POI: Michael Pak

[Lilmiss_cantbwrong]

Pak is def lying about something and what I do not understand is how MP and JB are not being charged with anything, including solicitation and whatever a pimp can be charged with. As far as I am concerned, at this point no one is any more innocent than the next guy because bottom line is Shanan is dead because of someone in OB and with out JB and MP she may actually still be alive!

 

[dc20015]

@ Tugela-

To your knowledge do escorts expect payment in cash or do you know if they use modern conveniences like credit cards, paypal etc?

Oops... you did say the John hands over the cash in an envelope beforehand. With that being said, do escorts ever accept payment via credit card or paypal? Do you think it's possible that SG, MBB, ALC, MB, JT and/or MW accepted payment via credit card or paypal?

I knew a guy who was a male prostitute from time to time. I'm pretty sure he always got paid in cash and/or drugs (as he was an addict). I can't imagine them using something that would leave a paper or electronic trail.

 

[Lilmiss_cantbwrong]

I do not think I have EVER heard of a working girl/guy receiving anything but cash for services. I mean as far as credit cards, pay pal and all that mess is concerned. What I am actually aware of is the use of "throw away" credit cards, much like the phones that are usually made out to fake people and accounts, and no one really seconds questions the use of these things.
Anyway, I do know that these cards are used sometimes as payment and so forth, but that is usually more of the working girl taking the cash and putting it on the card herself then actually having a client do it for her.
Like I said, this method is far fetched, yet it has been heard of and it is probably more commonly used than say a credit card, or pay pal. That of which are both verifiable, but also disputable, therefor causing problems for the worker getting paid up the road when the time comes. Everything done with a worker and a client should be done on a 'no trust' basis. No matter how intimate the moment, never trust. That is why cash is usually the only option. Once you hand over cash there's only 2 ways to get it back, ask for it and take it. :waitasec:

 

[Dwntwnslim]

HOUSTON — They interviewed prospective call girls at a Starbucks, bragging to an undercover police officer that their clients were “people you might see on television.” They charged $250 to $350 per hour, payable by cash, credit card and PayPal.


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/19/us/19houston.html

 

[dc20015]

HOUSTON — They interviewed prospective call girls at a Starbucks, bragging to an undercover police officer that their clients were “people you might see on television.” They charged $250 to $350 per hour, payable by cash, credit card and PayPal.


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/19/us/19houston.html

Sheesh. Bragging. Traceable payments. No wonder they got busted. Lol. But seriously, I have never been an escort, but I'd have to believe anything other than cash, drugs, or other "presents" is the exception rather than the rule.

 

[WINDSOR]

To use a credit card, the escort would have to be set up with a terminal somehow. Taxi drivers will accept credit cards because the dispatcher has the terminal and is in radio contact with the driver, and that is how they can get the credit card payment authorized.

Some escort services accept credit card payment (pre-payments) through their office. This New York agency for example

http://newyork.citysearch.com/profile/604140942/new_york_ny/elite_nyc_escorts.html#profileTab-owner

I think most of us agree that JB paid SG either in cash or drugs; back to my point, MP would want at least his share; and the cash or drugs appear to be gone from SG's possession.

LE enforcement needs to focus on MP, I am not sure he is the LISK but I know he was the last to see SG alive, he also had a motive and opportunity.

Now LE need evidence to lay charges. What kind of evidence?

**** Was MP seen with SG after he left Oak Beach. (by somebody or by a surveillance camera or traffic camera) Did anybody see him drive out of Oak Beach? Did he stop for gas on the way home?

**** Has MP said something to somebody and incriminated himself.


Unfortunately even if MP is responsible the usual forensic evidence will be explained away by the fact MP and SG worked together and traveled in the same vehicle. So it will not be easy.

MOO

 

[MrsPC]

I double checked, and I could not find any reports (yet) about money, so either there was no money in the wallet/purse which is my theory or LE is not saying there was.

No missing person report was filed by MP in Long Island or Suffolk County. Mari filed one in New Jersey, as that was where SG lived. Missing person reports are filed in the locale where the person lived.

http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20111213/NEWS/111219923

MP had a lot of plausible reasons to return to Oak Beach,

BTW in the timeline on SG by foreigner she does not have MP returning to Oak Beach until May 3. 2010.

If that is correct, then where was he from 6:00 AM May 1; until the morning of May 3 when he returned with A Diaz?

Just wondering?

MOO

Diaz did try to file a missing persons report according to this article

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/06/jersey_city_prostitute_still_m.html

 

[Dwntwnslim]

This app and device was available in early 2010. It's called squareup.

