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Kathryn Kalergas
The crime desk arresting podcasts.
Kayla Brantley
They sold some of the most expensive homes in America. Penthouses, waterfront mansions, trophy properties snapped up by the ultra rich and ultra famous. The Alexander brothers were real estate royalty, star agents who closed blockbuster deals for celebrities like Kanye west and Kim Kardashian, Ivanka Trump, power brokers and billionaires, all while flaunting a jet setting lifestyle of private planes, luxury parties and a list access. But now that glittering empire is on trial. Tal Oren and Alon Alexander are facing federal sex trafficking charges, accused by prosecutors of using their wealth, status and influence to lure women they met on social media or dating apps to fancy hotels and vacation spots in the Hamptons, Miami and Tulum. Once there, they allegedly plied their multiple victims, including an underage girl with cocaine, mushrooms or GHB before assaulting them individually or together. The brothers deny all allegations and say they will fight the charges in court. Also coming up on this episode, federal prosecutors are preparing to reopen the heavily scrutinized investigation into the 2011 death of Ellen Greenberg, a case that has long raised questions and sparked years of controversy. We'll break down what's changed and why it matters. We'll also bring you the latest from the trial of Brendan Banfield, accused of orchestrating a chilling double murder plot that left his wife Christine Banfield and complete stranger Joseph Ryan lured to the family home after meeting on a fetish website, dead. I'm Kayla Brantley and this is the Trial usa. We'll be back in just a moment.
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Kayla Brantley
Today we're taking you inside the explosive trial that has sent shockwaves through the luxury real estate world and beyond. Joining us is Kathryn Kalergas, senior reporter and resident bureau chief at the Real Deal, who helped break this story and has been reporting on the Alexander brothers from the very beginning.
Today we're taking you inside this trial that has sent shockwaves through the luxury real estate world and beyond. Joining us is Katherine Kellergis, senior reporter.
And resident bureau chief at the Real.
Deal, who helped break this story and how has been reporting on the Alexander brothers from the very beginning.
Welcome, Catherine. Thanks for being here.
Kathryn Kalergas
Thanks for having me.
Kayla Brantley
So for listeners who might not be familiar with this case and the brothers, can you explain who the Alexander brothers are and how significant they really were in the US Luxury real estate world?
Kathryn Kalergas
Sure. So the Alexander brothers, as we refer to them, were Oren and Tal Alexander. They brokered deals in Miami, New York and across the country, luxury real estate. They handled, you know, waterfront estates and high end condo sales in New York. And then their Oren's twin brother alone is also part of these allegations. He worked for the family's private security firm, Kent Security, which is based in North Miami. So the family was pretty well known in is pretty well known in South Florida. Their father developed luxury spec homes and they often sold their father's home. So they were involved in those deals as well. They represented celebrities and hedge funders and just people who buy these trophy assets.
Kayla Brantley
And you've been covering real estate for years. How big were they in the world and were they already on your radar before all of this came to light?
Kathryn Kalergas
Yes, so they were on my radar pretty shortly after I started at the real deal at the end of 2014. They were kind of starting there. They were rising in the luxury real estate world. And people know them. I mean, they, you know, they, like I said, they, they brokered a lot of these really extravagant deals. They represented, you know, billionaires and just prominent people. And so people knew them. They had a huge social media presence. They knew how to promote themselves. They, you know, were in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and all these publications. They kind of live this lifestyle that, you know, they tried to emulate their clients. So there was a lot of, like, traveling to luxury places and documenting it and, you know, doing extravagant things like that.
Kayla Brantley
Today, in today's day and age, when you look at Instagram, social media, a lot of times it can look flashier than it was. Were these guys really as influential among these powerful figures in real estate, or do you think it was just flashier than it actually seemed?
Kathryn Kalergas
I think in many situations it's maybe flashier than it seems, but they were, you know, they were well connected. They, they were close to, you know, executives at Douglas Elliman, they, which is the brokerage firm that they worked at for more than a decade. I think that. It's kind of hard to tell, right, because it's social media, but they obviously had the relationships to get this business done.
Kayla Brantley
I want to talk a bit about your reporting. You played a key role in the early reporting of this case. How did you first become aware something was amiss and what were the initial red flags?
Kathryn Kalergas
So, you know, we and others had heard rumors over the years that one or more of the brothers had, had assaulted somebody in high school. And they're never, you know, we didn't, we didn't really get anywhere with them. There weren't public, you know, there weren't publicly available lawsuits or police reports and things like that. But what happened was that I got a tip that something might be going on with, with the brothers. And I, you know, I had spoke to my colleagues, to my editor, Alan Cranley, and to my colleague, Sheridan Wall, and we, you know, we decided to check for lawsuits and Sheridan found these two Complaints that had been sitting in the New York court system for a few months that alleged that Orrin and Alone had drugged and raped two separate women in different instances. And so we began reporting that way.
