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Convicted Con Artist Charged In Similar St. Pete Case

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By STEPHEN THOMPSON, The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 7, 2008

TAMPA - As he awaits sentencing for one scheme in Tampa, convicted con artist Jordan Gann has emerged as a suspect in an almost identical case in St. Petersburg.

In both cases, Gann, 27, passed himself off as a successful doctor before stealing from women, authorities say.

Last month, he pleaded guilty to a felony grand theft charge, acknowledging he stole $750 from a woman. He faces up to five years in prison and will be in Orient Road Jail until his sentencing March 7.

In that case, he claimed to be a medical doctor and offered financial help to a woman he befriended in September, prosecutors and police say. He told her he would deposit $100,000 in a joint account for her if she first paid him $750, prosecutors said.

The woman met Gann at WestShore Plaza mall with the money but changed her mind, prosecutors said. Gann snatched the money from her and ran.

In St. Petersburg, Gann faces a new charge of grand theft in a similar scheme in September, St. Petersburg investigators say.

He passed himself off as an oncologist with degrees from Johns Hopkins and Harvard universities and claimed he had invented a system to insert microbes in the brain to battle cancer cells, St. Petersburg Detective Dean Clark said.

He also told others he was interested in investing in real estate in downtown St. Petersburg and carried around a bank statement showing he had $154 million, Clark said. He also claimed he was staying at Courtyard St. Petersburg hotel, but when investigators checked out that claim, they found he was sleeping on a couch in the lobby, Clark said.

Gann, who was using the name Rosenthal, was directed to a female real estate agent, Clark said. One day he text-messaged her that his mother had been in an accident in a Jaguar he had given her and he needed someone to talk to, Clark said.

They took a walk along a beach and ended up at her home, where he asked to borrow money, Clark said. The woman loaned him $1,500, and Gann promised to deposit several thousand dollars in her bank account the next day. Later, the woman's painkillers, along with a broach and some sunglasses, were discovered missing, Clark said.

Gann faces a charge of grand theft in the case.

Reporter Stephen Thompson can be reached at (727) 451-2336 or spthompson @tampatrib.com.

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