I pushed through the first couple of levels but I just can’t make it work for me. The theme song has nevertheless taken up plenty of real estate in my brain.
  
• Xenoblade Chronicles 3D; abandoned after ~2 hours This is probably a contentious choice to have on a list like this, though I clearly haven’t really given this a fair shake either. I think it’s probably partly to do with the learning curve of its rather involved format? Thinking of swapping this version out for the Switch one instead in the hope that might make it a bit more accessible to me.
  
• Where the Water Tastes Like Wine; abandoned after ~2 hours The premise of this game is great, and I like its rather non-standard approach in defining what a game should look like, but it just plays so goddamn slow. I found travelling across the country extremely frustrating - none of the options were really any good - and it’s unfortunate because that makes up far and away the largest part of what you spend your time doing in this game. The voice acting is also great, but it never takes anywhere near as much time to scan the dialogue as it does to read it aloud, so most of the acting gets lost behind an A button mash anyway. I want to love this game, but I just never find myself wanting to reach for it.
  
• Child of Light; abandoned after ~2 hours Call me petty, but I just could not manage to get past this game’s unbelievably naff rhyming dialogue. It made me want to skip through all the cutscenes and gave me no desire to attempt to follow the story. I thought the battle mechanic was quite interesting and enjoyable - not sure if this is common to other games in the genre, but it was new to me - but between the dialogue and an art style I didn’t really care for, this one’s been left by the wayside.
  
• Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap; abandoned after 01:48 I played the original Wonder Boy on a Sega Master back in the day and figured a remake of another game in the series might be fun, but I couldn’t really get into this one. Felt like it was going to be a bit grindy for my tastes. I do think it looks great and switching between the art styles is cool, but I don’t think I’ll be doing much more than dipping in and out, if even that.
  

