2010 - 2019
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Victor Flores
Birth Date: 2/9/59
Birth City: Eaton, IN
Patience: 9
Spending: 7
Bio
Growing up poor in Eaton, Indiana, Victor Flores is the last kid in the world you’d think would ever grow up to own a professional baseball team. He did what he had to do to survive. He had some minor scrapes with the law during his teen years and was taken under the wing of reputed Chicago mob boss Giovanni ‘Johnny Red’ Pannunzio. Flores worked his way up the Chicago mob structure. Always a natural with computers and programming, Flores spearheaded the original wave of cybercrimes, including identity theft and DoS attacks.
Using his knowledge and comfort with the computing world, Flores invested his ill-gotten gains in several tech startups during the mid-90s, getting rich when any college kid who created a startup was having money thrown at him. And unlike millions of others, he knew when to get out, largely divesting himself of tech stocks about six months before the bubble burst.
During the first decade of this century, Flores retained two things from his younger days: His love of baseball and his allegiance to the Chicago mob. After the Yankees killed MLB, Flores was among the inaugural investors in the fledgling North American Baseball League. His initial intent was to grab the Chicago franchise but, after that fell through, he founded the Mississauga Spartans, a team located in the western suburbs of Toronto , Canada. His wife was from there and most of her family still lived in the Lorne Park neighbourhood where she grew up.
The Spartans served several purposes for Flores. It allowed him to keep his wife happy by living close to her family. It fulfilled his desire to be the owner of a professional baseball team, and it also served as a money-laundering platform for both him and his former cronies. Except for the actual on-field product, organized crime had its tentacles throughout the organization, from concessions to the secondary ticket market to parking. Everyone, it seemed, got a little taste.
Although Commissioner James Gordon had been given wide ranging powers when he formed the NABL, they didn’t include actually forcing an owner to sell the team. So, although most of the other 24 owners weren’t happy with the person running Mississauga, they had little choice but to plug their noses and invite him along to the owners’ meetings.
But that all changed when a joint organized crime task force made up of US Federal agents and Royal Canadian Mounted Police brought down a myriad of indictments against the Pannunzio crime family, including Flores. He now faces dozens of charges in both Canada and the US that include, among others, racketeering, money laundering and tax evasion.
With the managing partner of the Spartans facing these serious charges, Gordon finally had the ammunition he needed to force his ouster. By a 23-0 vote, the league decided to rescind the franchise from Flores, citing a morals clause. Installed in his place was 29-year-old Ethan Matthews, a self-made millionaire.
In our next installment, we’ll take a look at Matthews and what kind of owner he’s likely to be.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
Victor Flores
Birth Date: 2/9/59
Birth City: Eaton, IN
Patience: 9
Spending: 7
Bio
Growing up poor in Eaton, Indiana, Victor Flores is the last kid in the world you’d think would ever grow up to own a professional baseball team. He did what he had to do to survive. He had some minor scrapes with the law during his teen years and was taken under the wing of reputed Chicago mob boss Giovanni ‘Johnny Red’ Pannunzio. Flores worked his way up the Chicago mob structure. Always a natural with computers and programming, Flores spearheaded the original wave of cybercrimes, including identity theft and DoS attacks.
Using his knowledge and comfort with the computing world, Flores invested his ill-gotten gains in several tech startups during the mid-90s, getting rich when any college kid who created a startup was having money thrown at him. And unlike millions of others, he knew when to get out, largely divesting himself of tech stocks about six months before the bubble burst.
During the first decade of this century, Flores retained two things from his younger days: His love of baseball and his allegiance to the Chicago mob. After the Yankees killed MLB, Flores was among the inaugural investors in the fledgling North American Baseball League. His initial intent was to grab the Chicago franchise but, after that fell through, he founded the Mississauga Spartans, a team located in the western suburbs of Toronto , Canada. His wife was from there and most of her family still lived in the Lorne Park neighbourhood where she grew up.
The Spartans served several purposes for Flores. It allowed him to keep his wife happy by living close to her family. It fulfilled his desire to be the owner of a professional baseball team, and it also served as a money-laundering platform for both him and his former cronies. Except for the actual on-field product, organized crime had its tentacles throughout the organization, from concessions to the secondary ticket market to parking. Everyone, it seemed, got a little taste.
Although Commissioner James Gordon had been given wide ranging powers when he formed the NABL, they didn’t include actually forcing an owner to sell the team. So, although most of the other 24 owners weren’t happy with the person running Mississauga, they had little choice but to plug their noses and invite him along to the owners’ meetings.
But that all changed when a joint organized crime task force made up of US Federal agents and Royal Canadian Mounted Police brought down a myriad of indictments against the Pannunzio crime family, including Flores. He now faces dozens of charges in both Canada and the US that include, among others, racketeering, money laundering and tax evasion.
With the managing partner of the Spartans facing these serious charges, Gordon finally had the ammunition he needed to force his ouster. By a 23-0 vote, the league decided to rescind the franchise from Flores, citing a morals clause. Installed in his place was 29-year-old Ethan Matthews, a self-made millionaire.
In our next installment, we’ll take a look at Matthews and what kind of owner he’s likely to be.
Last edited by Rich on May 13th 2014, 3:46 pm; edited 1 time in total
June 21st 2017, 10:43 pm by Rich
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