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Richest columbo characters

I have a curiosity: who could be the richest characters? I'm not only talking about murderers, but in my mind there are at least 2 innocents that are also very rich: Sir Harry Matthews in Columbo cries wolf, he owns many newspapers and offers to buy bachelor's world for 1 million dollars, then after that ploy Diana and Sean use to increase the value, he ends up agreeing with 2 million pounds, and if he is willing to pay so much for a single magazine I can't imagine how much money he has!

Clifford Calvert in a trace of murder must also be very rich cause he said he bought a jet for 20 million dollars and obviously lives in a huge house, has several housekeepers and a wife that spends a lot of money, including a mercedes, I wouldn't be surprised if both of these characters had at least 100 million dollars.

Leon Lamarr in death hits the jackpot, although it is short lived, puts his hands on 24 million dollars after his nephew won the lottery.

Arthur Kennicut in death lends a hand also has a giant house and owns several newspapers, although I don't think they say how much money he has.

Is there anyone else that could compete for the richest character accolade on the show?

Re: Richest columbo characters

Dolores in "Bird in the Hand" was the owner of an NFL franchise. Assuming she was a majority owner and not in debt, she was worth a pretty penny. It's possible the writers had Georgia Frontiere the owner of the LA Rams at the time in mind when they came up with her character, although they obviously wouldn't admit it. Anyway, an NFL team in LA at the time would have probably been worth several hundred million dollars. Today, teams are routinely worth over a billion.

Of course, that also leads us to Eric Wagner in "Most Crucial Game." Not only did he own the Los Angeles football team, but he had enough cash lying around for his manager to be looking around to buy other sports franchises. But that was in the 1970s, when football teams were barely worth $100 million. :relaxed:

Re: Richest columbo characters

Ohh, not bad at all, they're 2 characters I wouldn't have imagined would've been so rich, especially Dolores!

Re: Richest columbo characters

In a funny way, Paul Hanlon and Eric Wagner are like Adrian and Ric Carsini. Eric definitely knows how to enjoy the money (whether or not a person approves of some of the ways he enjoys it). But he evidently isn't using it up, so he can afford to try to resist that hockey team idea.

Re: Richest columbo characters

Oh, I forgot about Bo Williamson in blueprint for murder! He has several millions too, since the architect wants to build williamson city with his money.

And when Bo talks about what would happen in case he died, he said his wife would get the necessary to live but there wouldn't be the billions to build cities, and that his money would be managed by a bank.

Re: Richest columbo characters

ALso we can probably say who was the poorest: Roger White :)
He had two jobs just to survive and was responsible for his sick mother

Re: Richest columbo characters

There's the studio owner in Requiem for a Falling Star. He easily forgave Nora for causing him a loss of several million.

And of course there's always Columbo's uncle who got into real estate and now sends out embossed Christmas cards.

Re: Richest columbo characters

Ohh, you're right, at least in the italian version he appears to not mind a loss of 2 million dollars on the subject, I actually kinda remembered that scene, with columbo, the studio owner, nora and jerry parks.