Over messages, he told her how fun it was to own a …

Wesley Edens, the co-founder of Fortress Investment Group and co-owner of the Milwaukee Bucks, answered a LinkedIn message from a China-born entrepreneur in 2022 that blossomed into a correspondence. Changli “Sophia” Luo was a divorcée living in New York City who had founded One World Initiative Advocacy, a Manhattan-based nonprofit that said it worked to produce video interviews with economists and environmentalists. Edens, a billionaire who had divorced his longtime wife the previous year, built a reputation for making counterintuitive financial bets. He successfully invested in subprime loans after the 2008-09 financial crisis, spent billions to build a private passenger railway in Florida and, in 2018, bought a majority stake in the then-struggling English soccer club Aston Villa. Over messages, he told her how fun it was to own a sports team. And on their third get-together, Edens and Luo had sex at her apartment in June 2023, according to federal prosecutors. The brief relationship spiraled into an alleged extortion plot.

Wall Street Journal

This article originally appeared on Hoops Hype: Over messages, he told her how fun it was to own a …