Hamptons Architect Sentenced In Child Porn Case

Call him creepier than your average pedophile, which is quite an accomplishment. Jay Lockett Sears, the architect who reportedly designed homes in the Hamptons for Michael J. Fox and Clint Eastwood among others, was sentenced a few day ago for his nastly little child pornography photoshopping habit.

Photoshopping, you say? Yeah, apparently this creepster with a Mark Twain-Tom Wolfe-Santa Claus fetish vibe, was taking pictures of kids in public and then photoshopping himself and other adults into the harmless photo, making it, yeah...really not harmless anymore. Yick. This strikes us here at Hamptonyte as oddly creepier than a guy in a van with fists full of candy.

In either event, Sears was sentenced to six months house arrest and five years probation, according to the Associate Press.

Looks like the judge was on his own "Mission of Kindness." See what I did there? For background, check out this article by Erica Jackson at the Westhampton-Hampton Bays Patch, back when there was an Erica Jackson at Westhampton-Hampton Bays Patch. Or any Patch for that matter. The best is the closing quote from Vincent Cinque, who had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Angel's Wings back in the 5th grade.

"When he came to talk to us back in elementary school, he was just plain creepy," he said.

Creepy? What gave it away? The all white suits? The wings? The Cheshire grin? The cane? The camera snapping away pictures of girls at beach parties? What shocked us here at Hamptonyte is that anyone could see this guy around and NOT think he's a pedophile.Yes, we're shocked by people's shock.

On the bright side, if you're looking for an architect in the Hamptons, we know one who'll be home every day until December.

Did Bruce Buschel's douche chills contribute to his shuttered restaurant?

We'd like to think so, and so do the good folks at Curbed Hamptons, who reported a few weeks ago that Buschel's Southfork Kitchens on the Bridgehampton Turnpike is up for sale for $3.8m.

Buschel, no stranger to this blog, is somehow a complete stranger to the idea that shitting on your target demographic often makes your target demographic suddenly hungry for McDonalds. Although, in fairness to Buschel, McDonalds is probably where Buschel figured his demographic eats anyway.

Buschel is a rare and interesing character in that, it's rare for people to want to see someone's dreams battered like Private Pyle in Full Metal Jacket, yet sooo many people wanted to see that with him (peep the comments in the link). It's rare for someone to see their dream fulfilled and then completely undermine it by publicly attacking his own patrons in all his New York Times-contributing what-the-fuckery. It's rare for a New York entrepreneur to be so vaginally thin-skinned as to respond to relatively obscure blogs that criticize said what-the-fuckery, and it's rare for a massive amount of people to take glee in someone else's demise. Yet that is what Buschel and all the douche chills he invokes, has done.

Look at it this way: his restaurant closing is the equivalent of people saying 'I would rather starve than eat at your place.' Ah Buschel. The douche is strong in this one.

So Southfork Kitchens has shuttered. And that's a good thing. And Buschel may walk away with $3.8 million. And that's a bad thing.

See. We don't even want you to have money!

Sex offenders ring in the New Year: Hamptons Style!

If you're looking to party with the hottest, sexiest, trendiest sex offenders in the world, look no further than toney Southampton Town! That's right, these totally fabulous fingerers decided to hit the town for New Year's Eve, as their residency in mobile homes parked in Westhampton appear to be staying put into 2013.

County Executive Steve Bellone was supposed to pass a measure to move them out of Westhampton by year's end, but...oops. He totally forgot! Now they're here, they're fierce, and they're ready to party it up, Hamptons Style!

Check out Pat McGroin's definitely 2013 neckware he snagged from the mannequins at Cynthia Rowley's Montauk Shop. Holden McCrotch is absolutely fabulous and forward in this matching popped collar from Ralph Lauren. And he accessorizes! Nothing attracts the kiddies like his candy bracelets from Ralph's fabulously lovely, and totally not entitled princess daughter Dylan!

So where were these heavy-panting hotties tongueing down the toddlers at midnight on December 31? Our sources don't know. And they'd never kiss and tell...that would be soooo last year!

