> Under the name “Pleasure Time Incorporated,” Larson sold shares in a non-existent American-Indian Lottery, and, by the mid-1990s, he’d managed to cheat 20,000 investors out of $3 million. With the SEC, IRS, and FBI hot on his tail, he fled Ohio and disappeared into the void. > > When investigators finally tracked Larson to Apopka, Florida in 1999, he’d succumbed to throat cancer.

...

> “Winning that game show was the start of [Michael’s] downfall,” Larson’s brother, James, would later say. “It made him think he could trick anybody, and do just about anything he pleased.”

Well, yeah. Why wouldn't he think that. He got away with everything until he was already on his way out the door. I don't agree with his methods, but there's something to be admired in the sheer audaciousness of how he lived his life.

It's obvious this thought is shared by many, there are plenty of movies about heists and con-men where they are portrayed as heroes (and the movies go over very well) as evidence of this.