ELEGANT ELLIOT OFFEN, RIIIGHT!!!

He reportedly has used at least 14 aliases, switches addresses every few
months and has cash or valuables stashed in safe-deposit boxes scattered
from Fort Lauderdale to New York.

His extensive criminal past allegedly includes thefts that drove his
father to ruin and his brother into the streets of New York as a homeless
person, and a $30 million planned bankruptcy in South Florida.

On Monday, officials of the Broward Sheriff`s Office, the State
Attorney`s Office, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the FBI
released details about Offen at a news conference.

Offen is wanted in Broward County on racketeering, organized fraud,
conspiracy and grand theft charges in connection with the planned
bankruptcy and in New York on three arrest warrants.

Authorities say he snatched his daughter from his wife and kept the child
a virtual prisoner for seven years, not allowing her to have friends,
attend school or even know her real name.

His former girlfriend, identified Monday by the pseudonym of Randy
Jacobs, said he psychologically dominated her for a "terrifying" two
years in which he beat her and hinted that he might kill her.

Offen, 34, has become one of South Florida`s most-wanted fugitives since
he was charged last December with operating the planned bankruptcy, or
bust-out, in Broward and Dade counties in 1984 and 1985.

"He`s dangerous. He should be off the street. . . . We`re talking about a
very brilliant man who is a very sick man. He can convince anyone of
anything at any time," Jacobs said.

Broward prosecutor Kent Neal said the search for Offen has intensified
since investigators recently unraveled Offen`s background and learned he
reportedly was a former mental patient with violent tendencies.

A key to the hunt has been Offen`s daughter, who was taken into custody
by Connecticut officials after Offen and Jacobs were arrested on minor
charges -- and Offen posted bond before he could be identified as a
fugitive.

He has since outwitted authorities up and down the East Coast as he tries
to use a host of ploys to retrieve his child from a Connecticut youth
shelter.

"He has continued to try to contact the child and, using a variety of
ruses, has tried to regain custody of her," Neal said. "Deceptive ruses.
Calling her over the phone, using various aliases and accents."

Offen was using the alias of Jack Gordon back when he was charged in
December with using four companies and six warehouses to order
merchandise valued at $30 million retail without paying for it.

His plan was to sell the merchandise at bargain prices to dealers,
officials said, but some $15 million of the goods was confiscated before
he could do so.

The case began to turn strange after the Connecticut arrest, when
officials who thought they had a temporary custody case found themselves
with a 10-year- old girl who wouldn`t say anything.

"She refused to say how old she was, what her name was, where she had
been living," said John Coffey, a Florida Department of Law Enforcement
agent.

An intensive, months-long search for her identity resulted in
investigators learning that Gordon actually was Offen -- and that he was
far more than just another white-collar criminal.

First, there were bizarre notes that investigators found in apartments
that he would abandon with regularity. The gun-toting Offen apparently
had scribbled them to himself, officials said.

"Violated every stanard (sic) of human decency & civilized behavior," one
reads.

There was also his arrest record. Coffey said a computer printout of
Offen`s arrest record in New York is eight feet long and includes charges
ranging from littering to weapons violations to criminal trespass.

One larceny charge came, Coffey said, after Offen ruined his father`s
novelty shop on 42nd Street in New York through his stealing, and the
father swore out a warrant.

Offen`s family also told investigators that Offen terrorized them and
that his brother, Lloyd, was the victim of a theft that was never
reported to police.

"The family said he (Lloyd) used to be doing pretty well. Then he
(Elliott Offen) ripped off his brother. His brother is now a street
bum," Coffey said.

Offen snatched his daughter as his marriage was breaking up, officials
said, with his ex-wife saying Offen began to act strangely and beat her
so severely that she twice wound up in a home for battered women.

"He found more and more devious ways to get money," the former wife, who
didn`t want to be identified, told investigators.

Offen arrived in South Florida about three years ago, according to
Coffey, and by then had trained his daughter in how to adopt a series of
aliases to avoid detection.

Prosecutor Neal said that Offen would lock her in an apartment for hours
or days as he worked one angle or another on various schemes, although
there is no evidence he otherwise abused her.

"Her life was her father. Her life was protecting her father. She was
under his complete domination," Jacobs said at the news conference. "The
little girl had no friends. She was pretty good at entertaining herself,
watching television."

Jacobs also used to teach the girl writing and math -- and Offen would
teach the girl how to scratch out the names and dates in the notebooks to
remove any evidence of who did them.

Offen had also discovered the lucrative world of bust-outs, according to
officials.

Jacobs said that she met Offen on a blind date while he was just starting
the planned bankruptcy and soon found herself pulled into a whirl of
crime as she fell under his domination.

"I was terrified for my life. I looked like I was on drugs. I was in
complete shock. The man used to beat me, lecture me for hours about what
would happen if I talked," she said. "I was involved with a maniac."

Jacobs has since pleaded no contest to criminal charges connected to the
bust-out, and Offen`s daughter may be reunited with her natural mother.
But officials say that won`t happen until Offen is caught.