A general view of the building where Kenneth Starr resides in New York May 27, 2010. 
 
 NEW YORK (Reuters) - Kenneth Starr, an investment adviser to celebrities and other wealthy New Yorkers, was coaxed from a darkened suit closet by U.S. agents at his apartment on Thursday to face charges of running a fraud of at least $30 million, prosecutors said. 
 
 Starr ran a complex set of schemes involving his son, his wife, prominent New York City Democratic Party politician Andrew Stein, "a former national official of a major political party," and "a partner at a prominent national law firm," an affidavit by an Internal Revenue Service agent said. 
 
 The criminal complaint charging Starr with wire fraud, investment adviser fraud and money laundering, alludes to a number of wealthy New Yorkers as his clients or associates -- "an actress," "an elderly heiress," a "retired prominent basketball player" and "a jeweler." 
 
 Starr, 66, was detained without bail by U.S. Magistrate Judge Debra Freeman, who agreed with prosecutors that there was a risk of flight. An earlier court document gave his age as 65. 
 
 A U.S. prosecutor, William Harrington, told the judge that when agents arrived at Starr's luxury apartment building early on Thursday morning to arrest him, Starr told the doorman: "tell them I'm not here, only my wife is here." 
 
 The court heard that an hour later, when agents said they would use a master key to open the door, Starr's wife let them in and whispered "he's upstairs." The agents found him in a dark closet, his shoes protruding from under suits. 
 
 The judge released co-defendant Stein, who was charged with lying to the IRS, on $250,000 bail after their joint appearance in Manhattan federal court. Starr's lawyer, Joshua Klein, said he would appeal the denial of bail. 
 
 None of the clients were identified in court documents, but a lawyer said one was 99-year-old heiress Rachel Mellon. 
 
 "She is shocked to hear of this alleged criminal activity of Ken Starr, whom she has known for many, many years and in whom she had the utmost trust and confidence," Mellon's lawyer, Alexander Forger, said in a statement. 
 
 Another client purportedly duped by Starr was jeweler Jacob Arabov, whose wife recorded many of her conversations with Starr when she became suspicious of him. 
 
 "It is now clear that they were defrauded," their lawyer, Ben Brafman, said in a statement. He said they "intend to pursue all legal remedies to recover their investments." 
 
 STAR CLIENT LIST 
 
 An April 2008 civil lawsuit against Starr alleged he stole millions from aging widow Joan Stanton, an actress who voiced Lois Lane in a 1940s radio show "The Adventures of Superman." Stanton has since died. 
 
 That lawsuit said Starr also managed money for film director Mike Nichols, writer Neil Simon, journalist Diane Sawyer, Broadway director Hal Prince and actor Wesley Snipes. 
 
 NBC News in New York reported that other clients include film director Martin Scorsese, Hollywood star Uma Thurman and celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz. 
 
 The court document refers to "an actress" identified as Client-2 who, accompanied by her lawyers, went to the office of Starr & Co on April 26 to ask him why $1 million was wired to one of his associates from her account without her knowledge. The money was eventually returned. 
 
 Starr's son was neither identified by name in the complaint nor charged with any crime. Lawyers for Starr's son and wife, Diane Passage, could not immediately be found. Passage was named in a civil complaint by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. It said Passage produces films and plays. 
 
 Stein, a former president of the New York City Council, owes more than $2 million in back taxes, the complaint said. His lawyer, Andy Maloney, said in court that Stein "has been talking, cooperating for the last six months as much as any defendant as I've ever seen." 
 
 Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said at a news conference that some of Starr's clients "were actually pawns in a Ponzi scheme" since January 2008 through last month. 
 
 A Ponzi scheme is one in which corrupt money managers use funds from some clients to pay other clients. The scheme collapses when they are eventually unable to meet redemptions. 
 
 Many such frauds have unraveled in the financial crisis, the most infamous of which was financier Bernard Madoff's decades-long multibillion-dollar fraud. Madoff, 72, is serving a 150-year prison sentence. 
 
 Authorities accused Starr of misappropriating millions of dollars of client money for his personal use, including the purchase in April of a new luxury Manhattan apartment worth $7.5 million. The SEC said it had five bedrooms, 6 1/2 bathrooms, a 32-foot granite lap pool and a 1,500-square-foot garden. 
 
 Stein was accused of failing to disclose the existence of Wind River LLC, a shell company established in 2008 by an unidentified lawyer. Starr stated that funds going to Wind River were loans to Stein for his work as a "placement agent" for investments, according to the affidavit. 
 