Kayla Brantley
And can you walk us through a few of these allegations, especially the ones earlier on that really started your reporting?
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Kathryn Kalergas
So the allegations, like I said, were in two lawsuits. Kate Whiteman, who unfortunately was found dead late last year, she filed a lawsuit. And then Rebecca Mandel also filed a lawsuit. And they alleged that they were, you know, separate situation. So they were in different places. But both, both of the allegations were in New York. And, you know, one of them involved, Kate Whiteman, was taken to this party house in the Hamptons called Sir Ivan's Castle, which was like a medieval style castle. And that's where she alleged she was. Was drugged and raped by. By Orine and Alone. And a lot of the allegations that we hear about and see and are reported on in different publications have a similar pattern. There is partying, there might be drugs, there might be, you know, they drank something and then they didn't feel right. They, you know, maybe they were invited over and they thought that it was a party and it was just, you know, one or more of the brothers. That's kind of how, you know, the federal government has built this case.
Kayla Brantley
So these brothers are expected to go to trial. What can we expect coming out of that?
Kathryn Kalergas
The trial should be, I would expect to be about a month long. There will be witnesses, obviously, you know, who both sides will present. I expect there will be text messages, other communications, photographs, maybe. The prosecutors have also mentioned video. So those are the types of, you know, that's the type of evidence that I expect presented during the trial that is supposed to kind of show that this is. Went from, you know, 2008 to 2021.
Kayla Brantley
And throughout this, the brothers have completely maintained their innocence. Of course, we don't know the defense's stance as of now, but just some light on who these brothers are and kind of the bravado to just completely deny all of these charges.
Kathryn Kalergas
Yeah, generally speaking, they have claimed that, you know, relationships and sexual encounters have. Have been consensual. So they deny that the brothers forced any woman to have sex with them or engage in any kind of sexual activity. The defense is also probably going to try to poke holes in the timelines, you know, any. Anything that. That maybe is not consistent in. In the prosecution's case.
Kayla Brantley
And you actually knew one of the brothers, is that right?
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Kathryn Kalergas
As a reporter, real estate reporter in South Florida, I Spoke with Oren Alexander. He, you know, he spoke on industry panels. So he spoke on panels that the Real Deal hosted, that I moderated, you know, among his peers. So it's. It's obviously like a very cutthroat industry, and everybody trades information in a way as currency. So because a lot of these deals happen kind of under the radar, so it was like dealing with a lot of real estate agents and looking through.
Kayla Brantley
You know, the lawsuits, all the court documents so far. What do you think is the prosecution's strongest piece of evidence here?
Kathryn Kalergas
Well, we obviously haven't seen, for example, you know, whatever video they have referenced, but if they have video that shows, you know, sexual assault or rape or drugging or anything like that, that would. Would likely be the strongest evidence. And, you know, anything that kind of backs up the stories of these women would help bolster the prosecution's defense.
Kayla Brantley
One of the texts that really surprised me was a text that Orrin had sent to Tull in 2021. It said, we are on top of the game. Only thing that can bring us down is some hoe complaining. What do you make of that?
Kathryn Kalergas
I think that it shows how they spoke about women when they weren't around.
Kayla Brantley
And so now that these brothers are obviously, you know, behind bars, facing trial, what has become of this huge business that the brothers had?
Kathryn Kalergas
So they. They obviously, they worked at this big brokerage firm called Douglas Elliman for a long time. In 2022, they left the company to start their own brokerage, which was called Official, and it was backed by a white label firm that kind of handled all of the back. The back end. They basically, you know, helped build this team of agents who, you know, were. Were in a way, built off of their brand. So when that. When the allegations came out, everything happened very quickly. Oren took a step back from the company, and then Tal was accused of rape, and then he took a step back. They ended up in litigation with the company that they had been working with side. So their business over the months that followed essentially fell apart. And those agents went to different firms. You know, they ended up at luxury firms like Corcoran and just other competitors, Compass and companies like that. What we've noticed is their clients followed some of their agents. So their business really got splintered and went to different top agents.
Kayla Brantley
One of the things I'm curious to see come out in this case is some of the people who allegedly knew that something may have been going on or maybe, you know, colleagues who might testify to stories or seeing things, hearing things, because like you said earlier, there were whispers about this for years and a lot of times, as we've learned, where there's smoke, there's fire.
Kathryn Kalergas
There's a prominent housing expert who, you know, has done work for Douglas Elliman, who came out shortly after this and called it the worst kept secret in the real estate industry, which I think says a lot about just how many people had heard things. I don't think that when we started reporting on it, we really had an idea that it would get this big.
