ZZZZ Best Jury Asks to Review Testimony, Tape of Conversation

Jurors in the Barry Minkow securities fraud trial asked Monday to hear again the defendant’s first day of testimony about the rise and fall of his ZZZZ Best carpet cleaning empire.

The panel also asked for a replay of an audiotape of a conversation between Minkow and the late reputed mobster Jack Catain.

On the tape, Minkow declares that he is not going to make more payments to Catain or his associates. At one point, Catain says, “We’ll take care of you,” a statement the defense has interpreted as a threat.

Minkow, 22, who is charged with 57 counts of securities, mail and credit card fraud, says he was a puppet manipulated by greedy mobsters. The government says Minkow was an unscrupulous con man who swindled investors for his own enrichment.

In his first day of testimony Oct. 25, Minkow admitted defrauding investors out of millions of dollars but said he did it at the behest of mobsters.

In that section, which jurors asked to hear, he blamed most of his troubles on a man named Dan Krowpman, whom he portrayed as a combination father figure and evil Svengali, a loan shark who drove Minkow deeply into debt.

Krowpman has pleaded guilty to charges related to the ZZZZ Best frauds, but did not testify at the trial.

Minkow, who was 16 when he founded his company in the garage of his parents’ home, admitted that he lied to investors by saying that ZZZZ Best was making a fortune restoring water- and fire-damaged buildings when no such jobs existed.

Minkow’s co-defendant, Norman Rothberg, charged with taking a bribe to cover up ZZZZ Best’s frauds, waited in the courtroom Monday along with defense attorneys and prosecutors while jurors deliberated.

The panel ended its third day behind closed doors without reaching a verdict.