In their time as real estate brokers, the Israeli-American Alexander brothers – twins Alon and Oren and older brother Tal – were known as “closers”, the salesmen who could a get a sale over finish line, often to wealthy hedge funders who were then making hay in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis.
Their technique, one real estate expert explained outside the 26th floor of the federal court house in lower Manhattan last week, was based on the sense that the property salesmen “were just like their clients” – young, eager and successful. Kim Kardashian and then-husband Kanye West, Jared and Ivanka Trump were clients.
And like many, they were party animals. Nightclubs in Manhattan, the Hamptons, Miami, Aspen, Tulum and Ibiza were seasonal stops. Tal and Oren, 38, were profiled in the New York Times on “How Two Luxury Real Estate Agents Spend Their Sundays”. The Wall Street Journal followed on the family’s $31m sale of their Miami beach home. US Vogue featured Oren’s wedding to a Brazilian model.
But a far nastier picture of their high life has been on display in court for the past few weeks, where the three brothers are on trial for sex trafficking. Prosecutors have accused each of the three brothers of violent, forcible rape of at least 10 women each and in some cases of threatening them if they spoke of their experiences.