Psychics’ Boss Has a Vision of Big Profits in His Future

“I don’t like to use Vic ,” says Vic Tomborino, almost brand-new to this psychic reading business in Laguna Hills. Come to think of it, I probably should have asked him why he doesn’t like it. Probably would have been an interesting story.

Instead, we got right down to the psychic business, which Tomborino began last year in a storefront next door to a beauty parlor and 7-Eleven on La Paz Road. Tomborino, 33 and a Philadelphia native, made it clear he wasn’t crazy about being interviewed but thought, what the heck, it might help business.

“I hired some guys to hand out flyers, and some people just crushed the flyers and said, ‘This is real bad work you do.’ I imagine they were sort of prejudiced against it.”

Any conversation with Tomborino probably would be fun, because he’s retained his East Coast dialect and almost a schoolboy’s openness about this brave new adventure that he hopes will mushroom into the big time.

“Why is it so popular today, is that what you’re asking?” he says as we sit in his shop. “People need it, I believe. People really like it. A lot of ladies, men, they come in and they have a reading for whatever, a half-hour, 20 minutes, five minutes, they come in and they tell me one thing, ‘Is this going to happen? Is that going to happen?’ ”

Yes, I say, but why do they want to know? “I don’t know why,” he says. “I guess part of what’s really going on is that on television with all this 1-800 and 1-900 psychic stuff, it’s word-by-mouth. Someone says, ‘This psychic put me on the right track.’ A psychic helped this person or that one. It’s like if you go to a doctor, you tell somebody, ‘This doctor really cured me, do you need a doctor?’ so you go to him. This is what it’s about, really.”

Although Tomborino says the city has been “great,” the council only recently voted, 4-1, to allow fortune-telling within its limits. The city had been banning fortunetelling for pay, based on an outdated county zoning code, but had to update its municipal code because the state Supreme Court has ruled that such bans were unconstitutional. Councilman Randal J. Bressette noted that such businesses sometimes have acquired bad reputations.

Seeming oblivious to political swirling, Tomborino says, “First of all, if a person has a problem with drinking or some young kids with drugs and they don’t want to tell their parents, they would come in here and ask for advice. You always listen to advice but do you know if it’s right or wrong? It’s free to listen to someone’s advice, but this here is the right advice. . . .”

So, I say, you basically offer advice? “I listen, yeah, a shoulder to cry on. You put them on the right track. They come in, they don’t know if they should do this or do that, what is the right move, what is the right thing. And you tell them, ‘I think this is really right for you.’ ”

That just sounds like being a good guy, I suggest. Does that qualify as psychic aid? “Well,” he says, referring to himself in the plural, “we’re actually a good guy, and it’s advice. . . . I myself am not very much into psychics, but the ones I’ve hired, they’re really good. They really feel like they get deep into their auras. That’s something to do with vibrations of the person.”

Tomborino says he asks customers if they’re satisfied with the information his psychics provide at the going rate of $1 a minute. So far, he says, no complaints. “They’re really, like, stung, sort of. Not frightened. They’re just, like, “How can you know so much about me? You don’t know me.’ ”

Tomborino proudly answers by saying: “Well, you got to expect it when you come in through that door. Some people are gifted with this power.”

I ask how he got into the business. “Did you ever go up to L.A.? To Melrose?” he says. “I’ve seen some nice places up there, neons lighted up. I seen what’s going on up there, wow, all those psychics, there must be something going on. Then seeing the television stuff, I said, what does it take to get into this business. I hired a couple psychics and got the office.”

So, you’re more the businessman than the psychic? “Businessman, right.”

When I ask about the range of services, he says, “Tarot cards, the aura reading. I’m asking the customers, are they accurate, yes they are. It’s more of a future thing, not the past. The palms, 99 to 100% accurate on the palms. You have your crystal ball, not many people ask for the crystal ball. They may have some readings, mind readings, vibrations readings, sand readings.”

Sand readings? Tomborino explains that sand reading dates to the ancient Egyptians and involves placing the palms on fine sand. “It’s pretty psychic,” he says, laughing.

Although not psychic himself, Tomborino believes in the power. “I’ve seen it done and I really believe in it. As a matter of fact, there’s a guy where I go wash my van at the car wash over here, and he thought one of the younger girls was my girlfriend. I said, ‘No, no, she just works for me.’ ‘She’s good!’ he says. ‘I really followed up with her at my job.’

“He’s the manager at the car wash. He was working seven bucks, eight bucks an hour, now he’s the manager. So he’s happy. He’s real glad.”