If schadenfreude made a noise, then you’d be hearing it pretty loudly from me right now: Kevin Trudeau — a convicted credit card fraud, and a man who made tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars by telling people he could cure their cancer using, get this, coral calcium — has lost his appeal to the federal court, and must pay $37.6 million dollars in fines.

Trudeau, who shilled this false cancer cure as a diet supplement, was ordered by a federal judge in 2008 to stop making and airing infomercials about it. I wrote about this at the time, but I kept seeing those evil infomercials on TV. I wondered about this, but now I understand: Trudeau was trying to sidestep the order by selling books about this false cure, not the supplements directly. And, he kept buying up those ad spots while appealing the order. But on November 29th of this year, the appeals court said "nope".

As the court papers say:

The protections, unfortunately, were too weak: Trudeau aired infomercials in violation of the order at least 32,000 times. He should not now be surprised that he must pay for the loss he caused. At a minimum, it was easily within the district court’s discretion to conclude that he should. And $37.6 million correctly measures the loss. The figure is conservative — it only considers sales from the 800-number, not sales in bookstores carrying his "As Seen on TV" titles…

Wow, so he only violated a court order 32,000 times. But wait, there’s more! Apparently, there’s not a lot of real info in those books; they just funnel people to a web site urging them to spend hundreds of dollars for the products he sells. So how much money do you think he really made?

The court also instituted a $2 million bond in case he tries to make more infomercials. It doesn’t stop him from placing ads or writing books, just from bilking people using those long-form late night infomercials:

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UPDATE: Kevin Trudeau has been cited with contempt of court and must serve time in jail for it.

I love how that article describes Trudeau as "deeply tanned". That’s awesome.

For those unaware, Trudeau is not one of the good guys. In fact, to describe him in the terms I want, I’d have to violate my own rules on this blog.

The bad part of this? He’s only getting 30 days. Once he’s out he’ll still have all his books and a radio show on which to shill them. But I still have hope the system will prevail. There is a limit to free speech, and fraud breeches that limit. As Trudeau should have learned the first time he was convicted of it.

Tip o’ the coral calcium to Chris Babarskas once again.

Hey, remember Kevin Trudeau, the guy convicted of fraud, the larcenous liar who mercilessly (literally) plugs away on informercials to sell his books like Natural Cures "They" Don’t Want You to Know About, books that tell people to turn away from real medicine so they can die of cancer if they follow his quackery?

Yeah, that sweetheart.

Well, he’s at it again. He just doesn’t think that his reputation can get any lower, despite being able to comfortably limbo underneath a mosquito’s belly with room to spare. Trudeau recently urged his minions to send protesting emails and text messages to federal judge Robert Gettleman — the hero who raised a fine against Trudeau from $5 million to $37 million, to better match the money Trudeau defrauded out of people for his books. Gettleman is currently working on potentially revising his order after an appellate court found his ruling too broad.

I can’t imagine Trudeau’s actions will help his case any.

And, oddly enough, Gettleman doesn’t think so either. Especially since some of the notes were threatening. Seriously folks, how stupid must you be to send threatening emails to a frakking federal judge?

Well, they are loyal to Trudeau, so I guess that answers that.

Anyway, Gettleman had Trudeau hauled into court yesterday, where he slapped the fraudulent huckster with a contempt of court charge:

Gettleman ordered Trudeau to turn over his passport, pay $50,000 bond and warned he could face future prison time.

Gettleman, on his own authority, can sentence Trudeau to up to six months in prison. In addition, the judge referred the matter and the emails to the U.S. Marshals Service, which investigates threats to judiciary.

It would certainly be interesting indeed if Trudeau were thrown in jail for the rest of his life, with the added rule that he is not allowed to sell any wares whatsoever in books, magazines, on TV, radio, or any and all future media. If you think that’s too harsh, then maybe you need to familiarize yourself with Trudeau’s past antics. Some purveyors of alt-med quackery may be honest in their beliefs, but if you read Trudeau’s history you may find yourself being just a wee bit skeptical of his pure motivations.

I love seeing justice being served in cases like this. I really hope judge Gettleman throws the book at Trudeau… and that’s something Trudeau really doesn’t want you to know.

Tip o’ the coral calcium to BABLoggeee Chris Babarskas.