CONTEXT: Names have all been changed for anonimity, there's a lot of inside references and memory references that may not seem as significant to any reader, but just wanted to put this out there to let people know to not get complacent in the relationship and let them get away. I still hope one day I find my way back to her, but for now this was the final letter I left her.
Dear Michelle,
I’ve spent a countless number of days staring at this blank piece of paper not knowing what to do with it or what to say. The number of times I’ve scrunched it up and had to restart is crazy. I’d be lying if I didn’t say I still don’t know what I’m doing with this, just putting all cards on the table I guess. But most importantly I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I miss you and think about that gorgeous face of yours all the time. In no way is this me trying to “get you back”, no ill intentions or anything negative, please understand this.It’s been many years since I’ve used an actual pen to write on a piece of paper, the last being your “Get Well Soon” card when you were upset about you and your ex and your Christmas Card. Not having you in my life anymore has granted me a lot of time to myself to think and process my life. Believe me, I’ve done a LOT of thinking, about you, about me, about us and life in general. You’ll be happy to know I’ve done a lot of growing and all this period. All that I ask is IF you do read this, try to take in every word and read it meaningfully with no distractions. I write this with all my heart.
Remember the day I planned on asking you out to make things official? I dedicated the entire day to being all about you and keeping that beautiful huge smile on your face. I took you to get your ears pierced, we then went to Chadstone and shopped around, came home to nap before I took you to the Melbourne Star wheel. The glimmer in your eyes throughout the day and even while in the deck was mesmerizing and I couldn’t have been a happier man, unfortunately we were plagued by the indians and their families in the same cabin so I wasn’t able to fulfill my plan on asking you out but we laughed about it in the car ride home and at least it gave us a funny story on how we came to be official. Although I was grateful and thankful for the amazing time I got to spend with you then and especially the feeling of your warmth and comfort when you were cuddled in my arms and in that moment looking at you watching the view with me I couldn’t help think to myself, I’ve never cared about someone so precious ever in my life but most of all, you’ve never looked more gorgeous than in that one moment.
Or even the night I took you to the Conservatory, you wore my favourite outfit of yours but we were still a bit shy with one another. You were quiet at the dinner table as we were still early together but the vibe was mutually great and the night outside was as beautiful as you were. Never have I seen someone I love look so amazing while messily munching down on a buffet of food, that was the night you showed me you were a Little Piggy. The funniest part of the night was seeing your shock and guilt with the bill, I don’t need to tell you the cheeky laugh it gave me to see you like that as I was doing it right in your face. Although, my favourite part of the night was when we parked out the front of your house and chilled there for the longest time and enjoyed each other's company, in that moment, was when I knew, there’s no place I’d ever rather be than with my arms around you.
My all time favourite moment would have to be the time we spent staying at Crown. There has never been a better set of days in my life as perfect as those. It was all unforgettable, from the moment we came and just jumped in bed to cuddle, going to the Galactic Circus and playing the arcade games, especially the fun playing air hockey having to pretend to lose to you, seeing so concentrated on winning and then the smile that erupted on your face when you did, I couldn’t help but smile and think to myself, this angel makes me feel at home. The coolest part was the dinners on both nights, Korean BBQ the first night then having the pleasure of Jono and Erin to join us at Kitchen Workshop for the second night, the casino with them after it was fun as hell. What set each day in stone in my mind was showing you how much you meant to me when making love to you every night, I’ll never forget how lost I was staring into your beautiful blue eyes, I still do to this day and they’ll always be my true favourite feature of you. I’ve had a countless number of memorable cherished experiences with you and it is an honour for a lot of these experiences with me to be your firsts in general.
You’ve taught me so much over these past couple years that we’ve dated, you’ve shown me how to be a better person day by day by treating everyone with the same kindness, love and respect that you’d love reciprocated by them back. I’ve slowly learnt from you on how to be the bigger person in situations instead of sinking down to their level, how to be a mature man and not the Shaun I used to be before I met you. I love the man I have become because of you and have always hoped that you were lowkey proud of my development, all thanks to how amazing you are. Props to your amazing parents for raising the beautiful woman you are today. I know I still have faults, I admit that and take full responsibility for them all but I have grown heaps especially these past few weeks and am still working on them. You may think I never listen to you but I’d like you to trust me, because I always am, I listen to every word of your recommendations on how to be better, at the time I’m just a tiny bit ignorant about it but don’t let that deter you from thinking that I don’t take your words in.
The one thing I have loved being able to do with you that I am unable to do with anyone else EVER is ALWAYS FEELING COMFORTABLE coming to you whenever I need do things like vent, a shoulder to cry on or help with how to deal with certain situations because I found that no one else could ever help as much as you could and would. I loved being able to vent to you about any and every one of my problems throughout my day or life in general, you were my rock, I felt safe and at home knowing that you genuinely cared and were also giving me endless support and advice. It felt good knowing someone was genuinely listening to me and was there. I have always tried my 100% best to do the same for you and I hope I have reciprocated that same feeling back. I hope that you always knew and felt comfortable coming to me to vent about anything, work, life, any of your problems like your career troubles, friends (I’m not going to name all the troubles, we both know everything). Whenever you did rest assured that I always dedicated you my 100% undivided attention and support and would always drop whatever I was doing and come straight over to cheer you up whenever I possibly could because I wanted to always be there for you, seeing you sad is my least favourite thing in the world, it still is.
Most importantly, the one thing I think of that is most special in my life and that I hold very dearly to me is two words:
2 Weeks
In the little over 4 weeks I spent chasing you, I realised that all it took was only the last 2 that meant something to me. 2 Weeks together. 2 Weeks was all it took for me to fall in love with you. I remember our first kiss like it’s tattooed in my mind. I remember every moment, from coming to Jenna’s house to take you home, meeting Rachel for the first time and listening to her saying “you have a really nice car”, you whispering something to her before she closed your door, something that we will both never know which has always crossed my mind, in a happy and funny way. I remember playing our song OTW in the car going towards Mia's place and you falling asleep while it happened, I remember looking at you there so drunk, yet peaceful and full of life, happy in the moment even though you were asleep, no sight has ever lit up my world more than that. Taking you to Mia's house and conversing and getting along with all your friends was great but then our moment happened. I remember holding you so you wouldn’t stumble while walking me to my car, I remember you caressing my arms while we looked into each other’s eyes and all I could think was, there’s nothing in the world that I wouldn’t do for this angel to keep her happy, then you kissed me. You kissed me Michelle. I felt the touch of those soft amazing lips against mine and you turned my whole world upside down, the funny thing is, I was so full of happiness and shock that a tear came out of me left eye and I’m not even joking, I wasn’t crying but it was just one tear and I was praying that you wouldn’t notice and that it didn’t run across your face for you to feel it, thank god you didn’t and this is the first time you’re hearing about it. I laugh every time I think about it. I remember the drive home being one of the longest drives home as I had the windows, sunroof open pumping my hands and waving my arms around like I just scored the winning shot for the NBA Finals. I remember screaming YES!!!!!! FUCK YES!!!!! WOOOOOO!!!! I LOVE THIS WOMAN!!!! YESSSSSS!!!! ALL THE WAY HOME, I didn't care if any cars next to me heard or saw, loving life. What adds to this is how you became not only my partner, but my best friend as well. I love how I’m able to be 100% weird and silly with you, I love how much I’m able to be myself around you and share my humour with you, amazing how you find the same humour as me funny. We share a lot of history together. We’ve got history. When I started getting you into Chris Brown properly, then you started sharing the same interests and hobbies as mine (reps, Jordans, setups, gaming, tech, youtubers, PCs, shoes, I got you into the Marvel Universe, then you branched out and we kind of shared Star Wars together too, you branching out into streaming, finding your own favourite games like Skyrim), I loved the influence we’ve had on one another's lives and have always tried to support everything you do, I hope you know that (e.g. like always watching your streams to keep your viewer count up, helping you with your setup ideas, stresses, etc).
I constantly thought to myself, where am I ever going to find someone this gorgeous who’s into literally everything I’m into as well but is somehow still unique in her own way (I love how you enjoy listening to game and movie soundtracks, reading into things like lore of games and stuff, the list doesn’t end). Not only were you my girl, you were my best friend, more than Jono or Jack, more than anyone. My favourite thing is how you even kind of listened to Jake Miller and Zayn when I started playing them in the car and you started singing along and suggesting which songs you like, never been happier and prouder than realising our music taste influences one another, that Post Malone concert we went to was another night I won’t forget. I hope we never leave each other’s lives and stay close, there’s no one in the world like you, I won’t lie when I say I genuinely do hope we find our way back to each other but that’s not me telling you it HAS to happen or like forcing you or anything. It also is definitely not my intent on writing this letter, like I said, I just wanted to speak my mind and also put all my cards on the table. I know you told me not to wait, I listen, I completely understand and have accepted it may not work out, it’s just a little bit hope, I say it with full confidence that I’ll never love someone as much as I love you, you’re my best friend, my soul mate and although you don’t like ‘Friends’, you’re my Rachel, it’s you Michelle, it’s always been you.
It’s been mind-blowing to have you in my life and I am forever grateful and thankful for everything you’ve taught me, helped me with, changed in me (willingly, wanting to and for the better) and especially shown me (like how much I can love someone both as my bestie and my partner, taking advantage of every opportunity given in life). I truly mean it when I say thank you for everything, all the memories, the history, everything. You are a blessing on this Earth.
Thank you Michelle.

