Shakedown artist Jared Paul Stern was taped at two meetings with Ron Burkle.

It was 4 o'clock on Friday afternoon, March 31. In a spacious bilevel Greenwich Village loft, two men sat on wrought-iron chairs across from each other at a round glass table.

One was Jared Paul Stern, the New York Post's Page Six reporter and magazine editor. The other was Ron Burkle, a West Coast billionaire investor who had rented the loft for the month while he was in New York City considering new acquisitions, including a $2.2 billion bid for a chain of 12 newspapers.

But this bit of newspaper business with Stern was different.

Nine days earlier, at a lengthy meeting at the same table, Stern had guaranteed he could manage coverage of Burkle by Page Six chief writer Richard Johnson and other Page Six staffers — and have false items about Burkle killed.

"It's a little like the Mafia. A friend of mine is a friend of yours," Stern had said, detailing how Burkle and others could get various "levels of protection" in return for favors and other consideration.

Stern had set his cash price for the one-year shakedown deal, saying, "$100,000 to get going and then you could get it to me on a month-to-month, maybe like $10,000."

"Okay, that's a great deal," Burkle had replied during that March 22 meeting.

Now they were here to iron out the details: how different Page Six staffers — including Johnson — would be handled with other payments such as large "consulting" fees and other hidden arrangements.

And Burkle wanted assurances that Stern would not hit him up for more money a few months into the deal. To bolster his position, Stern explained the inner workings of the gossip column — tradeoffs of one kind and another — and Burkle agreed to wire the $100,000 to Stern's bank account.

Unbeknownst to Stern, sitting there in a black sweater and jeans, the meetings were being videotaped under supervision of the FBI and the Manhattan U.S. attorney's office.

At one point, during the second meeting, speaking on behalf of his fellow Page Six reporters, Stern said, "They all have gotta want to let up on you, they have gotta, you know, have reasons to be your friend. It has gotta be the right perks."

Earlier in the month, after Stern had sent Burkle e-mails asking for a private meeting with veiled hints of a shakedown, Burkle immediately notified his head of security, a former Secret Service agent, and his attorneys.

One of the attorneys contacted a former federal prosecutor in New York City, who in turn contacted an FBI agent, which set the ball rolling. Both meetings were videotaped, Burkle with his back to the camera.

At the second meeting — on March 31 — FBI agents and an assistant U.S. attorney were listening on the second floor.

Alternately confident and stumbling, Stern detailed his proposals as he shifted around in his chair. Burkle was still throughout, listening carefully.

During the meetings, Stern said Page Six staffers play favorites — on "level one of protection," taking care of people who give them juicy tidbits while throwing barbs at those not considered "friends of the page."

Level two and level three protection, according to Stern, involve "perks," contracts and deals. For his money, Burkle could purchase all "three levels," Stern said.

At one point, Burkle said to Stern, "You always like to tell the truth?"

"Yes," Stern replied.

At the end of the second meeting, Stern said he would e-mail Burkle with instructions on how to wire a $100,000 downpayment to Stern's bank account.

And throughout last week, until the Daily News broke the story of Stern's shakedown, Stern was sending e-mails to a Burkle employee, asking for his money.

William Callahan, a former federal prosecutor who viewed the tapes, said, "I would subpoena all the staff of Page Six into a grand jury and question them about taking extortion money to kill untrue stories and other favors and consideration for favorable stories."

The shakedown and Stern's description of the inner-workings of Page Six have rocked the world of gossip, while devastating the Post's franchise column. The News' revelations about the scandal have appeared on the front pages of newspapers around the nation and on television news shows as well.

Though the Post has characterized Stern as a reporter "who sometimes worked two days a week" at the paper, present and former staffers said that in fact, Stern had been at his desk in the newsroom nearly every day.

Stern is listed in the Post's phone directory and he was at his desk when The News called him shortly before 5 p.m. on Thursday to ask about the shakedown. "Outrageous," he said, "I'll call you back."

But he never did and later that night, he retained high-profile lawyer Edward Hayes.

Stern, who has been suspended by the Post, began working for Richard Johnson and Page Six about 11 years ago as a full-time reporter. Hundreds of articles and items have appeared in the Post with the Stern byline.

