USMag – The man who tried to extort $100,000 from Cindy Crawford has turned himself into police in Germany, the Associated Press reports.
Edis Kayalar, 26, reportedly walked into a police station in the southwestern city of Stuttgart late Monday. He has been charged with one count of extortion in the U.S. If convicted, he could face up to two years in prison.
The former supermodel, 43, and her husband Rande Gerber were the latest celebrities to be ensnared in an extortion drama involving a bizarre photo of their eight year-old daughter, Kaia.
Kayalar allegedly threatened to release the year-old photo — which reportedly showed the girl bound to a chair and gagged. According to court papers, Kaia said that a former nanny took the picture as part of a “cops and robbers” game they were playing.
The suspect will appear before a judge Tuesday to determine his current detention.
TMZ – Cindy Crawford was targeted for extortion, over a photo of her daughter which showed the daughter bound to a chair and gagged.
Documents were filed in federal court saying that Edis Kayalar, a friend of a former nanny of Crawford and husband Rande Gerber, was threatening to sell the photo of the couple’s 7-year-old daughter.
Crawford’s rep says the photo was taken as part of a game of cops and robbers, without Crawford’s knowledge. The docs say the nanny took the photos as a “prank” and that Kayalar stole the picture from her.
We’re told Crawford and Gerber went to the cops, who turned it over to the FBI.
According to legal docs, Gerber paid Kayalar $1,000 for what he thought was the original photo. But Gerber claims Kayalar came back a few days later, claiming he still had a copy and demanded more money.
And this is curious …. according to the documents, Kayalar was arrested by the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department on September 16, 2009, placed in federal custody by ICE agents for an immigration violation. He was then deported to Germany.
But it didn’t end there … The Feds say on November 1, 2009, Kayalar called the Crawfords from Germany and said he “had no choice now but to extort the victims for money because they had gotten him deported.” He demanded $100,000 or else he’d release the photo to the media.
BTW, someone tried peddling the photo to TMZ approximately 6 weeks ago. We passed.
OK! George, 48, enjoyed a day in the Italian countryside with latest lady love, model Elisabetta Canalis
and fellow celebrity couple Cindy Crawford and Rande Gerber.
PEOPLE – It’s hard to age gracefully as a supermodel. But at 43, Cindy Crawford has her coping strategies firmly in place – a mixture of acceptance and defiance.”I have cellulite. I admit it,” the legendary cover model says with a laugh in the September issue of Redbook, on sale Tuesday.But if [Wait!Theres Tons More…]
Us Mag -George Clooney is coming to the defense of pal — and Cindy Crawford’s husband — Rande Gerber, who is currently being sued for sexual harassment.
“I was with Rande the entire night — as were a lot of people,” he said in a statement to Usmagazine.com Monday, regarding an occasion in which two former female employees said Gerber tried to kiss and fondle them. “They will all say the same thing that I’m saying. This event never happened. Period.”The lawsuit was filed in March in San Diego County Superior Court by a pair of former waitresses who claimed they were fired from a restaurant owned by Gerber’s company for refusing to give in to the advances of Gerber and other managers where they worked. [Wait!Theres Tons More…]
Cindy Crawford and husband Rande take a stroll along the beach in Baja California, Mexico on April 8.
CELEBRITY bar operator Rande Gerber, whose dozens of glamorous nightspots include the Whiskey Bar at the W in Times Square, is locked in a bitter dispute with two West Coast hotels. Two of Gerber’s nightclubs at the Hard Rock Hotel in San Diego, Sweetwater Saloon and Moonstone Lounge, have been shuttered by hotel management over claims that Gerber’s security staff routinely physically and verbally abused clubgoers.
George Clooney, who’ll be joining new dad (again) Brad Pitt at the Venice Film Festival, hosts lunch on his yacht Sunday for celebrities including Bono and Cindy Crawford in Saint-Tropez, France. – People
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