CONTEXT: Names have all been changed for anonimity, there's a lot of inside references and memory references that may not seem as significant to any reader, but just wanted to put this out there to let people know to not get complacent in the relationship and let them get away. I still hope one day I find my way back to her, but for now this was the final letter I left her.
​
Dear Michelle,
I’ve spent a countless number of days staring at this blank piece of paper not knowing what to do with it or what to say. The number of times I’ve scrunched it up and had to restart is crazy. I’d be lying if I didn’t say I still don’t know what I’m doing with this, just putting all cards on the table I guess. But most importantly I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I miss you and think about that gorgeous face of yours all the time. In no way is this me trying to “get you back”, no ill intentions or anything negative, please understand this.It’s been many years since I’ve used an actual pen to write on a piece of paper, the last being your “Get Well Soon” card when you were upset about you and your ex and your Christmas Card. Not having you in my life anymore has granted me a lot of time to myself to think and process my life. Believe me, I’ve done a LOT of thinking, about you, about me, about us and life in general. You’ll be happy to know I’ve done a lot of growing and all this period. All that I ask is IF you do read this, try to take in every word and read it meaningfully with no distractions. I write this with all my heart.
Remember the day I planned on asking you out to make things official? I dedicated the entire day to being all about you and keeping that beautiful huge smile on your face. I took you to get your ears pierced, we then went to Chadstone and shopped around, came home to nap before I took you to the Melbourne Star wheel. The glimmer in your eyes throughout the day and even while in the deck was mesmerizing and I couldn’t have been a happier man, unfortunately we were plagued by the indians and their families in the same cabin so I wasn’t able to fulfill my plan on asking you out but we laughed about it in the car ride home and at least it gave us a funny story on how we came to be official. Although I was grateful and thankful for the amazing time I got to spend with you then and especially the feeling of your warmth and comfort when you were cuddled in my arms and in that moment looking at you watching the view with me I couldn’t help think to myself, I’ve never cared about someone so precious ever in my life but most of all, you’ve never looked more gorgeous than in that one moment.
Or even the night I took you to the Conservatory, you wore my favourite outfit of yours but we were still a bit shy with one another. You were quiet at the dinner table as we were still early together but the vibe was mutually great and the night outside was as beautiful as you were. Never have I seen someone I love look so amazing while messily munching down on a buffet of food, that was the night you showed me you were a Little Piggy. The funniest part of the night was seeing your shock and guilt with the bill, I don’t need to tell you the cheeky laugh it gave me to see you like that as I was doing it right in your face. Although, my favourite part of the night was when we parked out the front of your house and chilled there for the longest time and enjoyed each other's company, in that moment, was when I knew, there’s no place I’d ever rather be than with my arms around you.
My all time favourite moment would have to be the time we spent staying at Crown. There has never been a better set of days in my life as perfect as those. It was all unforgettable, from the moment we came and just jumped in bed to cuddle, going to the Galactic Circus and playing the arcade games, especially the fun playing air hockey having to pretend to lose to you, seeing so concentrated on winning and then the smile that erupted on your face when you did, I couldn’t help but smile and think to myself, this angel makes me feel at home. The coolest part was the dinners on both nights, Korean BBQ the first night then having the pleasure of Jono and Erin to join us at Kitchen Workshop for the second night, the casino with them after it was fun as hell. What set each day in stone in my mind was showing you how much you meant to me when making love to you every night, I’ll never forget how lost I was staring into your beautiful blue eyes, I still do to this day and they’ll always be my true favourite feature of you. I’ve had a countless number of memorable cherished experiences with you and it is an honour for a lot of these experiences with me to be your firsts in general.
You’ve taught me so much over these past couple years that we’ve dated, you’ve shown me how to be a better person day by day by treating everyone with the same kindness, love and respect that you’d love reciprocated by them back. I’ve slowly learnt from you on how to be the bigger person in situations instead of sinking down to their level, how to be a mature man and not the Shaun I used to be before I met you. I love the man I have become because of you and have always hoped that you were lowkey proud of my development, all thanks to how amazing you are. Props to your amazing parents for raising the beautiful woman you are today. I know I still have faults, I admit that and take full responsibility for them all but I have grown heaps especially these past few weeks and am still working on them. You may think I never listen to you but I’d like you to trust me, because I always am, I listen to every word of your recommendations on how to be better, at the time I’m just a tiny bit ignorant about it but don’t let that deter you from thinking that I don’t take your words in.
The one thing I have loved being able to do with you that I am unable to do with anyone else EVER is ALWAYS FEELING COMFORTABLE coming to you whenever I need do things like vent, a shoulder to cry on or help with how to deal with certain situations because I found that no one else could ever help as much as you could and would. I loved being able to vent to you about any and every one of my problems throughout my day or life in general, you were my rock, I felt safe and at home knowing that you genuinely cared and were also giving me endless support and advice. It felt good knowing someone was genuinely listening to me and was there. I have always tried my 100% best to do the same for you and I hope I have reciprocated that same feeling back. I hope that you always knew and felt comfortable coming to me to vent about anything, work, life, any of your problems like your career troubles, friends (I’m not going to name all the troubles, we both know everything). Whenever you did rest assured that I always dedicated you my 100% undivided attention and support and would always drop whatever I was doing and come straight over to cheer you up whenever I possibly could because I wanted to always be there for you, seeing you sad is my least favourite thing in the world, it still is.
Most importantly, the one thing I think of that is most special in my life and that I hold very dearly to me is two words:
2 Weeks
In the little over 4 weeks I spent chasing you, I realised that all it took was only the last 2 that meant something to me. 2 Weeks together. 2 Weeks was all it took for me to fall in love with you. I remember our first kiss like it’s tattooed in my mind. I remember every moment, from coming to Jenna’s house to take you home, meeting Rachel for the first time and listening to her saying “you have a really nice car”, you whispering something to her before she closed your door, something that we will both never know which has always crossed my mind, in a happy and funny way. I remember playing our song OTW in the car going towards Mia's place and you falling asleep while it happened, I remember looking at you there so drunk, yet peaceful and full of life, happy in the moment even though you were asleep, no sight has ever lit up my world more than that. Taking you to Mia's house and conversing and getting along with all your friends was great but then our moment happened. I remember holding you so you wouldn’t stumble while walking me to my car, I remember you caressing my arms while we looked into each other’s eyes and all I could think was, there’s nothing in the world that I wouldn’t do for this angel to keep her happy, then you kissed me. You kissed me Michelle. I felt the touch of those soft amazing lips against mine and you turned my whole world upside down, the funny thing is, I was so full of happiness and shock that a tear came out of me left eye and I’m not even joking, I wasn’t crying but it was just one tear and I was praying that you wouldn’t notice and that it didn’t run across your face for you to feel it, thank god you didn’t and this is the first time you’re hearing about it. I laugh every time I think about it. I remember the drive home being one of the longest drives home as I had the windows, sunroof open pumping my hands and waving my arms around like I just scored the winning shot for the NBA Finals. I remember screaming YES!!!!!! FUCK YES!!!!! WOOOOOO!!!! I LOVE THIS WOMAN!!!! YESSSSSS!!!! ALL THE WAY HOME, I didn't care if any cars next to me heard or saw, loving life. What adds to this is how you became not only my partner, but my best friend as well. I love how I’m able to be 100% weird and silly with you, I love how much I’m able to be myself around you and share my humour with you, amazing how you find the same humour as me funny. We share a lot of history together. We’ve got history. When I started getting you into Chris Brown properly, then you started sharing the same interests and hobbies as mine (reps, Jordans, setups, gaming, tech, youtubers, PCs, shoes, I got you into the Marvel Universe, then you branched out and we kind of shared Star Wars together too, you branching out into streaming, finding your own favourite games like Skyrim), I loved the influence we’ve had on one another's lives and have always tried to support everything you do, I hope you know that (e.g. like always watching your streams to keep your viewer count up, helping you with your setup ideas, stresses, etc).
I constantly thought to myself, where am I ever going to find someone this gorgeous who’s into literally everything I’m into as well but is somehow still unique in her own way (I love how you enjoy listening to game and movie soundtracks, reading into things like lore of games and stuff, the list doesn’t end). Not only were you my girl, you were my best friend, more than Jono or Jack, more than anyone. My favourite thing is how you even kind of listened to Jake Miller and Zayn when I started playing them in the car and you started singing along and suggesting which songs you like, never been happier and prouder than realising our music taste influences one another, that Post Malone concert we went to was another night I won’t forget. I hope we never leave each other’s lives and stay close, there’s no one in the world like you, I won’t lie when I say I genuinely do hope we find our way back to each other but that’s not me telling you it HAS to happen or like forcing you or anything. It also is definitely not my intent on writing this letter, like I said, I just wanted to speak my mind and also put all my cards on the table. I know you told me not to wait, I listen, I completely understand and have accepted it may not work out, it’s just a little bit hope, I say it with full confidence that I’ll never love someone as much as I love you, you’re my best friend, my soul mate and although you don’t like ‘Friends’, you’re my Rachel, it’s you Michelle, it’s always been you.
It’s been mind-blowing to have you in my life and I am forever grateful and thankful for everything you’ve taught me, helped me with, changed in me (willingly, wanting to and for the better) and especially shown me (like how much I can love someone both as my bestie and my partner, taking advantage of every opportunity given in life). I truly mean it when I say thank you for everything, all the memories, the history, everything. You are a blessing on this Earth.
Thank you Michelle.