Jerry Della Femina's Problems Would Make Jesus Christ Want To Murder Him

Jerry Della Femina's idea of poverty is so rage inducing we saw the Dalai Lama read this Business Insider article and then immediately turn around and punch an infant in the face.

Della Femina, the sleazy, slimy lying gold-toothed creep ad man was one of the few Madison Avenue execs who amassed his fortune and didn't manage to blow it on a coke habit in the 80s. He's been a permanent fixture in the Hamptons since forever and even opened up a successful restaurant with the money he made convincing people with money they don't have to buy shit they don't need.

Now he's sold his house because, well, because his poor unborn great grandchildren may not be able to sit by a pool lined with the skin of Mexican day laborers while doing lines off a blonde co-ed's back. Or as we used to call it: The American Dream.

That's right, a man who lives in America in 2012, with full knowledge of how high the unemployment rate is, who no doubt had to lay off some of his own workers at his various business ventures, who flies his helicopter over thousands of foreclosed homes, has the balls to complain that he's selling because he refuses to pay more taxes under the Obama administration.

Taxes? Really? Taxes? You do realize, Della Femina, that your tax bill is probably quadruple the monthly mortgage of the average home just west of where you live, right?

Instead of feeling fortunate that he even has the money to PAY those taxes, he's selling low just to avoid them. His ginormous, disgustingly lavish, and grossly unnecessary oceanfront house went for $25 million. He wanted $40 million. But he's settling for 25. A fact that makes us just...so sad.

“I want the proceeds of this sale to go to my kids and my grandkids,” he told The Post's Jennifer Gould Keil and Selim Algar. “I don’t want my money going to Obama, and that’s what’s going to happen in the New Year. That’s why I sold right now, that’s why I wanted to get this done.”
“I’m basically the loser in Obama’s class warfare,” he added.

Wow. That really gets us...right around...the chest/heart region or thereabouts. Another loser in Obama's class warfare, according the article, is Discovery Networks CEO David Zaslav, who inherited Della Femina's meager 8 bedroom, 6.5 bathroom, heated pool-even-though-there's-a-literal-ocean-500-feet-away, mansion that sits on 1.7 acres.

On a side note, we'd like to know how an advertising/marketing guru can be this culturally tone-deaf. On a sider note, we'd like to know how Della Femina's brain didn't say to him: 'please don't call the NY Post and...say anything like what you're about to say.' On an even sider note, we'd like Della Femina to eat a bag of dicks.

Rule #127: When commenting on a blog...know who you're defending

Many moons ago, we published in an innocuous little blog piece entitled The Worst. Press Release. Ever. It was a press release that didn't, um...release anything. It wasn't a new promotion, it wasn't an incident, it wasn't details on a new store opening. It was a synopsis of a party thrown by a rich couple, featuring amateur acts all coralled by a man in the know in the Hamptons: Tariq Alexander.

His "network" is called TSW, The System Within, and apparently it's a social network for wanna-be celebrities looking for their big break, not by auditioning, or working hard at their craft, or conceptualizing something amazing and fresh, and new. No. By going to the parties where powerful people hang out and basically throwing themselves at them. It's a form of charlatanism we often overlook in our culture. The by-product of our short-cut, American Idol, skip-the-line, skip-the-hard-work, go right to the front because you're special mentality.

The post sat dormant for months until suddenly we got inundated with multiple comments from "users" (appropriate word) of Tariq's network, The System Within.

Even though you believe the press release mentioned in the original post may not have been the most well written announcement of the Hamptons event, I fully support the spirit of what they were trying to accomplish. I have worked with TSW in the past and found it to be an incredibly helpful organization. They have always bent over backwards to help me with any problems or questions that I have encountered and have been a great resource for connections within the entertainment world. As mentioned by the poster above, the entertainment industry is incredible difficult to break into and having the resources of TSW at my disposal have made the audition process and the endless search for new contacts much easier. From my point of view, knowing the assistance that TSW has provided to me in the past, this event sounds like it was a wonderful opportunity for those involved to network and show off their talents. Although the press release did not relay what it was meant to, I think it is important to look beyond it to the important service that TSW is providing to its clients. I have fully enjoyed and appreciated the assistance I have received from Mr. Alexander and his company would urge others trying to break into entertainment to consider using TSW as a resource.

