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BACHELOR'S LIBRARY MOGUL STRIKES PLEA DEAL

November 07, 2005

Central Iowa's bachelor bibliophiles can breathe easier today. Eddie Wedelstedt, owner of Des Moines's Bachelor's Library and 60 other "adult entertainment" facilities, pleaded guilty to distributing obscene material and obstucting an IRS investigation. He had been indicted last march on 23 tax, racketeering and obscenity charges. But while Mr. Wedelstedt will go away, the "Libary" looks like it can stay.

A Department of Justice press release says that Mr. Wedelstedt will serve a 13-month prison term. While he will forfeit his Texas stores, and the government will keep $1.25 million it has seized, the rest of his organization may continue to operate, including the Des Moines store.

It's not clear from published reports what affect the plea deal will have on co-defendant Arthur Morris Boten of Des Moines.

The tax charges alleged that Mr. Wedelstedt attempted to conceal cash receipts earned by heis company, Goalie Entertainment Holdings, Inc., from peep shows and arcades. As reported by the Rocky Mountain News,

A federal grand jury accused Wedelstedt of traveling the country in his company's Learjet and stuffing cash from back-room video arcades into a black bag, later stashing some of the money in a safety deposit box at an Arapahoe County bank.

It's a tribute to the lifting power of a Learjet that it didn't crash with all those quarters. Those quarters add up:

The government amassed more than 2,000 boxes of documents to make its case. Initially, prosecutors sought the forfeiture of his entire empire, by some estimates valued at more than $40 million.

I wonder how many agents will take those "documents" home to "catalogue and review."

Prior Tax Update coverage here and here.

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