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Has the moment finally arrived when we can actually believe what hoax Gold Fields bidder Edward Pastorini (nee Theodore Roxford and/or Lawrence Niren) is saying? Most probably.

The chances of (Pastorini’s firm) HHR (or me) paying the SEC anything more than US$500 at the most are zero…The chances are greater that Your Honor will wake up tomorrow morning and be able to speak 20 languages fluently.

That, according to Bloomberg, is what the bogus bidder, who has targeted firms like Sony and Playboy over the years, told a Manhattan judge who has handed down a $900,000 fine following action by the SEC.

Pastorini is said to be in Buenos Aires and refuses to visit the US, saying he fears arrest. He tried to get Judge Kevin Castel to order his execution by firing squad and then subsequently described the proceedings as a “kangaroo court,” with the SEC manufacturing a “ridiculous pack of lies.”

In April last year, FT Alphaville had to explain to Bloomberg that a self-declared exclusive story saying Pastorini was set of offer $12.5bn for South African miner Gold Fields was unlikely to be true.

In a fit of journalistic self-flagellation, Bloomberg reporters subsequently tracked Pastorini down to Argentina and told his life story, including his stint in a rock bank called the 101 Crustaceans.

Strangely, as Felix Salmon points out, the news agency has never found itself able to apologise for the error.