And

I'm sorry you had a bad experience with TSW. I've been using it myself for quite some time now and personally I love it. I've received a lot of helpful insight and tips that previously did not occur to me. I've also received various career and network opportunities that proved to be very useful. I've also spoke with others who have worked with the company in the past, including those I’ve recommended, all of whom have given positive feedback.

For a while we felt bad for throwing poor Mr. Alexander under the bus. But at long last, the universe makes sense again. Our last commenter dropped us a little alley-oop by way of some link love to multiple news sources reporting that Alexander's "TSW" business is under investigation for developing a pyramid scheme, whereby the number of referrals and paid users funnels money upward for not a whole lot of Return On Investment. The links are here, and here. So yeah. There's a lesson for the above commenters. Before you go out on a limb for someone, make sure it isn't rotten to the trunk. And by rotten, we mean Pyramid Schemes. And by Pyramid Schemes, we mean Tariq Alexander.

The Weakonomy: Naming Names

So we got a kick out of this article on CNBC.com, not because we don't think Lehman Bros. royally screwed people out of their future, but because, as a society, we've evolved to the point of stalking Lehman Bros. employees.

Meet Lehman Executive Erin Callan and her hunky piece of Queens firefighter love-hunk Anthony Montella (pictured here). They're enjoying themselves on a beach. Just look at her. She looks happy. Which is against the rules for executives at Lehman Bros., Goldman Sachs, or any of the investment companies that made us so proud to be little entrepreneurs.

Apparently Ms. Callan is named in a lawsuit filed by the California Public Employees' Retirement System, which, without even reading the details of the suit, sounds painful to think about. (Read: please don't tell me Lehman Bros. ransacked peoples' pensions.) Ms. Callan is one of three executives named in the suit, so CNBC.com decided to go dumpster diving on their asses.

No news regarding the other two, but they did get some sweet photographs of Callan and her boy-toy living it up in East Hamptons, dipping their toes in the sand. Callan poses with her head cocked, puppy-love style. Montella still has that look of disbelief prevalent on the faces of many wonks who bag themselves a financial whale. That "pinch-me-this-can't-be-happening" look. Ah, the lifestyles of the rich and morally bankrupt.

In addition to this bit of paparazzi scandal, the article also unearthed a montage of photos published on Webshots that Montella took of Callan's East Hampton home, which was on sale for a very modest $3.75 million, then pulled from the market and put back on the market for an inexcusable $3.9 million, and then pulled from the market and put back on for a more realistic and feasible $3.6 million. Be right back, I gotta go hit a cash machine.

As it stands, the house is back off the market and it appears Ms. Callan will remain in East Hampton, holed up with her hunky firefighter-man, (who may come in handy should Californian pensioners decide to come burn her house down). And lastly, but more importantly, her boyfriend has a Twitter account.

Tweeting? Really? The jury's still out on whether or not to behead you both.

Badvertising: The Job Search

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Badvertising: Hamptonyte's Guide to Nightmare Jobs

A new feature here on Hamptonyte will highlight job openings whose language in the advertisement should send up a red flag to anyone who might still have the luxury of picking and choosing what they wish to do for a living (if such people still exist.) From Craigslist, to MediaBistro, to CareerBuilders, we'll decode the language so you don't have to.

First up: This ad, which posted on Craigslist on October 27 for a "PR (public relations) Intern." What got our attention first? The word "whining." Kids...whenever a potential boss says he/she doesn't want "whining," RUN. Run far away. Because whining probably means you can't tell him about any obstacle that prevented you from performing your job. This could mean anything from a broken-down subway car, to accidental amputation. Ie: "stop whining about your arm getting chopped off, you totally have another one. Get back to work!"

