Celebrity
Lou Pearlman, creator of Backstreet Boys and NSync, dies in prison at 62
Lou Pearlman
In this June 27, 2007, file photo Lou Pearlman poses outside his office’s at Church Street Station in Orlando, Fla.
Lou Pearlman, the disgraced music impresario who launched the Backstreet Boys, NSync and other boy bands in the 1990s before being convicted of a Ponzi scheme, has died at 62, according to the prison where Pearlman was serving a 25-year sentence.
The former producer and manager died Friday at the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana, Texas, where he was held after pleading guilty in 2008 to charges that included conspiracy and money laundering.
No cause of death was given.
Despite success as a music mogul, Pearlman was accused of defrauding investors out of more than $300 million in what authorities called a massive Ponzi scheme.