Stern is the editor of Page Six Magazine, writes a daily column on fashion for the Post during Fashion Week and is also the paper's Sunday books editor. For a time, Stern had his own Post column, Nightcrawler, featuring his club-hopping adventures with his girlfriend "Snoodles."

Stern remained secluded yesterday at his second home in Oak Hill, N.Y., about 120 miles northwest of Manhattan. He had no comment for reporters.

Burkle was back home in Los Angeles.

You Need a Real Friend'
Exclusive Excerpts of Scribe's Astonishing Shakedown Bid

New York Daily News
April 9, 2006

These are excerpts from an hour-and-21-minute talk between New York Post Page Six staffer Jared Paul Stern and California investor Ron Burkle. The March 31 meeting was the second between the two. Burkle's end of the conversation was directed by his attorneys, FBI agents and an assistant U.S. Attorney.

Burkle: "What happens if three months from now you come back to me ... how do I have comfort that is not what happens?"

Stern: "Uhm, well, I mean, it is not a stickup, I am not going to keep coming back to you for something unless there's you know, more to it."

Stern: "I didn't want to spend my whole lifetime in a desk at Page Six, that isn't something I want to do. ... If I go out on a limb for you and something happens, you know, for whatever reason it comes out, this is terrible you know it turns out it was wrong because of me, you know my credibility is shot too, you know what I'm saying."

Burkle: "It is ruining my reputation and it is driving me crazy. ... So if you had been looking after me, what would the article about Gisele [Bundchen] have said?"

Stern: "Well, I think it would have been first of all kind of, ignored some kind of dating or relationship thing and b, there wouldn't have been something ... you know, I don't think it was fair anyway."

Burkle: [Says that a complaint to News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch] "may have aggravated the people at the column."

Stern: "I wouldn't be asking you for this kind of money if I didn't think I could help you when it is needed."

Burkle: "If you were in my shoes, if you had $220,000 about to shift from this side of the table to that side of the table, what is my year going to look like with protection and what is my year going to look like without protection?"

Stern: "I mean, let's call it help. Protection I think is, you know, that adds overtones and stuff that uh ..."

Burkle: "So you say I can buy it then?"

Stern: "Yup, I am just saying, you know there isn't some, you know, we don't have some fund to set up where you just, you know, you write a check to the fund and then you go on with business. You know what I mean? You need me to make that work. You need a strategy and someone to implement it to get everybody on your team."

Burkle: "I don't mean to be disrespectful, but I just want to see what I get for $220,000."

Stern: "It is a possibility and why do you want to go and take the chance that someone says to me, ‘Hey, should we use that story?' You know you want someone there saying no, in fact you want everybody there saying no.

***

(Stern goes on to say if Burkle doesn't pay, the articles would continue.)

Burkle: "What is going to happen in the next 90 days? Am I going to have another s--- article?"

Stern: "If you don't do anything about it, then I'd say the probability is the same."

Burkle: "Maybe I ought to take [two Page Six staffers] to lunch and tell them, you know, sorry if I have done anything to offend them. Does that stop the articles?

Stern: "No, because first of all they have gotta want to let up on you and b, they have gotta, you know, have reasons to want to be your friend. It has gotta be the right perks."

(Burkle asked about Page Six staffer Fernando Gill.)

Burkle: "Do you give him [Fernando Gill] any money out of the money I give you to curry favor with him without him knowing where it came from? Would he know where it came from or am I going to have to do something with him too?"

Stern: "Um, well, once we decide on a strategy for him, that we have to figure out, I mean, you know, if he doesn't know where it came from, it doesn't really help you."

Burkle: "Well, I thought you said you had credibility with each of these guys that's for one protection level."

Stern: "Yeah, I do and like I said, they are not going to go out of their way to, uh, continue writing on you knowing that we have an arrangement. But like I say, that is what we want. But Level II is where, you know, that would mean they won't do it."

Burkle: "This has been ruining my reputation, ruining my personal life, ruining my business life. That is going to go on if I don't do something?"

Stern: "There is no reason to think that it wouldn't end."

Burkle: "It has to stop and I need it to stop. But I am a business guy and I am a simple guy and it is $220,000 and it is only for 12 months ...

Stern: "At the end of 12 months and before that, things, you know, you are in a position to where you will be a friend of the paper, friends of the people who work there and you won't have that problem."