Kayla Brantley
We're taking a quick break after this.
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Kayla Brantley
Katherine, I'm wondering if you could take us more inside the world of luxury real estate. Obviously, the brothers have so many people surrounding him and anyone else that we should be looking at as this goes to trial.
Kathryn Kalergas
Yeah, definitely. I think one thing that's important to note, because I mentioned obviously the trophy homes and all of that is a large part of what we cover. And what the brothers were involved in was new development. So that means like new condo projects and you know, the marketing and the selling that goes in behind the scenes like before. Sometimes before these buildings exist, there's a lot of like parties and star architects and you know, celebrity restaurateurs and traveling by private jet and just kind of that whole. There's so much intrigue around it. And they really, you know, they were really a big part of that world. They, even if they weren't actively handling sales of specific projects, they kind of like pushed their way into it. And they were very aggressive in business. And that's how they started to succeed was with that strategy. So in Miami is where they had the biggest success. They picked up projects, high profile projects. One of them was the Raleigh, which is on Collins Avenue. It's a waterfront development. And they ended up losing that. But they also, you know, they also partied with these developers and that was an advantage that they had over their competitors.
Kayla Brantley
And kind of stepping back and looking at the case broadly, what do you feel it represents for these elite industries where there's a lot of wealth and a lot of money at stake and a lot of influence and power with limited security?
Kathryn Kalergas
Sometimes I think that that is the case, like in any industry where you have, especially where you have people who are independent contractors, because real estate agents are independent contractors. They don't, you know, they don't have to. They don't follow the same guidelines that people who are, you know, salaried and work for a company have to follow. So there's a lot of room for, you know, you are your own boss and it's harder to control real estate agents. It's just, it's always been like that. The industry is under regulated, so it creates this, like, it can create this vacuum where things like this can happen and where they can continue to happen because people are maybe looking the other way or, or they're being helped by people. So it's hard, I think it's harder than people realize to be a real estate agent. And when you're in a situation where you are working for somebody who has so much control over what percentage of the commission you get or things like that, it's even harder to report, you know, things that are either illegal or just unprofessional.
Kayla Brantley
And you working at the real deal, obviously your focus is real estate, which a lot of time, you know, if there's crime it involves fraud or something along those lines. How rare is it for you to deal with a federal trial of sexual assault and abuse like this?
Kathryn Kalergas
Yeah, I've never covered a case like this before, so it's pretty rare for us. We do find ourselves covering, like you said, fraud cases and other, you know, pretty wild stories, but. But never anything of this, you know, of rape or sexual assault and of this magnitude.
Kayla Brantley
And I'm not sure if we know much about the alleged victims, but were some of these women, you know, random, or were they people that they worked with or. I'm not sure if you have any insight into that.
Kathryn Kalergas
I mean, the indictment goes through. You know, it mentions women who are of different ages. One woman was a minor at the time. So it's kind of all over the place in terms of who these alleged victims were and whether they allegedly targeted a specific type of person or things like that. I wouldn't be able to say that it was all real estate agents or it was all one type of woman who they allegedly assaulted. But I do think there, it's. It didn't really, like, subscribe to one type.
Kayla Brantley
Okay.
Yeah.
I only ask because I feel like in a lot of these cases, when you see things like this, you know, I think of, like, a Harvey Weinstein where he was abusing actresses who, you know, needed him for opportunities or, you know, you look at cases like that. I just didn't know if this was a case like that or if it was just kind of, you know, women that they met out at parties and they just, you know, allegedly wanted to take advantage of.
Kathryn Kalergas
I think it was probably both. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's. When you read what the. What the allegations are, it's both. There are definitely, you know, work functions that have come up and then just general partying. There are. In the indictment, you know, it says that there are other people, known and unknown, who allegedly participated in this. In this conspiracy. And I think that a lot of people, ourselves included, like, want to know who else, you know, will come out and. Because if a jury finds them to be guilty, these things don't, you know, they don't happen without other people's involvement. So that's something that I think is really important to look at.
Kayla Brantley
And one of the first women who came forward to accuse Oren and Alon of sexual assault, her name was Kate Whiteman. She passed away in October of 2025 in Australia. What do we know about Whiteman and.
Anything about her death?
Kathryn Kalergas
She was one of the first women, one of two women to File the initial lawsuits that we reported on. She, you know, I don't, we obviously don't know too much about the situation. I think a lot of people, once they saw the initial report that she had died, you know, obviously jump to conclusions. But she was, you know, no foul play was suspected. According to the Australian authorities. They haven't, they haven't released an official cause of death. But you know, her death was reported in January publicly, but the Australian police found her body in late October. So it's a very sad story. You know, it makes you think that you know, who was looking after her and who, you know, who was her support system. But we really don't know yet, you know, what the cause of death was.