"Square is an electronic payment service, provided by Square Inc. Square allows users in the United States to accept credit cards through their mobile phones, either by swiping the card on the Square device or by manually entering the details on the phone."

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Square_%28application%29"]Square (application) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]


https://squareup.com/

 

[Lilmiss_cantbwrong]

I just want to say I speak from 1st hand knowledge, and from what I see, No REASONABLE PROVIDER would accept any form of payment except cash... Credit is way to unstable.


Again, I speak from 1st hand knowledge.

DO NOT judge!

 

[Seaslug44]

I agree that MP does not have an honest appeal about him during his on-camera interviews.

However, bottom line is that the police found merit in his story. According to those who heard the tape of SG's 911 call, MP was the voice of reason. He was the one person who SG could have trusted to get her out of her paranoid delusional state without harm. MP is not a suspect because there is much evidence to support that he tried to help her, he reported her missing, and he searched for her even the next day.

That does not sound like a guilty person and his polygraph supported the police findings that he is innocent.

Of course, all of this is mute since there is not a shred of evidence that SG died of anything other than natural causes.

 

[the quiet girl]

I agree that MP does not have an honest appeal about him during his on-camera interviews.

However, bottom line is that the police found merit in his story. According to those who heard the tape of SG's 911 call, MP was the voice of reason. He was the one person who SG could have trusted to get her out of her paranoid delusional state without harm. MP is not a suspect because there is much evidence to support that he tried to help her, he reported her missing, and he searched for her even the next day.

That does not sound like a guilty person and his polygraph supported the police findings that he is innocent.

Of course, all of this is mute since there is not a shred of evidence that SG died of anything other than natural causes.

oh, you read the ME report? I was not aware their was any evidence either way yet.

 

[WINDSOR]

I agree that MP does not have an honest appeal about him during his on-camera interviews.

However, bottom line is that the police found merit in his story. According to those who heard the tape of SG's 911 call, MP was the voice of reason. He was the one person who SG could have trusted to get her out of her paranoid delusional state without harm. MP is not a suspect because there is much evidence to support that he tried to help her, he reported her missing, and he searched for her even the next day.

That does not sound like a guilty person and his polygraph supported the police findings that he is innocent.

Of course, all of this is mute since there is not a shred of evidence that SG died of anything other than natural causes.

1) The fact that the police found merit in MP's story says more about the police than MP. They have not been exemplary in most aspects of this case.

2)Voice of reason... yes he wanted to defuse the situation, get his money and go home.

3)He tried to help her... by getting her into his car, he was upset with GC for calling the police, he wanted to handle the situation himself.

4) He never reported her missing, he did not return to Oak Beach for two days, He never tried to follow SG into the swamp to rescue her from 'drowning'.

5)The polygraph has no validity in NY.

6) If he really had tried to help her he would have stayed and worked with LE and been involved with the search that morning. That's what you or any concerned person would have done.

Please understand what kind of individual who lives off the avails of prostitution is. He is not a noble character.


If MP did not have SG in his car at 6:00AM that morning he would have no reason to leave Oak Beach.

If MP had SG in his car that morning he had no reason to stay.

What did he actually do?


MOO

 

[Lilmiss_cantbwrong]

Pak is the only one I see that is MOST uncomfortable with being in camera. His 48 Hours (I think it was that one) was really pathetic, and if I never suspected Pak before, you bet your *advertiser censored* I suspect him of SOMETHING now, whether it be him being the actual killer of Shannan, or if he just has knowledge of it.
If I am in a house with someone I 'care' about, or even just know for that matter, or better yet, if I was just in a house and a young woman was there screaming her heart out that someone was trying to kill her... I wouldn't need 15-20 seconds to, uh, well, you know, uhmm..... hmmmmm, think about what it was she had said. Because that is what we got, a long, studdering, suspicious pause, and then an "Oh yea, she said 'they're trying to kill me.'" REALLLYYY? You wouldn't remember that? How could you not remember that on that night the girl you brought somewhere to meet a man for sex, and you couldn't remember that the girl was screaming "THEY ARE TRYING TO KILL ME!!!" That's a powerful statement.... she was speaking of someone trying to silence the remainder of her life and this prick couldn't remember her one plea for help?!?!?!?
I'd love to smack Pak my damn self... I don't know what exactly it will accomplish except possibly him trying to beat me too, but yeah, I would love to smack some sense into that boy.....