"We would prefer to have someone from the Brooklyn area (Williamsburg/Greenpoint) as we don't want to have to deal with anyone whining about the incredible journey it was for them to travel from Manhattan to Brooklyn, late arrivals, etc. If you can handle the commute and don't think you need a passport to get here feel free to apply."

As if this isn't douchey enough, peep the other warnings to steer clear from this agency:

"This is not a job for someone who is going into PR for the parties, free gifts, chance to be on a reality show or to gawk at celebrities. If you're capable and a good representative of our team we'll bring you along to events, tapings etc. but don't expect it solely because you work with the agency."

Here's why you need to ignore this post. PR jobs are almost ALWAYS centered on parties, free gifts, and the chance to gawk at celebrities...it's what CREATED the industry in the first place. Any PR agency that pretends to divorce itself from that culture is LYING. They want to gawk at celebrities just as much as you do; they just don't have enough passes to get you into the joint. Next please.

Kelly Bensimon Sells Clothes For A Cause. Still Manages To Sound Like An Idiot

We know. Ripping apart this broad is low-lying fruit, and we usually try to be fair when someone repugnant does something to benefit humanity. In this case, we can't.

Real Housewives of New York City star Kelly Bensimon was out on someone's front lawn in Amagansett this past week. Eating their grass and sputtering out nouns? No. She was selling her soul, (see also: her clothes) for charity. If you happened to make it to her big fur yard sale, you too can dress like so last year.

The proceeds of cleaning out her closet to make room for this coming year's unnecessarily absorbidant shopping spree went to benefit Island Harvest, a non-profit organization that helps feed hungry Long Islanders.

Wonderful. Insightful. Caring. Philanthropic. Kelly...how does this act of generosity fit, philosphically speaking, into your world-view?

Added Bensimon: "I can't even do a yard sale without my hair being done."

Sigh. Something tells me she can quote Plato's Republic and make it sound stupid.

Real Housewife of NYC Ramona Singer Hates Africans

We just wanted to come back from our semi-vacation from this blog to put up a headline like this. Looks like Ramona Singer of the Real Housewives of New York City blew off hosting an event to raise funds for African children suffering from HIV/AIDS.

According to this article, she'd been prodding her assistant to call the party throwers and come up with all sorts of excuses not to host the thing. Our best guess is that her final excuse, the deal-sealer, was something like: "tell them I'm out of the planet. No, tell them I have bees in my closet. No, tell them my deck chairs rioted last night."

Anyhoo, the brave, the very noble, the very AIDS-educated scientist and world policy-maker Sonja Morgan (a Real Housewives co-star) stepped up to the hosting podium. And then fell down drunk while demonstrating her identity with Africans by doing the running man. But the brass balls award must go back to Singer. After rattling off all her reasons why she couldn't be there to host the event, she found out Sonja was hosting, and called the organizers to book a ticket as a guest! Wow.

We know three things. We know Ramona Singer's condemned soul is going to be everywhere proclaiming her innocence. We know the organizers of this Colors of Hope should feel deep shame for even asking a Real Housewife to host anything. We know children in Africa are shaking their heads and burying their faces into their hands.

Fameball Learns of Dune Ban; Opens Own Nightclub

According to our friends at Gawker, Michael Lohan, the guy who thinks bad parenting is charming, has gone all in on a Hamptons nightclub, aptly named "Controversy." As if there aren't enough toolbags running nightclubs during the summer in the Hamptons.

We think it might have something to do with that story we reported on last month, about how the Axe Lounge at Dune won't let him in. So he started his own. Here's to hoping the maximum occupancy is 1.

Wall Street Banks To Employees: Have Fun, But Don't Be A Dick About It

The recession has done nothing to deter the well-heeled from kicking off their business shoes and dipping them in the sands of the Hamptons. But now from Reuters comes this warning apparently handed down from Wall Street banks to its bevy of toolbag employees licking their chops to get out east, roll up their trousers, and hit on the waitresses. Go buy your $15 million homes. But do it secretly. Use a fake name, maybe. Or, aha, the name of a rival! This will seriously keep you from our guillotine.

