Prosecutors want wild nuptial video at federal fraud trial

-- Wedding planner, $10,000. Flowers, $45,000. Hotel, $80,000. Videographer, $4,000. But to federal prosecutors -- perhaps priceless.

The government alleges the 2005 romance and marriage of Edward Hugh Okun and Simone Bolani played a part in a $132 million fraud that victimized 577 clients through a now-defunct, Richmond-area company owned by Okun.

Authorities have asked U.S. District Judge Robert E. Payne to admit into evidence parts of the professionally made video of their $200,000 wedding for use in Okun's March trial.

The 13 minutes show the bride, then 27, dancing provocatively, and the groom, then 54, removing a garter from her leg with his teeth in opulent festivities attended by a pug wearing a tuxedo and a Pomeranian dressed in a gown.

Bolani announces she is pregnant with Okun's son. Okun tells his guests that with a new generation on the way, that it "should make my yacht broker very happy."

In a written response to the prosecution request, Okun's lawyers strongly oppose the government's motion, arguing that the prejudicial effect of the video far outweighs any value as evidence of wrongdoing.

"Presentation of these videotaped statements could only result in inflaming the jury against Mr. Okun . . . based on the premise that he is an adulterer who left his wife to marry a much younger woman who[m] he had impregnated," Okun's lawyers argue.

"The only purpose of this evidence is to impugn Mr. Okun's character and prejudice the jury against him," they contend.

According to a July 10, 2008, indictment, from August 2005 to December, 2006, Okun's Richmond-based company, The 1031 Tax Group, bought six intermediary companies that held money from the sale of investment properties until it could be used to buy new properties.

Under section 1031 of the Internal Revenue Code, such transactions, performed in a timely manner, defer the capital-gains tax that would otherwise be due. Sale proceeds are held by the intermediary companies until closing on the replacement property purchase.

Once Okun acquired an intermediary company, the government alleges he wired millions of dollars worth of client money into his personal bank account and other accounts he controlled, using it for personal purposes and to buy other intermediary companies.

The wedding, alleges the government, was part of a scheme to convince his executives and others -- many of them wedding guests -- that he "had massive independent wealth."

Three of Okun's former employees have pleaded guilty to charges under agreements that call for them to testify.

Aside from the wedding, Okun is alleged to have spent the misappropriated funds to buy: a $4.1 million home on Hibiscus Island in Miami, an $8.6 million, 131-foot yacht he named "Simone," a helicopter, luxury cars, jewelry and an estate in New Hampshire.

Now 58, Okun is facing a three-week trial starting March 2 on charges including conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, money laundering and bulk-cash smuggling.

In the Dec. 10, 2005 wedding video, Bolani, in a Brazilian accent, says she was impressed with Okun's generosity when he took her shopping the first weekend they met in February 2005. "He's very, very good to me," she says.

Okun says they spent that first weekend together and that he decided to ask Bolani to marry him within two months of meeting her. "I looked at those eyes and I fell in love with her immediately," he says.

When the two first met, Okun was married and living in Indianapolis but soon moved to Miami. At the same time, says the government, his employees saw "a change in Okun in that he began purchasing a significant number of new toys including cars and jewelry for Simone."

According to the government, in Aug. 26, 2005, Okun signed a settlement agreement with his now ex-wife requiring him to pay her almost $6 million within 30 days and an additional $2 million within 180 days.

Prosecutors say Okun's first purchase of one of the intermediary companies , his divorce settlement agreement and his first theft of client money all occurred within one week of each other.

Without the video, the government contends, an "important context that sets the stage for Okun's scheme to defraud will be missing."
Contact Frank Green at (804) 649-6340 or .