Stern: "I can solve these issues for you, but it is, you know, it is, you know there are going to be other things. We are going to have to find ways to work with those guys outside of being friends."

Burkle: "You gave me ideas yesterday. You tell me I have to pay [Page Six editor] Richard Johnson $100,000 to be something somewhere ..."

Stern: "Yeah, a consultant say to, you know, your media companies, for instance."

Burkle: "Well, like Current TV, I have Current TV."

Stern: "Yeah, okay. Yeah, that is something we should definitely do and we should start to work on something sooner rather than later."

Burkle: "So I get to choose today whether I want to be a friend or do I want to be an enemy?"

Stern: "Right, um."

Burkle: "And if I choose to be a friend I need to pay you and if I choose to be an enemy, you just write things?"

Stern: "Yeah, I mean we can still be friends, but we're not going to be as good friends."

Burkle: "Maybe that's what I need to be, maybe I only want to be a partial friend."

Stern: "I think you need a real friend."

Burkle: "So if I don't do anything with you today, I stay on the same s---list?"

Stern: "Yeah."

Burkle: "I know you don't have an official list, but ..."

Stern: "... On the antagonistic side, it could be worse. Is that clear?"

Burkle: "No. Say it again."

Stern: "You know, for whatever reasons, and it's not because there's any kind of agenda overriding or a conspiracy — I am saying you're not on the good list and the way you're headed you're even further down the bad list, so if you don't do anything about it, then there's no reason to think that it will change. I mean it is not going to change just by chance. It is going to change if you do something about it. And you need to do it right away. I mean you could hire consultants, media consultants, whatever, and pay them 10 times what you're going to pay me and they might be able to help you a little bit on a certain level but they're not really going to give you the ... (silence)"

(Burkle said maybe he shouldn't pay, that he should just take his chances.)

Stern: "Why is that?"

Burkle: "That is what I do for a living. That's a lot of money."

Stern: "It's not that much."

Burkle: "It is $220,000, a quarter of a million dollars for all intents and purposes, for 12 months, that's a lot of money to most people."

Stern: "Well, if, you know, it is not the kind of offer you get every day. It is not really anybody else who could and wouldn't deal for it."

Burkle: "I don't want to end up three months from now being asked for more. But I'm not trying to negotiate, it is either worth something to me or it is not worth something to me ... I just don't know."

Stern: "But I am not trying to talk myself out of a deal. If I didn't think it was worth it and if I didn't think it was worthwhile, I wouldn't come to you. I wouldn't propose it, I wouldn't ask for it, I wouldn't do it in this way just short term to get a little bit of money out of you."

Stern: "Richard [Johnson] is not going to do anything to go after you from that point, he is not going to do it. I have worked with him for 11 years and, um, if I ask him not to do it, he won't do it."

Burkle: "Then why would I want to give him a hundred grand a year and get him onboard?"

Stern: "Well, I don't think you want to do that. You don't have to go that far, but ..."

Burkle: "I don't mean to be hardhearted, but a minute ago I said is that what I needed to do and you said, yeah, that is a good idea and you can arrange it. Now you said I didn't need to go that far.

Stern: "Well, $100,000 to be onboard, is, I think that might be overshooting the mark. But I think if you kept me, I can do it for you the right way and make the right approach."

Burkle: "Do you have wire instructions, so I can wire or a check or do you have them now or e-mail?"

Stern: "I can e-mail."

(Stern e-mailed the wire instructions for his New York bank three days later, on April 3, to Kevin Marchetti, Burkle's assistant.)

Burkle: "What are the odds in the next six months if I don't do anything with you that I'd have a bad article written?"

Stern: "Well how many articles were there in the last six months?"

Burkle: "Probably 15."

Stern: "Okay, so the odds are the same. The odds do not change unless you do something to change them."

Burkle: "So if I don't do a deal with you now, I'm going to have a lot of articles written about me in the next six months?"

Stern: "Yeah, you know, that it is not just if you don't do anything."

Burkle took a phone call, and then said to Stern: "Take care and send those wire instructions right away."

Stern: "I mean, it is a smart thing to do."

Burkle: "Okay, I have never done anything like this before but I've never had bad press like this before either."

Stern: "Well, it boils down to you gotta play the game if you want it to go away."