Prince Rainier III (1923-2005)
Rainier’s mother, Princess Charlotte, was actually illegitimate. Her father Louis II, getting older and with no legitimate children, legitimized her and made her his heir. She never took the throne, and in fact renounced her rights to her son, Rainier, the day before his 21st birthday.
Rainier became the Sovereign Prince of Monaco upon the death of his grandfather in 1949.
During WW2, Rainier served in the Free French Army. During the 40s and 50s he was in a long term relationship with the French film actress Gisele Pascal. Rainier’s sister, Princess Antoinette, wanted her own son to ascend to the throne, and spread rumors that Pascal was infertile. The rumors along with her treatment by the press and public ended their relationship.
After the war Monaco, a country who made its money primarily as a gambling origin, was in crisis as wealthy Europeans found their funds diminished after the war. To restore Monaco’s treasury Rainier decided to promote Monaco as a tax haven, and he personally took control of SBM (the company who owns the Monte Carlo Casino, Opera, and Hostel de Paris) in 1964. Prince Albert still retains a large share of the company and profits from it today.
Marriage:
Everyone knows this one. Rainier married American film star Grace Kelly in 1956.
Their marriage is rumored to have been turbulent. It is said that Grace struggled with adjusting to royal life, regretted ending her film career, and that Rainier had extramarital affairs. Her children have stated that though she was a loving mother, they spent more time with nannies than with their parents.
Grace's dress is iconic, but here you go if you want to revisit some photos from that day.
Rainier smoked up to 60 cigarettes per day, and in the last years of his life his health steadily declined. On March 8th, 2005 he entered the hospital for a lung infection and by the end of the month he was on a ventilator suffering from renal and heart failure. On March 31st he officially announced his son Albert, as regent, and on April 6th he died.
The Constitution
Monaco’s constitution stated that Monaco is a constitutional monarchy ruled by the hereditary princes of the Grimaldi. If the reigning prince were to die without leaving a male heir, Monaco, according to the treaty, would be incorporated into France. In 2002, realizing he had a 43 year old bachelor son, Rainier amended the constitution to allow the crown to pass to his daughters should Albert not marry.
Grace, Princess of Monaco (1929-1982)
Grace was born in Philadelphia to an affluent and influential family. Her father was an Olympian and a Democratic nominee for Mayor of Philadelphia and was appointed by President Roosevelt as National Director of Physical Fitness. Her mother taught physical education at the University of Pennsylvania and coached women’s athletics at Penn.
Her Uncle, George Kelly, was a Pulitzer prize winning dramatist, screenwriter, and director and used his influence to gain Grace admission to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. Grace became one of the biggest movie stars of her generation.
In 1955 she was sent to the Cannes Film Festival and invited to appear in photos with Prince Rainier. After a year-long courtship, they were married in 1956.
Grace was not allowed to continue her acting career after her marriage. She instead devoted herself to her role as Princess, become heavily involved with the Red Cross of Monaco and the Rainbow Children Coalition.
On September 13, 1982, Kelly was driving back to Monaco after spending time at her country home. During the drive she had a stroke, lost control of her vehicle, and drove off the mountainside. She died a day later.
An article on their relationship
Prince Albert II (b. 1958)
Prince Albert is one of the wealthiest royals in the world with a net worth at more than $1B. He attended Amherst College in Massachusetts, studying political science, economics, music, and English literature, and completed his education with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science. He toured Europe in 1979 as part of the Amherst College Glee Club.
Albert competed in the bobsleigh for five consecutive Winter Olympics on behalf of Monaco, and was their flag bearer at the 1988, 1994, and 1998 Olympics. He is also a judo black belt.
He became Prince of Monaco when his father died in 2005.
Marriage:
Prior to his marriage his status as a bachelor was a hot topic of discussion. He was known to date well-known fashion models and actresses, however at age 53 had never married. It was rumored that Albert was gay, something he expressed great frustration with in the press. In 2006 he attended the opening ceremony of the Torino Olympics with South African swimmer Charlene Wittstock. They were engaged in 2010, and married in 2011.
There are rumors that Charlene tried to flee the country the day before their wedding. It is reported that the future bride, after discovering Albert may have fathered yet another child during their relationship, attempted to flee as many as three times before their wedding, however was always intercepted at the airport. It is also said she attempted to seek refuge at the South African embassy, and that officials in Monaco ended up hiding her passport so she could not leave the country.
Moreover, during their wedding, Charlene openly cried at parts, and Prince Albert was caught on camera begging her to kiss him. Honestly, she looked pretty miserable the whole time. The palace has denied all of these claims.
During their honeymoon, they stayed in separate hotels
Here's everything you ever needed to know about their wedding
Watch it
Prince Albert is passionate about the environment and an avid sportsman. Prince Albert speaks French, English, German, and Italian. He speaks English with basically no accent thanks to his American mother.
Illegitimate Children
In 2005, the day before Prince Rainier died, Albert publicly acknowledged he had fathered a son out of wedlock. In 2006, he confirmed he had also fathered a daughter. These children were barred from the line of inheritance because of a 2002 constitutional amendment requiring an heir’s parents to be married.
Alexandre (b. 2003)
Alexandre’s mother (Nicole Coste) was a flight attendant for Air France and met Prince Albert when he was a passenger on a flight. He asked for her number, the beginning of a years-long affair. The relationship ended at the insistence of Prince Rainier. Albert visited Alexandre and Nicole often, however when he refused to acknowledge Alexandre publicly, Nicole sold an interview and pictures to the media. Albert was in mourning for his father and made no public comment, but later did acknowledge paternity. Alexandre and Nicole live in France at an estate given to them by Albert.
Jazmin (b. 1992)
Jazmin’s mother, Tamara, met Albert while working as a waitress. Albert knew of Jazmin and visited her, however did not acknowledge her publicly until she was in high school to protect her identity. In 2006 the French magazine Voici published photographs of Jazmin and her mother on a visit to Monaco, outing her as Albert’s daughter. She has attended events with Albert and Charlene, and is listed as a sponsor for her father’s royal foundation.
An interview with Jazmin
Princess Charlene (b. 1978)
Born in Zimbabwe, Charlene’s family relocated to South Africa in 1989. She represented South Africa at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, finished fifth in the 4x100 meter relay.
Albert and Charlene met at the Mare Nostrum swimming competition in Monaco in 2000, however were not seen together until 2006.
Charlene converted to Roman Catholicism for her wedding, and has learned French and Monegasque after her move to Monaco. She is an ambassador for the Special Olympics, patron of the South African Red Cross, and is passionate about sport.
In recent news, she completed “the crossing” water bike challenge, a 180 kilometer water bike race for charity.
An interview with Charlene and Albert on the 1st birthday of their twins
Albert and Charlene have 2 children:
Hereditary Prince Jacques *twin* (b. 2014)
Princess Gabriella *twin* (b. 2014)
Gabriella was born 2 minutes before her brother, however because of the constitution her brother will inherit the throne. They are super sweet together and you see them at events often.
Princess Caroline of Hanover (b. 1957)
Caroline is the eldest child of Rainier and Grace Kelly, however because of the constitution her brother, Albert, sits on the throne of Monaco. She served as de facto first lady of Monaco until the marriage of Albert and Charlene.
Until the birth of her niece and nephew she was heir presumptive to the throne, although she had only held that title since 2005 after the change of the constitution to include female heirs.
Caroline received her French baccalaureat in 1974, and received a degree in Philosophy from Sorbonne University. She is fluent in French, English, Spanish, German, and Italian. Her hobbies include horseback riding, swimming, and skiing.
Marriages:

