Cain accuser Sharon Bialek is an accomplished grifter. She has history of financial and legal problems

November 8th, 2011 | Author: Posted by Ben Hart

Unemployed for past two years. Nine jobs in 12 years.

Twice filed for personal bankruptcy.

Accused former boyfriend of harassing her to repay money he lent her.

Child out of wedlock. Not married.

Her first date with her current fiance “lasted 72 hours.”

Now lives with him so he can pay her bills

She’s an accomplished grifter. Here are the court cases against her:

Case Number Plaintiff Defendant Date Filed:
2009-M1-158826 ILLINOS LENDING BIALEK SHARON 07/20/2009
2007-M1-189176 MIDLAND FUNDING LL BIALEK SHARON L 09/10/2007
2005-M1-111072 BEATOVIC MARK BIALEK SHARON 02/25/2005
2000-M1-714398 BROADACRE MGT BIALEK SHARON 05/31/2000
2000-M1-707461 BROADACRE MGT BIALEK SHARON 03/20/2000
2000-M1-701522 BROADACRE MANAGEME BIALEK SHARON 01/18/2000
1994-M1-717733 ADRIANOS BILL BIALEK JOHN 06/17/1994

CHICAGO TRIBUNE: The emerging portrait of Herman Cain’s most recent accuser shows a suburban homemaker with a history of financial and legal troubles.

Sharon Bialek, 50, is the fourth woman — and the first publicly — to accuse the Republican presidential hopeful of sexual harassment. In a dramatic news conference Monday in New York, Bialek, a former employee of the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation, said she had sought Cain’s help in finding a new job in July 1997 shortly after the organization had fired her.

Instead, Bialek said, Cain, who was then head of the restaurant association, reached under her skirt while the two were seated in a parked car and attempted to move her head toward his crotch. Cain’s campaign quickly issued a denial, calling her allegations “completely false.”

Bialek said she shared her allegations with her then-boyfriend and another male friend shortly after her meeting with Cain. However, the man she is now engaged to said she did not tell him about her history with the former Godfather’s Pizza CEO until Friday night, when she told him she was going to New York for the news conference.

Born and raised in Chicago, Bialek graduated from Carl Schurz High School on the Northwest Side and briefly attended Northeastern Illinois University before enrolling at Arizona State University. She graduated from ASU in 1983 with a communications degree, a school spokesman said.

Records show she twice has filed for personal bankruptcy, first in 1991 and then again in 2001. In the latter case, she claimed $5,700 in assets and more than $36,000 in liabilities. Among the creditors seeking payment was a management firm demanding back rent of $4,500, four credit card companies and a lawyer asking for his legal fees.

After the case was discharged, she accused a former boyfriend of harassing her for repayment of a loan, court records in the bankruptcy case show. Bialek borrowed $4,500 from William Concha, though Concha now believes she had no intention of paying him back, according to his brother, Mario.

Reached Monday night in Spain, William Concha declined comment.

At least two liens have been filed against Bialek, according to records from the Cook County recorder of deeds.

The IRS filed a tax lien against her in 2009 for nearly $5,200. In August, the Illinois Department of Revenue claimed Bialek owed the state more than $4,300, including penalties and interest, relating to income taxes from 2004, according to county records.

Court records also show creditors took legal action against her during the past decade, including at least one lawsuit filed in Cook County.

Bialek’s fiance, however, denied she had any current money problems. Harwood, a corporate executive in the medical equipment industry, said he supports her financially so she can stay at home with her 13-year-old son from a previous relationship.

Bialek has not had a job outside the home in about two years, according to her attorney, Gloria Allred.

After leaving the restaurant foundation in 1997, Bialek worked for five years in WGN Radio’s marketing department, Allred said. A Tribune Co. spokesman declined comment on her employment with the station.

Bialek also spent 21/2 years at CBS Radio as managing director for nontraditional revenue, Allred said. She previously had co-hosted a cooking show on television for nine years and worked for Revlon as an account manager and for the Easter Seals Society in corporate development, according to her lawyer.

