Hapless gem trader Kurt Kaiser lost out on a deal to sell a half million dollars worth of uncut diamonds, but really hit rock bottom when he despondently picked up a hooker — who took off with the gems. “I woke and thought ‘I’ve been screwed,’ ” Kaiser, 47, told The Post yesterday outside his home in Forest Hills, Queens.
He believes he was drugged by the woman, who was last seen on a hotel surveillance video with his briefcase in one hand and her heels in the other.
Kaiser met the sexy brunette while throwing back drinks at Whiskey Park on Central Park South — his third stop Monday night after blowing a deal to sell the rocks.
“I was sitting by myself having a last vodka and soda, and she came up and asked, ‘Mind if I join you?’ I said: ‘Hell, yeah!’ ”
He spent another 45 minutes at the bar with the 23-year-old Hispanic woman, who wore a short, black dress and high heels.
She suggested they go somewhere more comfortable — the Cosmopolitan Hotel in TriBeCa.
They took a cab and the woman had the driver stop at a CVS, where she used his credit card to buy a $500 gift card and a box of condoms.
Kaiser, who is not married, told cops that only then did he realize she was a hooker, but he carried on with the date anyway, sources said.
He told The Post he started feeling woozy around the same time.
“Whatever she drugged me with, it took effect very quickly,” Kaiser said.
Kaiser, who brought the briefcase full of diamonds to the bar, claims he never told the woman about the precious cargo.
When they got to the room, he removed the small bag containing 45 uninsured stones — 290 carats of diamonds — from his briefcase and hid them in a drawer, “because I was afraid she would steal them,” he said.
They had sex before he passed out.
When he woke up at around 6 a.m., she was gone, along with the stones, the certification documents, his passport, watch and sunglasses.
At least she left his wallet.
“It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” he said.
Kaiser told cops he put down $50,000 for the diamonds — and had two “investors” whose names he would not divulge.
He was planning to travel to Hong Kong today to try to sell them to another buyer, but now is offering a reward for their return.
Police sources said surveillance video from the hotel clearly shows the woman running down a hallway carrying his briefcase and her shoes.
Cops have dusted the room for prints and are checking a condom for her DNA.
“She probably doesn’t even know what she took,” Kaiser said.
“If she gives them back, I probably won’t press charges,” he said. “She can have someone drop them off at the 1st Precinct.”
Additional reporting by Kevin Sheehan and Georgett Roberts