• Marriage 1: Philippe Junot

Married Phillippe, a Parisian banker, in 1978. The couple divorced in 1980 with no children.

• Marriage 2: Stefano Casiraghi

Married Stefano in 1983, the sportsman heir to an Italian industrial fortune. The two had to marry in a civil ceremony rather than a religious ceremony because Caroline, a Catholic, was divorced. Caroline was 3 months pregnant at the time of their wedding.
They have three children:

1. Andrea Casiraghi (1984)

• Married to Tatiana Santo Domingo and has 3 children

1. Charlotte Casiraghi (1986)

• Married to French producer Dimitri Rassam and has two children

1. Pierre Casiraghi (b. 1987)

• Married to Beatrice Borromeo and has 2 children

Note: The Casiraghi’s are all very beautiful and very fashionable but I don’t want to go much into them here because they are so far down the line of succession. They’re fun to follow for their fashion if you have the time to check them out.

• Marriage 3: Prince Ernst August of Hanover

Married Ernst August, a Prince, in 1999. They have one daughter, Princess Alexandra.
Caroline is thus a Princess twice-over, through her family and through her husband. She and Ernst August have been separated since 2009 however are still legally married, thus she retains the title of Princess Caroline of Hanover.
Read about all of her weddings here
See her speaking in English around 12:00 here
Princess Stephanie (b. 1965)
Stephanie was in the vehicle with her mother when Grace died. She suffered a fracture of the neck.
She has studied classical dance and piano, and competed in gymnastics and horse riding. She interned at Christian Dior and debuted as a model in 1984. She has a swimwear and perfume line, and owns cafes and stores in both Monaco and Barcelona. She also has sold more than 2 million copies of her song, Ouragan, and sold 1.5M copies of her album Besoin. She recorded “In the Closet” with Michael Jackson, however is listed as “mystery girl” in the credits.
Marriages/Relationships:

• Marriage 1: Daniel Ducruet

Stephanie married her former body guard, Daniel Ducruet, in 1995. When Rainier learned of their relationship Daniel was not only still his employee, but had a pregnant girlfriend too. Stephanie gave birth to their two children “out of wedlock” because Rainier refused to grant permission for them to marry, however eventually relented. The two divorced a year later after Ducruet was photographed naked with a stripper.
Read more
They have two children:

