Nsahville Public Records

Nashville diamond thieves met their match

Information from this report was culled from interviews with Michael Young’s attorney, Assistant U.S. Public Defender Ellen Pitcher; Metro Police West Precinct Detective Todd Daniel and Rob Bates, senior editor of JCK , a leading jewelry trade magazine’ and public records from the U.S. District Court in Oregon, the Portland (Ore.) Police Bureau, Metro police, the North Carolina Department of Correction, the Multnomah County (Ore.) Sheriff’s Office and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Oregon.

Michael Carey Young, 39
Alleged Mastermind

Victor Lupis, 25
The Rookie / Grab Man

Ernest Remor III, 36
Alleged No.2 / Diamond Mover

Trey Smith Adams, 27
Alleged Getaway Driver

Jack Cannon, 25
Alleged Grab Man / Diversion

Shadowy Russian jeweler
Fenced diamonds in Philadelphia's Famous Jewelers' Row

Handful of women
Available to play the part of wife or fiancee

Source: Federal courts records

He was well dressed, sophisticated, friendly. Just the kind of customer to browse diamonds costing tens of thousands of dollars.

But Victor Lupis, 25, was no shopper.

Behind the warm green eyes, infectious charm and delicate frame was a grab man for an interstate diamond heist ring that spent a year nabbing nearly $2 million in jewels and platinum. Lupis and his crew knocked over jewelers in California, Oregon, Nevada and Florida, with cunning, charisma and speed.

A February pit stop on their cross-country spree included Genesis Diamonds in Nashville, where Lupis filched $270,000 worth of jewelry.

They were the scourge of jewelers across the country, which had already seen Grab-and-run programs in recent years. But a few years, they agreed, had the sophistication of this crew.

Arrest and the confession may shed light on how they did it, and led to a roundup of suspected players, some of which deny a role in the crimes. Thus officials believe the crew, and robberies, met.

Lupis was still a small-time crook with a short rap sheet - assault, drug possession and some problems with his driver's license - when the crew was recruited as a straw man. Michael Carey Young, 39, was the mastermind and lookout. Ernest Remor III, 36, second in command, often jetted across the country to fence the diamonds.

Trey Smith Adams, 27, who specialized in lifting Dodge minivans, stole and drove the getaway cars. Jack “Damian” Cannon, 25, diverted attention from Lupis while he made the grab.

Should photos, video of executions be shown?

The images would be the ultimate in “reality� programming: A TV broadcast or online streaming video of an actual execution.

Would you watch? Would you want news organizations—or anyone with a computer, for that matter—to broadcast or stream it on a live or delayed basis?

On July 22, Georgia prison officials complied with a request from Andrew Grant DeYoung’s attorneys for a video of Young’s death by lethal injection for killing three people in 1993.

There are no plans for the DeYoung tape to be aired anywhere—yet. The video, being held by a court, could be evidence in a future lawsuit over execution methods.

But the incident and predictions of more such requests by death-row inmates raises the possibility that such a video could be leaked and posted on the Web before authorities could react. And, days ago, a university professor and a former federal prosecutor co-authored a commentary in The New York Times Sunday Review that cited the DeYoung taping as they called for executions to be televised. The pair said it was the only way for the public to get firsthand information on whether or not the practice is “cruel and unusual punishment,� given that we now get only “vague contours� from news media or family observers.

According to a display at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. (see newseum.org/news/2008/01/the-daily-newss-front-page-photo-of-ruth-snyders-execution-new-york-daily-news.html), the only news photo of the exact moment of an execution was taken Jan. 12, 1927, against prison rules, by a photographer at the electrocution of convicted murderer Ruth Snyder. The front-page photo helped the New York Daily News sell 1 million extra copies—and caused a number of states to enact laws forbidding such photos.

The last public execution in the United States took place in 1936, in Owensboro, Ky.—reported as a sunrise hanging before a crowd of 20,000 and “hundreds of news reporters and photographers.�

News organizations today, however, will be caught in ethical and First Amendment free-press crosscurrents in deciding whether to show an execution. Virtually no news organization, as a matter of policy, prints, airs or posts grisly photos or video of the instant of death or dead bodies. Such policies, though, have been formulated in response to car chases, suicide attempts, storm damage, traffic accidents and the like. No such strictures exist on most websites.

Public records online, the national guide to private & government online sources of public records

Hidden History of Nashville

International vital records handbook

Sourcebook to Public Record Information, The Comprehensive Guide to County, State, & Federal Public Records Sources

Access to government in the computer age, an examination of state public records law