Wall St Protesters Target Homes Of Executives

Hundreds of anti-Wall Street protesters marched on the New York homes of wealthy executives on Tuesday, triggering one of their targets, billionaire hedge fund manager John Paulson, to defend his wealth.

Around 500 people marched through Manhattan's Upper East Side, passing the high-rise buildings where many of the executives live. Among them are Paulson, global media mogul Rupert Murdoch, JPMorgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon and David Koch, co-founder of energy firm Koch Industries.

The protesters chanted "Banks got bailed out, we got sold out" and "Hey you billionaires, pay your fair share" and carried signs that read "Stop robbing from the middle class to pay the rich" and "We are the 99 percent," a reference to the idea that the top 1 percent of Americans have too much.

Mustafa Ibrahim, 23, an engineer marched on the "Billionaire's Tour" during a visit to New York from Cairo, where he said he was arrested during a popular uprising this year which toppled Egyptian autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

"It's pretty much the same thing as Egypt," Ibrahim said. "The problem is the rich keep getting richer and the poor are getting poorer."

Since Sept. 17 protesters have been camped out in a park in Lower Manhattan near Wall Street, rallying against bailouts for banks during the recession, which allowed them to earn huge profits while average Americans suffer high unemployment and job insecurity with little help.

As protesters took their grievances to the homes of the rich, the Paulson & Co hedge fund defended its status.