1. Louis (b. 1992)

• Married Marie Chevallier in 2019

1. Pauline (b. 1994)

​

• Relationship 2: Jean Raymond Gottlieb

Stephanie and Jean never married, however have a child together. He was Rainier’s Head of Security. She did not identify him on the birth certificate and it was not confirmed that he was Camille’s father until she confirmed it herself on her Instagram.
More about Jean
​

• Marriage 3: Franco Knie

Stephanie met elephant trainer (yeah, you read that right) when she presented him with the award for “best animal tamer” at the Monaco Circus Festival in 1997. Franco, a decade older than Stephanie, was married with two children at the time. Franco left his family for Stephanie, moving her and her three children into his circus caravan in Zurich. Marrying in 2001, their relationship lasted 18 months until their divorce.
An interview with Stephanie in English in 1990
Why is he a Prince and not a King?
From vogue:
It goes back deep into the history of Monaco. Monaco has always been a tiny nation, and, for protection, allied itself with (or, at some points, was flat-out annexed by) big powerful countries, with big powerful rulers—aka kingdoms, or, a nation ruled by a king or queen. So Monaco’s rulers styled themselves as prince and princess. That, by definition, made the nation a principality, or one ruled by prince or princess.
Regardless, Albert actually plays a bigger role in the day to day operations of the country than most of his European peers. Legislative power is divided between the Prince who initiates the laws, and the National Council who votes on them. Executive power is retained by the Prince, and he has full judiciary powers.
Jewels
See their tiara collection
I think the Ocean Tiara, gifted to Charlene for her wedding, is particularly interesting. You either love it or you hate it.
The Grimaldi Curse
What do you think?

Trump was over a billion in debt and the Russians bailed him out.
► Trump was first compromised by the Russians in the 80s. In 1984, the Russian Mafia began to use Trump real estate to launder money. In 1987, the Soviet ambassador to the United Nations, Yuri Dubinin, arranged for Trump and his then-wife, Ivana, to enjoy an all-expense-paid trip to Moscow to consider possible business prospects. Only seven weeks after his trip, Trump ran full-page ads in the Boston Globe, the NYT and WaPO calling for, in effect, the dismantling of the postwar Western foreign policy alliance. The whole Trump/Russian connection started out as laundering money for the Russian mob through Trump's real estate, but evolved into something far bigger.
► In 1984, David Bogatin — a convicted Russian mobster and close ally of Semion Mogilevich, a major Russian mob boss — met with Trump in Trump Tower right after it opened. Bogatin bought five condos from Trump at that meeting. Those condos were later seized by the government, which claimed they were used to launder money for the Russian mob. (NY Times, Apr 30, 1992)
► Felix Sater is a Russian-born former mobster, and former managing director of NY real estate conglomerate Bayrock Group LLC located on the 24th floor of Trump Tower. He is a convict who became a govt cooperator for the FBI and other agencies. He grew up with Michael Cohen--Trump's former "fixer" attorney. Cohen's family owned El Caribe, which was a mob hangout for the Russian Mafia in Brooklyn. Cohen had ties to Ukrainian oligarchs through his in-laws and his brother's in-laws. Felix Sater's father had ties to the Russian mob. This goes back more than 30 years.
► Trump was $4 billion in debt after his Atlantic City casinos went bankrupt. No U.S. bank would touch him. Then foreign money began flowing in through Bayrock (mentioned above). Bayrock was run by two investors: Tevfik Arif, a Kazakhstan-born former Soviet official who drew on bottomless sources of money from the former Soviet republic; and Felix Sater, a Russian-born businessman who had pleaded guilty in the 1990s to a huge stock-fraud scheme involving the Russian mafia. Bayrock partnered with Trump in 2005 and poured money into the Trump organization under the legal guise of licensing his name and property management.
► In July 2008, the height of the housing bust, Trump sold a mansion in Palm Beach for $95 million to Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch. Trump had purchased it four years earlier for $41.35 million. The sale price was nearly $54 million more than Trump had paid for the property. Again, this was the height of the recession when all other property had plummeted in value.
► Semion Mogilevich was the brains behind the Russian Mafia. Mogilevich operatives have been using Trump real estate for decades to launder money. That means Russian Mafia operatives have been part of his fortune for years. Many of them owned condos in Trump Towers and other properties. They were running operations out of Trump's crown jewel.
► From Craig Unger's AMA: "Early on, a source told me that all this was tied to Semion Mogilevich, the powerful Russian mobster. I had never even heard of him, but I immediately went to a database that listed the owners of all properties in NY state and looked up all the Trump properties. Every time I found a Russian sounding name, I would Google, and add Mogilevich. When you do investigative reporting, you anticipate drilling a number of dry holes, but almost everyone I googled turned out to be a Russian mobster. Again and again. If you know New York you don't expect Trump Tower to be a high crime neighborhood, but there were far too many Russian mobsters in Trump properties for it to be a coincidence."
► So many Russians bought Trump apartments at his developments in Florida that the area became known as Little Moscow. The developers of two of his hotels were Russians with significant links to the Russian mob. The late leader of that mob in the United States, Vyacheslav Kirillovich Ivankov, was living at Trump Tower
► According to a Bloomberg investigation (3/16/2017) into Trump World Tower, “a third of units sold on floors 76 through 83 by 2004 involved people or limited liability companies connected to Russia and neighboring states.”
► In 2013, Federal agents busted an “ultraexclusive, high-stakes, illegal poker ring” run by Russian gangsters out of Trump Tower. They operated card games, illegal gambling websites, and a global sports book and laundered more than $100 million. A condo directly below one owned by Trump reportedly served as HQ for a “sophisticated money-laundering scheme” connected to Semion Mogilevich.
► The Russia Mafia is part and parcel of Russian intelligence. Russia is a mafia state. That is not a metaphor. Putin is head of the Mafia. So the fact that they have been operating out of the home of the president of the United States is deeply disturbing.
► Rudy Giuliani famously prosecuted the Italian mob while he was a federal prosecutor, yet the Russian mob was allowed to thrive. Now he's deeply entwined in the business of Trump and Russian oligarchs. Giuiani appointed Semyon Kislin to the NYC Economic Development Council in 1990, and the FBI described Kislin as having ties to the Russian mob. Of course, it made good political sense for Giuliani to get headlines for smashing the Italian mob.
► A lot of Republicans in Washington are implicated. Boatloads of Russian money went to the GOP--often in legal ways. The NRA got as much as $70M from Russia, then funneled it to the GOP. The Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee lead by McConnell got millions from Leonard Blavatnik. In the 90s, the Russians began sending money to top GOP leaders, like Speaker of the House Tom Delay. Craig Unger's book alleges that most of the GOP leadership has been compromised by RU money.
► At the Cityscape USA’s Bridging US and the Emerging Real Estate Markets Conference held in Manhattan, on September 9, 10, and 11, 2008, Donald Trump Jr. was frank about the tide of Russian money supporting the family business, saying "...And in terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets."
► Eric Trump told golf reporter James Dodson in 2014 that the Trump Organization was able to expand during the financial crisis because “We don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.”
► Russian oligarchs co-signed Trump’s Deutsche bank loans.
Trump now gleefully takes cues from Putin:
► At the end of 2018, Putin and his allies started making a strong push for a resolution that would justify their country’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan and reverse an 1989 vote backed by Mikhail Gorbachev that condemned it. The Putinists’ goal was to pass the resolution by Feb. There is no one on this side of the Atlantic who thinks the USSR was justified in invading Afghanistan. And out of nowhere, on January 2nd, Trump came out strongly supporting Russia's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.
► Trump went against American intelligence on North Korean missiles. He told the FBI he didn't believe their intelligence because Putin told him otherwise. “I don't care, I believe Putin"
► Trump met in secret with Putin at the G20 summit in November 2018, without note takers. 19 days later, he announced a withdrawal from Syria. As a note, Trump conducted FIVE completely private meetings and conferences with Putin, and has gone to great lengths to prevent literally anyone, even people in his administration, from learning what was discussed.
► Trump refused to enforce sanctions legally codified into law - and in some cases reversed standing sanctions on Russian companies.
► He has denounced his own intelligence agencies in a press conference with Putin on election meddling - and publicly endorsed Putin's version of events.
► Trump pulled out of the INF treaty with no explanation, which allows Putin to create long-range hypersonic missiles that threaten Europe with impunity. The US already has all the weaponry that the INF would ban the development of, so this offers us literally nothing, while allowing Russia to develop powerful new weapons to challenge our allies.
► Demanded Russia get invited back into G7
► Pushed the CIA to give American intelligence to the Kremlin.
► Withdrew from the Open Skies treaty
► Received intelligence in 2019 that Russia was paying bounties for dead American soldiers, and hasn't done anything about it by the time of this writing.
► Announced troop withdrawal from Germany (America's missile defense from Russia and forward operating base against Russian aggression)
► And of course, Trump continues to threaten to pull out of NATO, a move so catastrophically stupid, so inconceivably cosmically myopic, I truly can't express the profundity of the idiocy. Suffice to say, pulling out of NATO would be like the only guy in a prison yard with a shotgun just throwing it over the fence for absolutely no reason, suddenly giving the people with crude homemade shivs complete power.
► Trump commuted the sentence of Roger Stone, a former advisor convicted several charges, including lying to Congress, witness tampering and obstructing a congressional committee proceeding, as part of former special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation.
Edit: thanks for the awards, credit should also go to u/victorvictor1 who originally composed this list. Also, please share so that more people can see this