Kayla Brantley
Yeah. And she was only 45 years old. Police are saying that it's non suspicious. Police are saying that it's non suspicious. But the cause of death does remain unclear. And I think just at moments like this, we think of, you know, all the alleged victims who have come forward in sexual abuse cases like this and how a lot of times, you know, no matter the outcome, it does end in some type of tragedy, whether justice was served or not and the toll.
Kathryn Kalergas
That it takes on, you know, on these, on these alleged victims.
Kayla Brantley
Yeah, absolutely.
Thank you so much, Katherine.
I really appreciate it.
Kathryn Kalergas
Thank you.
Kayla Brantley
Now the week in crime, One of America's most controversial death investigation could finally be reopened. Federal prosecutors are now reviewing the case of Ellen Greenberg, the 27 year old Philadelphia schoolteacher whose death in 2011 was ruled a suicide despite her being found with more than 20 stab wounds, including to her heart and the back of her head. Ellen was discovered by her fiance Sam Goldberg inside their apartment in Philadelphia. Her death was initially classified as a homicide, then controversially changed to suicide, a decision that sparked years of allegations of a cover up and a deeply flawed investigation. Now federal subpoenas have reportedly been issued. However, that's not to redetermine how Ellen died, but to examine whether police, prosecutors or medical officials mishandled the case so badly it could amount to criminal corruption. For Ellen's family, this is the first real sign of accountability in more than a decade. And this matters because if systemic failures are proven, it could reshape how questionable deaths are investigated nationwide. We'll be bringing you a full deep dive on the Ellen Greenberg case next week on the Trial usa. Last week we walked you through the shocking story of the Virginia double murder case involving Brendan Banfield. Here's what has come out in court this week. As the trial continues in Fairfax county, prosecutors have wrapped up their case and begun the defense's turn at the stand. And the courtroom drama has only intensified. The key witness is Julia Paris Magalies, the family's Brazilian au pair and admitted lover of Banfield. This week, she reiterated her version of events that Banfield or orchestrated the killings, including creating a fake FetLife account on his wife's device to lure a stranger, Joseph Ryan, into a violent scenario that turned deadly. This week brought new forensic testimony. Jurors heard from blood stain analysts called by both sides with sharp disagreement over whether Christine's blood was intentionally placed on Ryan's body, a detail prosecutors say supports their plot theory and defense experts say remains inconclusive. Another big development came from the defense's effort to challenge how investigators handled digital evidence. A Fairfax county detective testified that early reports linked Christine's own devices to the FetLife and email accounts at issue, a point that defense is now using to argue that the prosecution's theory may be flawed. Perhaps the most striking this week, body cam footage and testimony captured Banfield more than once becoming emotional in court, including crying while jurors heard audio from the night his wife's death was confirmed. So as of now, the prosecution says Banfield mastermind an elaborate murder plot to avoid divorce and custodial fallout involving his au pair and staged online lures. The defense is pushing back hard, casting doubt on the reliability of Magaly's testimony and questioning key forensic assumptions. The trial is heading deeper into defense evidence and we'll keep track of the twists, especially how jurors respond to these dueling narratives and expert testimonies. That's all for this week. If you want to stay up to date on the biggest trials unfolding across the country, the evidence, the testimony and what happens next. Make sure you're following the Trial USA Wherever you listen, this is the Trial usa. I'm Kayla Brantley. Thanks for being with us.
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Host: Kayla Brantley
Guest: Kathryn Kalergas (Senior Reporter and Resident Bureau Chief, The Real Deal)
Date: January 23, 2026
This episode takes listeners inside the high-profile federal trial of the Alexander brothers—once stars of American luxury real estate—now facing sex trafficking and sexual assault charges that have sent shockwaves through elite circles. Host Kayla Brantley is joined by investigative reporter Kathryn Kalergas for an in-depth look at the case, the allegations, and the broader implications for the luxury real estate industry. The episode also covers updates on the Ellen Greenberg death investigation and the Brendan Banfield double murder trial.
“A lot of the allegations … have a similar pattern. There is partying, there might be drugs, … [the victims] drank something and then they didn’t feel right.” – Kathryn Kalergas (09:00)
“We are on top of the game. Only thing that can bring us down is some hoe complaining.” – Oren Alexander to Tal (12:11)
“A prominent housing expert … called it the worst kept secret in the real estate industry, which I think says a lot about just how many people had heard things.” – Kathryn Kalergas
This summary covers all crucial topics and maintains the conversational tone and insights of the episode, providing context and depth for those who haven’t listened.