Allred described her client as a “registered Republican,” though Bialek does not have an active voter card in Illinois, election officials said. The state does not allow voters to register by party, but records show she pulled a GOP ballot in the 2008 primary.

As well as becoming acquainted with Cain, Bialek has had at least one more famous friend over the years. Current White Sox analyst Steve Stone confirmed Monday night that he dated Bialek in the 1980s.

Bialek met her fiance online several years ago. After communicating via email for many months, they fell in love on their first date, which lasted 72 hours, Harwood said.

The couple moved in together four years ago and got engaged while vacationing in Venice, Italy, in June 2010.

Bialek told reporters she had not seen Cain for more than 14 years after the alleged incident, until she went to a tea party convention organized by WIND 560-AM in the northwest suburbs last month. While at the event, she approached Cain, who indicated he remembered her and looked uncomfortable, she said.

“I kept wondering whether he had done to other women what he had done to me and whether anyone was going to speak up about it,” she said.

Monday night on CNN, Piers Morgan asked Bialek if she thinks Cain should become president.

“I don’t think we can have anyone in the White House who is unable to tell the truth,” Bialek replied.

Her father, Chester Bialek, said he did not know about his daughter’s allegation until Monday.

As TV trucks pulled up in front of her Mundelein home and reporters rang the doorbell, Harwood said his fiancee does not plan any legal action against Cain and does not intend to stand in the political spotlight for very long.

“We’re in it together,” he said. “My only concern is that it not become some type of media circus.”

Who is Sharon Bialek?

ABC CHICAGO: Sharon Bialek, who lives in suburban Mundelein, said Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain reached under her skirt 14 years ago when she asked him about a job.

In this Intelligence Report: Who is Sharon Bialek? The Chicago-area woman has an extensive corporate and personal history in the area going back to the early 1990s.

It was her hope for a new job that Bialek says brought her to Herman Cain that day in 1997. Bialek’s resume and a trail of public records indicates that changing jobs has been a regular occurrence for the Chicagoan. She has worked for at least nine different employers over the past 17 years and appears to have struggled financially.

The public record on Bialek begins in 1991 when she filed personal bankruptcy for the first time while living in Des Plaines.

Between 1993 and 1996 Bialek worked for four different companies in promotion and marketing positions.

In 1996, and part of 1997, Bialek was at the National Restaurant Association. After being let go from that job in mid-1997, she says that she went to Washington, D.C., to meet with Cain, president of the association, because she needed a job.

In 1999, Bialek’s son Nicholas was born and a paternity lawsuit was filed by the father, a media executive.

In 2001 came Bialek’s second personal bankruptcy, filed after sizable legal bills. That year she was hired by WGN radio where she worked until 2004 when she took a marketing job and then a job at WCKG radio.

Along the way, according to her attorney, Bialek also held positions with Revlon and Easter Seals.

Bialek currently lives in Mundelein with fiance Mark Harwood.

Friend Calls Bialek “Gold Digger . . . All About the Money”

ANDREA PYSER-NEW YORK POST: According to someone who knows Bialek: “She has a
very infectious personality. It’s easy to see how she won [Cain] over. But the reality of her situation is — she’s a complete gold digger. It’s all about the money.”

The friend said she comes from a lower-middle-income family, but lives in a posh apartment running from bill collectors. “Most of her jobs ended in termination. It’s always the employer’s fault, not hers.

“This is a lady who lives off the system. She is hellbent on finding a way of never having to work and living the lifestyle she wants to live, a very affluent lifestyle. In my next life, I want to come back as her.”

The sad part is that Bialek has a 13-year-old son who must live with the shame and media scrutiny.

Fourteen years after the incident, an untraumatized Bialek said she approached Cain at a Tea Party conference last month in Chicago — and was smitten again.

An “uncomfortable” Cain remembered her.

“I wanted to see if he would be man enough to own up to what he had done . . . During his speech, he had the same infectious presence and command as he did when I had heard him speak the first time.”

The last decade and change haven’t been so good. Bialek is unemployed, has a son. Her boyfriend’s long gone.

The gold rush is on.