Ta-daaaaaaa! It's the Official Prima Holographic Ultra-Rare Rofl Trial Summary Thread!
This is just for reference. None of the little bastards are roleplaying here, so we can be as meta as we want!
Daddy said if we do a good job with the Summary Thread, he might let us host the next trial... So let's all try our best!
This is boring. Where's all the killin'? Where's everybody playin' the blame game?!
Father gave us our own thread, but we're missin' out on all the good stuff!
Yeah! Enough with this boring evidence crap!
SCREW ALIBI SPREADSHEETS, I WANNA SEE SOME CARNAGE!!!
H-hey, you guys are off-script! Did you forget your lines again?!
I thought we rehearsed this! Father told us no matter what, we can't forget our...
...
Uh... What were we talking about?
N-not you too, Monotaro! Are you okay? Did the amnesia come back?!
Who, me? I'm fine. I just have one question...
Who's Monotaro?
Waaaah! This is a total train-wreck! Daddy will never let us host a trial at this rate!
...

Truth Bullets

• Monokuma File: Sonia - The victim of this case is Sonia Nevermind. She was found dead at the bottom of the middle of the Three Lakes between the Casino and Hotel Kumasutra. She died during night time. The cause of death is asphyxiation.
  
• Winter Wear: The victim was found wearing generic winter clothes to stay warm such as a jacket, pants, and some gloves. In addition, instead of her trademark neck ribbon, the victim was found wearing a fluffy red neck scarf.
  
• Sonia’s Shoes: Extensive scuffing marks on the back of the victim’s red high heels and tears on the back of her black leggings were discovered.
  
• Sonia’s Scarf: Worn by the victim instead of her trademark neck ribbon. It has been wrapped to cover the victim’s neck. On a free end of the scarf, there is a small hole, and near it are traces of blood.
  
• The Motive: For the first motive of this Killing Semester, Monokuma threatened that if a murder doesn’t happen in the next twenty-four hours, then he will make their parents forget they ever existed.
  
• Emergency HVAC Maintenance: A malfunction in the outdoor HVAC system was detected some time in the afternoon, so Monokuma had to repair it overnight. He announced that temperatures in the Courtyard would drop from the normal 25 C (77 F) to -10 C (14 F) during the night. The system was reactivated to normal operation at 8 AM when Monokuma gave the morning announcement. All indoor areas maintained room temperature overnight. After maintenance, the outdoor temperature returned quickly to normal.
  
• Free Access to the Labs: In the prologue to the Killing Semester, Monophanie announced to the class that all Research Labs at the Academy would be open and its doors kept unlocked 24 hours a day, allowing anyone free access to utilize them.
  
• Wax Residue: Visible traces of black wax were found at the lower-level Plaza next to a bench adjacent to the TV post.
  
