Woman stockbroker is accused of targeting Boston man for extortion

(Evan Richman/Globe Staff/1995)

Laura Goldman near her Rittenhouse Square apartment in Philadelphia in July 1995.

By Nathan Cobb, Globe Staff

Sunday,July 9, 1995

Thomas Lee has roughly $400 million to his name, a high-rise office to kill for, and control of more than a dozen companies. But when a Philadelphia woman was placed in handcuffs outside her home on Thursday, the cigar-chomping Boston financial kingpin had a problem that even money hasn't been able to fix.

The arrest of Laura Goldman, a 37-year-old stockbroker, ended a 14-month period during which she is alleged to have harassed and extorted money from Lee. But Lee's decision to go to federal authorities about Goldman has also led to revelations, contained in court documents, that he spent a night with her in February 1993, and later paid her a six-figure sum.

The court papers say that Lee, whom Forbes magazine lists as one of the 400 richest people in America, gave Goldman $200,000, as well as up to $15,000 for psychiatric care, in January of this year. The money was intended to stop her from communicating with and allegedly harassing him, the documents say. But the agreement between the two also specified that Goldman would relinquish any claims against the multimillionaire.

This last stipulation apparently refers to the fact that Goldman has a different story to tell. Lee told authorities that Goldman later accused him of raping her when the two spent the night together, according to court papers. Goldman repeated the charge in a telephone interview from Philadelphia on Friday. She said she did not notify police of the alleged attack "because in my business Tom Lee is one of the most powerful men in the country and I was scared of him."