 Starr is not the same Ken Starr who led the investigation of former President Bill Clinton in the affair over White House intern Monica Lewinsky. 
 
 The cases are USA v Kenneth Starr and Andrew Stein, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and SEC v Starr et al No. 10-04270. 
 
 (Reporting by Grant McCool and Basil Katz; Editing by Maureen Bavdek, Phil Berlowitz) ||||| Peter Kramer /AP Photo The Daily Beast has learned the identity of two of the anonymous A-listers described as among the defrauded in the criminal complaint of financial adviser Kenneth Starr. 
 
 Today’s criminal complaint against financial adviser-to-the-stars Kenneth Starr contains several anonymous clients who were allegedly defrauded by him and his firm. The identity of clients and victims alike has become an instant guessing game in New York and Hollywood. 
 
 As reporters scramble around the Manhattan courthouse trying to piece together this fast-moving story, sources familiar with Starr and his clients have filled in some of the blanks: “client number two” in the criminal complaint is an “actress" who marched into Starr’s offices on April 26 demanding to know where $1 million of her money had gone. Within a day, the money had been returned to her, but the feds allege that it was not her money being paid back to her. Rather, it was the money of “client number three”—a former talent agent executive and his wife.” 
 
 The actress is none other than Uma Thurman, according to several sources close to her. The talent agent is strongly believed to be Jim Wiatt, the former head of William Morris—and another client of Starr’s firm—according to other entertainment industry insiders, though the Daily Beast could not confirm this. 
 
 For months, "the actress" had been suspicious, the newly filed complaint against Starr said. She’d viewed financial statements that she found “confusing.” She’d shown them to a friend with “financial expertise” and the person noticed that that her assets had dropped significantly, but that “no one had notified her.” 
 
 • Peter Lauria: The Pole Dancer & the Ponzi Scheme 
 
 
 
 • Allan Dodds Frank: Madoff vs. Starr—Who’s the Real Ponzi King? According to the complaint, when the actress (i.e. Thurman) questioned Starr, he hemmed and hawed. Starr told her he couldn’t reach “associate 4,” the man who he said held the money. 
 
 “Starr was asked to contact Associate 4 to have the money returned. Starr returned to the room several times to say that Associate 4 was unreachable.” 
 
 Eventually, Thurman was taken to a private conference room, where she called Associate 4’s number. “She was put right through," the complaint says. “She informed Associate 4 that she had a problem because a large portion of her savings was in his account.” 
 
 “[Associate 4] replied that he did not know the money belonged to her and that he thought it belonged to Starr. He further said that he got really mad at Starr and told him ‘you bungled me up on this.' He promised to get the money back to her.” 
 
 Within hours, he did. 
 
 Except that, the money transferred came from client number 3, according to the complaint, a “former executive of a talent agency, and his wife.” 
 
 Such stories are likely to begin bubbling up, as the Hollywood community reels from the news that a mini-Madoff was allegedly in their midst. Rumors have been percolating throughout the entertainment industry for months that all was not right with Starr and his firm—the director Mike Nichols pulled out all his money. So had the photographer Annie Leibovitz, who was having money problems and was introduced to a lending firm called Art Capital, via Starr. When her relationship went south, amid critical reports about Art Capital, her relationship with Starr busted up as well. 
 
 On Thursday, Leibovitz said, "News of Ken Starr's arrest does not come as a complete surprise to me, and I will follow this story with great interest. Ken Starr no longer represents me and has not for some time." 
 
 Jacob Bernstein is a senior reporter at The Daily Beast. He has also written for New York magazine, Paper, and The Huffington Post. 
 
 Get a head start with the Morning Scoop email. It's your Cheat Sheet with must reads from across the Web. Get it. For more entertainment and fashion coverage follow Sexy Beast on Twitter. 
 
 For inquiries, please contact The Daily Beast at editorial@thedailybeast.com.
– A money manager who catered to high-profile celebrities and wealthy New Yorkers has been charged with running a $30 million Ponzi scheme. The client list of Kenneth Starr (no, not that Kenneth Starr) includes Uma Thurman and Martin Scorsese, reports Reuters. No details on exactly who lost what, but Starr made enough to afford a $7.5 million Manhattan apartment. The indictment doesn't name names of possible victims, but it recounts "an actress" storming into Starr's office to demand to know where $1 million of her money went. Jacob Bernstein of the Daily Beast identifies her as Thurman. She reportedly did get her money back, though it came not from Starr but, in classic Ponzi fashion, another client. That unlucky guy was Jim Wiatt, the former head of William Morris, writes Bernstein.