This is the problem with unsourced material in journalism: the "some people say" approach to sourcing. Employers have probably sent no such warning to its staff. But it's fun to think they have!

Things are much better," [ Judi Desiderio, CEO,Town & Country Real Estate] said. "People feel more secure about their jobs. They feel more secure that the world isn't going to crack wide open and suck them in."

Yes, but just to be safe from the business end of our pitchforks, wear dark sunglasses and a big hat when you walk into her office.

Trailer Residents, Too Rapey For Westhampton

In your textbook case of NIMBYism, the Town of Southampton has successfully managed to at least temporarily slap an injunction on Suffolk County, preventing them from upgrading DSS trailers that house homeless sex offenders.

Everyone is relieved. Well...except the sex offenders. Some of whom you can find by entering Westhampton's zip code (11977) in the NYS Sex Offender Registry.

Read this article for the legal maneuvering it took to get this thing done; it would impress the Nixon Administration. They managed to prevent showers from being upgraded in the trailers, which made the trailers essentially unlivable (everybody knows sex offenders HATE being dirty), and therefore in violation of other town and county occupancy codes. Done. Go somewhere else, rapey homeless pervs!

Like Mastic! While Hamptonyte Blog certainly can't expect residents to be over the moon about registered creepers setting up shop in town (even if it is in the middle of the friggin woods on Old Country Road) I have to take personal umbrage with this quote from Suffolk County Legislator Jay Schneiderman:

“The community is not going to tolerate this any longer,” Mr. Schneiderman said. “This is not a policy—this is dumping on a community.”

And this gem:

“The burden needs to be shared,” said Westhampton Beach Village Board member Toni-Jo Birk.

Excuse me? That's dumping on a community? Two trailers plopped in the middle of the woods? And that's not sharing the burden, Madame Birk? Have you looked over the fence at William Floyd Parkway in Mastic, Mastic Beach, and Shirley? Here are the numbers for Level 2 and 3 sex offenders:

Mastic Beach: 18
Mastic: 13
Shirley: 8

Westhampton: 1
Westhampton Beach: 3
Hampton Bays: 8
Quogue: 0
Eastport: 0
Southampton: 2

In other words, adding Westhampton, Westhampton Beach, Hampton Bays, Quogue, Eastport, and Southampton's number of sex offenders draws them into a tie with Mastic. Three communities outnumber 6 communities by a tally of 39 to 13! I wonder where these offenders are going to end up when the county gets rid of its trailer program and switches to a $90-per-day voucher program? Hmmmm.

Run that horseshit by us again, Ms. Birk?

Heralded Whale Is Actually Attempted Murderer of Dog

Who knew that when we shed tears and took group photos in honor of a poor, martyred whale in Easthampton, we were honoring an attempted murderer?

In the aftermath of that whale's very public demise comes this harrowing tale from an Easthampton High School teacher.

This is literally the neverending story that began a month ago when a humpback whale beached itself in Easthampton. Crowds gathered. Police gathered. Then they riddled it with poison darts, because in all liklihood it was going to die as a result of being separated from its mother. Everyone went into hysterics. Wrote letters to every editor about the mishandling of this case. That poor, poor whale.

Turns out, the whale was a vengeful douche. Like Montezuma's revenge, an Easthampton Australian Shepherd, with the unfortunate name "Sydney," may have chowed down on some grade-A whale steak, marinated in Rush Limbaugh's medicine cabinet. The dog was trotting along the beach and then got very sleeply. Coma sleepy. And...stopped trotting quite obviously. His owner took him to a series of vets, and presto! $4,100 dollars later, Sydney was back answering to its unfortunate name.

Thanks a lot, dumb whale! You took a gouge out of someone's wallet and nearly killed a dog to boot! Now everybody hates you.