Lou Pearlman - the hog-fat, boy-band honcho who created *NSYNC and the Backstreet Boys and launched the careers of Justin Timberlake and Nick Carter - was a pervy pedophile who preyed on the young men he mentored, Vanity Fair reports.

"I would absolutely say the guy was a sexual predator. All the talent knew what Lou's game was," Steve Mooney, an aspiring singer who was Pearlman's assistant, told VF's Bryan Burrough. "Some guys joked about it. I remember [one singer] asking me, 'Have you let Lou blow you yet?' "

Phoenix Stone, an early member of the Backstreet Boys, tells Vanity Fair Pearlman was "definitely inappropriate" with Nick Carter. Nick's mom, Jane Carter, wouldn't get into specifics, but said, "Certain things happened and it almost destroyed our family. I tried to warn everyone. I tried to warn all the mothers . . . I tried to expose him for what he was years ago."

Rich Cronin, lead singer of LFO, recalled Pearlman told him of an "ancient massage technique that if I massage you and we bond in a certain way, it will strengthen your aura."

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