 

[shadowraiths]

I have long felt Pak was involved in Shannan's disappearance. And that was before I knew his name or had read about his criminal past. ( link )

Pak, 41, had served six months in prison after pleading guilty in August 2004 to a federal charge of conspiracy to misuse a passport. He was arrested on May 11, 2004, at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport after flying from Zurich with a woman from China who had a U.S. passport in someone else's name, according to the indictment.

Assistant U.S. Attorney J. Michael Worley said Pak accepted money to bring her into the country. Pak said in an interview that he accepted money to help the woman with her English and only learned about the passport problem shortly before boarding a flight with her from Sri Lanka to Zurich. By then, he said, he felt he couldn't get out of his agreement.​

Add to that the claim that the 911 call ended when Shannan was "pulled into a truck" ( link )

Her mother, Mari Gilbert, has said that her daughter’s last phone call was “…23 minutes to 911 when she was grabbed and pulled into a truck.”​

Along with early reports about an Asian man in an SUV (who we later learned was Pak) ( link )

Colletti said it was then that he noticed an Asian man in his 30s driving a black SUV.

"I could see a car come and stopping, coming a little bit and stopping," he said.

Asked if he thought Shannan was afraid of the man in the SUV, Colletti replied, "She was afraid of somebody."​

Occam's Razor being what it is, afaics, Pak is a shoe-in for what happened to Shannan.

 

[shadowraiths]

See also, page 9 of the May 5, 2011, Suffolk County Legislature Public Saftey meeting minutes ( link, h/t [ame=http://websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?p=6880243#post6880243]goathairjones[/ame], emphasis added, mine ):

Of course this whole case started with the disappearance of Shannon Gilbert which occurred on May 1st -- almost a year ago, a few more days -- and Shannon Gilbert was a young woman who advertised on Craig's List. On the day in question she left her home in Jersey, took a train into Manhattan where she engaged in one, maybe two tricks, and she had a driver who was contacted by an individual in the Oak Beach Association and she was taken there at approximately two o'clock in the morning.​

 

[Lilmiss_cantbwrong]

the LISK website has officially been shut dwn for good!

 

[Tugela]

Yes what you say is true, but he did return to Oak Beach, when he exposed himself to the questions of LE. If he left to avoid questioning of LE why did he then return to be questioned? See my point, he had to leave to hide something(SG?)

I agree with you about JB paying for services of SG. However if SG was refusing to give MP his share, you can understand MP's anger.

I think MP got all the money in the end, IIRC SG's wallet was empty when found.

MOO

He would have returned once he realized that she really was missing, and the situation had the potential to turn into something much nastier. Essentially he was covering his butt because if he didn't he would have become the prime suspect, and he has enough street smarts to understand that.

 

[Tugela]

@ Tugela-

To your knowledge do escorts expect payment in cash or do you know if they use modern conveniences like credit cards, paypal etc?

Oops... you did say the John hands over the cash in an envelope beforehand. With that being said, do escorts ever accept payment via credit card or paypal? Do you think it's possible that SG, MBB, ALC, MB, JT and/or MW accepted payment via credit card or paypal?

I think some high end ones might, but I doubt that the girls who work out of craigslist and things like that do. They would only take cash. There are a number of reasons for that, the biggest one being trust. There is also the tax implication - cash means income that you can hide from the IRS because there are no records.

You need to remember that the clients don't want to leave a paper trail through credit cards and such that LE might use at a later date as evidence either.

 

[Dwntwnslim]

I think some high end ones might, but I doubt that the girls who work out of craigslist and things like that do. They would only take cash. There are a number of reasons for that, the biggest one being trust. There is also the tax implication - cash means income that you can hide from the IRS because there are no records.

You need to remember that the clients don't want to leave a paper trail through credit cards and such that LE might use at a later date as evidence either.

Thanks for your valuable input, Tugela! You too Lilmiss_cantbwrong!

 

[WINDSOR]

He would have returned once he realized that she really was missing, and the situation had the potential to turn into something much nastier. Essentially he was covering his butt because if he didn't he would have become the prime suspect, and he has enough street smarts to understand that.

How would MP realize SG was missing after he left Oak Beach? The fact he could not find her when he looking for her in Oak Beach implies he knew she was missing.

If MP said to you "I could not find SG so I left Oak Beach, then I realized she was missing so I thought I should come back two days later to look for her." would you believe him?

MP did not know what happened to SG why would he leave before it was resolved? If he knew what happened there was no reason to stay.

MP returned for several reasons,

a) to look like a good guy looking for SG
b) to see if he was a suspect
c) to ensure no evidence that might incriminate him was left around.

MP is a street smart individual who has served time, and is familiar with LE procedures.

MOO