• Letter to Gundham: Delivered to Gundham’s dorm room some time yesterday afternoon. It reads: “Gundham, I may have found a way to escape. Do not talk to me today. We are being watched and everyone is potentially dangerous. Meet me at 6:30 AM outside the Dormitory. -Sonia”
  
• Letter to Sonia: Found on the victim’s person during the investigation. It was delivered to Sonia’s dorm room some time yesterday afternoon. It reads: “Sonia, I may have found a way to escape. Do not talk to me today. We are being watched and everyone is potentially dangerous. Meet me at midnight at the Shrine of Judgement at the lower level of the Courtyard. -Gundham”
  
• Gundham’s Account - Sunrise: Gundham claims to have left the Student Dormitory at 6:25 AM this morning to meet with Sonia outside the Dormitory at 6:30.
  
• Gundham’s Account - Sonia’s Corpse: Gundham further claims to have found the victim’s corpse at 7:00 AM lying on top of the middle of the frozen Three Lakes. He claims to have attempted to save her by walking onto the ice to extract her from the frozen lake, but in his attempt fell immediately through the ice and passed out to hypothermia shortly after exiting the lake.
  
• Flattened Patch of Grass: During the investigation just after 9 AM, Gonta, with his extremely sharp vision, noticed that there was a small patch of flattened grass of approximate size 30 centimeters by 15 (12 inches by 6 inches) behind the TV stand at the lower-level Plaza. According to Gonta, taller grasses like those found in the Courtyard when flattened typically do not stand up until twelve hours have passed.
  
• Rantaro’s Account: In the prologue to the Killing Semester, Rantaro went up to the Ultimate Survivor’s Lab in search of dossiers he prepared at an unknown prior time. Upon arrival, he discovered they were missing.
  
• Sonia’s Belongings: Kazuichi was granted permission to search Sonia’s dorm room and her belongings during the investigation. Among other things, he found the last book she was reading, “Spooky People and Spookier Places,” which covers cults, the occult, and serial killers, as well as Sonia’s Monopad, which seems to have been there for some time as it has sunk into the mattress. You can read the book HERE.
  
• Sonia’s Wristwatch - During the investigation, Sonia’s corpse was found wearing the watch on her left wrist. The watch seems to have been broken at some point: its hands are stuck, and turning the crown on the left side no longer changes the time. Monokuma assures the watch kept an accurate track of time up until it was broken. A visual is available in the Truth Bullet Supplements. .
  
• Sonia’s Wristwatch Supplement - The watch is made by TIMELY, a Novoselic-based watchmaker. It is a simple yet expensive and luxurious golden watch with white clock hands and a rose-pink dial.
  
• An Account of Wax Dolls: During Daily Life, Angie, Gonta, Kaede, Mahiru, Maki, Makoto, Rantaro, and Sayaka discovered lifelike wax doubles of each student hidden away in the Art Room closet. Knowledge of their existence was kept to themselves.
  
• Hagakure’s Account: In his “deep memory clairvoyance,” Hagakure remembered that all watches made in Novoselic, in compliance with international standards, are by law required to place their crowns to the right side of the watch face.
  
• Autopsy Report: At the victim’s neck, there is a round hole approximately 50 millimeters (2 inches) wide that goes completely through. The victim’s larynx has been destroyed, and a mass of blood accumulated in the victim’s airways to totally restrict breathing after the hole was created. An estimated time of death cannot be produced.
  
• Letter from an Accomplice: A letter found on Sonia’s person without a sender name or recipient. The sender claims to know the recipient’s secret and solicits their services to be an accomplice to whatever murder plot the recipient desires. The full text of the letter can be found in Supplements.
  
• Secret Message: Upon counting the number of letters between each apostrophe in the Letter from an Accomplice and then turning that number into a letter (1=A, to 26=Z), the letter in secret reads “HIT ORDER. KILL SONIA. MIDNIGHT. DEUS SALVET.”
  
• Autopsy Report Supplement: A limited chemical analysis reveals heightened levels of adrenaline prior to death, suggesting the death was not instantaneous. Further, no indications of a gunshot wound could be observed on the victim.
  
• Motive Anti-Cheat (MAC): After the body was discovered, Monokuma met in private with Byakuya during the investigation. According to Monokuma, Byakuya didn’t act in the spirit of the motive and convinced someone else to kill by authoring all the letters involved in this murder. This renders Byakuya the sole accomplice to the murder. Subject to punishment, he may not reveal the blackened’s identity.
  

Truth Bullet Supplements

• Click HERE to access all available and relevant Trial supplements, including visual aids.

Cast - Main Course

• roflcopterpilotx as Endymion, Monokuma^UTC-5
  
• mechamaru as The Legend of Max, The Monokubs^UTC-8
  
• brooklyndis as Candy(Star), Mahiru Koizumi^UTC-5
  
• Chespineapple as Monkey Business, Byakuya Togami^UTC+0
  
• DestinyShiva as Butterfly, Komaru Naegi^UTC+0
  
• Duodude55 as Hopeful, Makoto Naegi^UTC-5
  
• Hearter20 as Ubertreffen, Kaede Akamatsu^UTC+0
  
• JustADramadog as Bamboo Sword Girl, Peko Pekoyama^UTC-4
  
• lappy-486 as Wild Side, Gonta Gokuhara^UTC-5
  
• Makosear as Trigger, Maki Harukawa^UTC-3
  
• Panos0502 as Riot of Color, Angie Yonaga^UTC+2
  
• PeanutPiano as The History of the Future, Yasuhiro Hagakure^UTC-8
  
• Pikmaster5 as The Light, Sayaka Maizono^UTC+11
  
• spaghettiyo as Cartoon Heroes (Speedy Mix), Shuichi Saihara^UTC-8
  
• staplemage as Horatio, Rantaro Amami^UTC-8
  
• TheIdiotNinja as PARANOiA Hades, Gundham Tanaka^UTC+1
  
• thejofy as Across World, Kokichi Ouma^UTC-5
  
• tyboy618 as Toy Box Factory, Kazuichi Souda^UTC-5
  

Reserve Course

• TheCatMinister as Ibuki Mioda^UTC-3
  
• Nakama_witnesser as Hiyoko Saionji^UTC+8
  
• Bossobee143 as Tenko Chabashira^UTC-5
  
• RSLee2 as Nagito Komaeda^UTC-7
  
• dukedice as Kaito Momota^UTC-6