‘Violent’ Columbia protester is heir to ad empire, has mansion, model babymama — and long rap sheet

One of the most violent leaders of the Columbia University riots is allegedly a professional agitator and limousine liberal — the scion of millionaire ad execs who lives in a $3.4 million Brooklyn brownstone, has a model babymama and a stepmom dating John Cougar Mellencamp.

James Carlson, aka Cody Carlson, aka Cody Tarlow, is “a longtime anarchist,” a high-ranking police source said.

He bought his 2,893-square-foot, three-story brownstone with four wood-burning fireplaces and a carriage house in Park Slope in 2019 for $2.3 million, according to property records and online listings.

The provocateur, who has arrests dating back to 2005, is one of three children of prominent advertising execs Richard “Dick” Tarlow and his wife, Sandy Carlson Tarlow.

Dick Tarlow, died in 2022 at age 81 with an estate worth at least $20 million, court papers show.

The Shelter Island resident was known for his work with Revlon, Ralph Lauren, Cuisinart and Pottery Barn.

He was a loyal supporter of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and helped underwrite the school’s John Jay Justice Awards.

Sandy Carlson Tarlow, who died in 2003 at age 59, was known for defining the “public face of Ralph Lauren,” according to her obituary.

By the time she and her husband sold her namesake firm, Carlson & Partners, to DDB in 2001 for an undisclosed amount, the company had more than 100 employees and was doing $165 million in business.

Dick Tarlow and his second wife – Carlson’s stepmom, Kristin Kehrberg — lived together in a $15 million Fifth Avenue mansion.

The widow is now dating John Cougar Mellencamp, Page Six reported last summer.

Carlson, 40, appears to have two children, including one with a model, blonde bombshell Kim Heyrman.

The four-bedroom, four-bath townhouse Carlson owns is currently being renovated, workers told The Post Friday. The property boasts a large garden with a deck and skylights.

Estranged relatives of Carlson refused to discuss him.

“We don’t talk to him. Leave us alone. He is out of our lives for so many years,” a woman who answered the phone at his sister’s home said Friday.

Carlson is a rabble rouser and an attorney by trade, according to sources.

He is being looked at as a “possible leader” of the anti-Israel protesters who broke into Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall Tuesday night and barricaded themselves inside, a City Hall source said.

Emergency Services Unit cops used a military-style truck to get inside and arrest the rioters, including Carlson, early Wednesday morning. 

He was charged with burglary, reckless endangerment, criminal mischief, conspiracy and criminal trespassing.

“I observed the defendant inside the location with several other individuals,” a police officer wrote in the arrest report. “I did observe doors with shattered windows, doors off hinges, broken desks and exits blockaded by piled-up chairs.”

Carlson destroyed a camera inside a holding cell at One Police Plaza while he was in custody around 1 a.m., police sources said.

He was charged with criminal mischief for that incident.

After his Wednesday arrest at Columbia, cops additionally charged Carlson with a hate crime, assault and petit larceny for allegedly lighting an Israel supporter’s flag aflame and hitting the 22-year-old in the face with a rock during an April protest, cops said.

Carlson was among the anti-Israel protesters in January who wreaked havoc on the city by blocking traffic at the Holland Tunnel as well as the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges, a source said.

His rap sheet dates back to at least 2005, when he was charged in San Francisco for participating in the violent “West Coast Anti-Capitalist Mobilization and March Against the G8,” where protesters cracked a police officer’s skull, nearly killing him, and attempted to set a police cruiser ablaze, according to a City Hall source and  news reports.

Carlson was charged at the time with suspicion of attempted lynching, malicious mischief, battery to a police officer, aggravated assault on a police officer with a deadly weapon and willful resistance to a police officer that results in serious bodily injury, according to the source.

The charges were dropped in 2007, CNN reported.

Carlson has no known links to Columbia University. About 30% of those busted in the Hamilton Hall takeover were outside agitators, according to Columbia and Mayor Adams.

Carlson could not be reached for comment.

Additional reporting by Jon Levine