Hollywood & Crime: The High Low Stakes of the Bling Ring
They wanted to rob, and they did. How a bunch of rich kids walked into the houses of A-Listers and helped themselves to millions of dollars' worth of clothes.
“While this activity started as a twisted adventure for Prugo and his small group of friends fueled by celebrity worship, it quickly mushroomed into an organized criminal enterprise.” – The L.A.P.D. report on The Bling Ring.
"NANCY JO. THIS IS ALEXIS NEIERS CALLING. I'M CALLING TO LET YOU KNOW HOW DISAPPOINTED I AM IN YOUR STORY. THERE'S MANY THINGS THAT I READ IN HERE THAT WERE FALSE. LIKE YOU SAYING THAT I WORE SIX INCH LOUBOUTIN HEELS WITH MY TWEED SKIRT, WHEN I WORE FOUR INCH LITTLE BROWN BEBE SHOES-"
"29 DOLLARS!!!"
"EVERY TIME YOU F**KING YELL I HAVE TO RE-RECORD IT!!!!" – Alexis Neiers, leaving a voicemail to Nancy Jo Sales.
What would you do if you could get away with stealing something from a bunch of rich people? There’s been a lot of talk lately about altruistic theft or retributive shoplifting, the notion that the poor can take what they please from corporations and it’s not a crime given the ways they exploit their workers and tax loopholes to become billionaires. I’m not here to settle that debate (I am a hardcore left-winger so guess my feelings on corporate overrule), but it did make me think of one of the 2000s’ most obsessed-over true crimes. It was a case of vanity, theft, and ugly shoes that revealed just how thin the barriers are between the haves and the have-nots. The victims were all millionaires. The perpetrators were a group of inept brats with good luck and Google Maps. A reality TV series caught most of the action in real-time. And one of our most beloved filmmakers dramatized it. The Bling Ring was the high-low stakes Hollywood true crime story that we all needed.
It’s 2008. Twitter was emerging as the social media platform to be on, but Facebook was still king. The celeb blogs like Perez Hilton were keeping gossip snarky and mean. Keeping Up with the Kardashians was in its second year and growing in popularity. Oh, and a guy named Barack Obama was about to become President. There’s a huge recession going on, and pop culture is coping through a combination of comic book movies, the Beijing Olympics, GTA IV, and Coldplay. And reality TV is everywhere.
In Calabasas, California, a teenage girl named Rachel Lee is finding solace through reality TV and Xanax. She goes to an alternative high school after being expelled from her previous school, where she seems to do better. It's at Indian Hills High School where she meets Nicholas Frank Prugo, another expelled kid who felt out of place. He and Rachel bonded over fashion and shopping. She inducted Nick into her social circle, which included a number of kids: Diana Tamayo, the student body president and an undocumented immigrant who loved clothes; Courtney Ames, stepdaughter of the boxer Randy Shields; Johnny Ajar, a former convict and the boyfriend of Ames, who had spent time in jail for drug trafficking; Roy Lopez Jr., a restaurant worker who knew Ames; and Alexis Neiers, the daughter of a life coach and a proud party girl.
They were a mixture of middle-class kids and rich brats, although none of them are in the upper echelons of the uber-elite. They thought that made them underdogs of a kind, even though none of them ever truly had to worry about money, given that Calabasas homes regularly go for millions. Some were good students, but most indulged in petty crime and late-night underage partying. Attending an alternative school put them on the margins compared to many of their peers.
Lee and Prugo went on a shopping spree after stealing someone's wallet and using the credit cards inside. Prugo would later describe Lee as the ringleader, their manipulative leader and the one who wanted to start their crime spree across the mansions of the Hollywood hills. For their first celebrity target, they wondered, "Who would leave a door unlocked?" Who would be the most likely to have a ton of money and jewels lying around? The answer, they decided, was Paris Hilton, the heiress and reality TV star whose image as a dumb blonde made Lee and company believe she really was stupid. They found her home on Google Earth and checked if she was in town on the night of their theft. Prugo and Lee went together and rang the doorbell. They found a key under the doormat, but they didn't need to use it. The door really was unlocked. They returned with other members of the group and robbed Hilton of nearly $2 million in clothes, cash, jewellery, and other items over the course of five visits. While in her house, they tried on her shoes, took some drugs, and partied as if they owned the place. It wasn't a professional robbery. They didn't have to do much planning. They just walked in.
