Brian Valentine's plan to gift his bride a Tom Petty live performance at the couple's wedding reception was music to the ears of Chad Christopher Lund.  The FBI says Lund, a 44 year-old Las Vegas man, posed as a booking agent for Petty and collected a down payment of $165,000 from the Amazon executive for the performance.  Lund has been charged with felony fraud charges resulting from the investigation into the scam, which began after Valentine, a VP with Amazon, went online to look into contacting someone connected with booking concerts for his bride-to-be's favorite artist.  That search led to a site allegedly operated by a Lund firm that included Tom Petty on a list of acts it was able to book.  In an e-mail replying to Valentine's expressing interest in booking Petty, Lund allegedly claimed a 'relationship' between his firm and the artist that would allow him to negotiate a deal. The criminal complaint contends Lund later reported to Valentine that he had talked Petty reps '...down to a price of $330,000' for the performance and instructed the exec to wire half that amount to his bank to secure the date.  He then reportedly gave Valentine the name and e-mail contact of the Petty representative Valentine would arrange the details of the booking through - a man Valentine was never able to contact.  The bad news came when Valentine contacted Tony Dimitriades at Petty's management firm, a man whose signature appeared on the contract Valentine had been provided, informed Valentine he had not signed it and that management had '...never heard of Chris Lund or his agency' and had no knowledge of any private booking for Seattle in July.
The story had a happy ending for the couple.  Valentine was able to arrange for Petty to play the reception through Dimitriades.
TheSmokingGun.com

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