IntellaShares reportedly is threatening members who file disputes — all while trading on the name of Save The Children. Photo source: 4/1/2015 screen shot from website of IntellaShares.
UPDATED 11:31 A.M. EDT U.S.A. In 2010, the Federal Trade Commission took action against an online venture known as iWorks. This allegation appeared on Page 7 of the FTC’s Dec. 21, 2010 complaint:
“They have also attempted to drive down their chargeback rates by threatening to report consumers who seek chargebacks to an Internet consumer blacklist they operate called ‘BadCustomer.com’ that will ‘result in member merchants blocking [the consumer] from making future purchases online!’”
BehindMLM.com is reporting today that a “program” known as “IntellaShares” appears to be threatening participants with entry on a “BLACKLIST.”
IntellaShares appears to have launched earlier this year and then experienced a prompt collapse. Despite this, the “program” claims on its website that it has or will donate $478 to the “Save The Children Foundation.”
It is unclear if IntellaShares actually was referring to Save the Children Federation Inc., the internationally prominent Connecticut charity that operates at SaveTheChildren.org.
BehindMLM has described IntellaShares as a “$2.50 micro Ponzi investment scheme.”
The “program” has a presence on well-known Ponzi-scheme forums such as MoneyMakerGroup. There are assertions of an imminent “relaunch.”
Such scams may use social media such as forums, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook to target marks. Some may imply they are linked to a charity or perform good deeds with money sent in by participants.
In 2009, for instance, a Ponzi scheme known as AdViewGlobal purported to be involved in an effort to preserve the rain forest. AdViewGlobal, which was a knockoff of the 2008 AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme, later disappeared.
Like IntellaShares, AdViewGlobal purported to be in the “advertising” business. It also had a presence on the Ponzi boards.
In 2011, a Ponzi-board “program” known as “Club Asteria” promised weekly payouts of up to 8 percent while trading on the name of the American Red Cross. During the same year, a TalkGoldPonzi forum promoter pitching both Club Asteria and a separate scam known as JSSTripler/JustBeenPaid (730 percent a year) claimed that filing disputes with payment processors meant that “all members will suffer.”
IntellaShares may be operating out of New York.
The SEC this morning declined to comment on IntellaShares. The FTC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Update 11:31 a.m. The FTC said this morning that it “hasn’t brought any enforcement actions involving IntellaShares.”
Whether it would remains an open question. The agency has an aggressive enforcement history when consumers end up on the receiving end of threats or are duped into joining work-at-home “programs.”
UPDATED 12:24 P.M. EDT U.S.A. BehindMLM.com has a story today about an emerging “program” known as “8Elos” that may have ties to TelexFree promoters, including Sann Rodrigues, already charged with fraud in the TelexFree Ponzi- and pyramid case.
Rodrigues is an alleged recidivist securities- and affinity fraudster who now may be adding a shiny object scheme (emeralds) to his fraud bona fides. The evolving situation is so bizarre it almost defies description. BehindMLM, which reports 8Elos is using addresses in the British Virgin Islands and Switzerland, has published an early review here.
One of the things that caught the eye of the PP Blog is that 8Elos appears to be trying to loosen American purse strings by trading on the venerated name of Abraham Lincoln through the use of a quote on leadership attributed to the 16th President of the United States.
The PP Blog could not immediately confirm that Lincoln ever spoke the words attributed to him by 8Elos: “The greatest ability of a leader is to develop extraordinary abilities in ordinary people.”
By even attributing a quote to Lincoln, however, 8ELos may be trying to sanitize a scam in largely the same way a 2011 MLM scam known as Club Asteria tried to sanitize its scam and bring in large numbers of Indians. Club Asteria leeched off the name of Mahatma Gandhi.
8Elos may be targeting Brazilians, Brazilian-Americans and Latinos. Based on the flags published on its website, it also may be targeting Chinese, Portuguese, Spaniards and Russians.
Lincoln was assassinated in 1865; Gandhi was assassinated in 1948.
Club Asteria put a “JOIN OUR MISSION” button below a quote attributed to Gandhi. It also placed a “JOIN NOW” button directly below an image of the actor Will Smith — this after months of trading on the names of the American Red Cross and the World Bank.
8Elos, which implies it has ties to emerald and gemstone deposits in Brazil, curiously describes itself as “the perfect link between everything and everyone, the four elements with the four dimensions, people in search of infinity and its preciousness.”
The Utah Securities Commission issued a Final Order against Jack Phillips, an Oregon resident, for conning Utah investors into several phony investment schemes involving travel cards, foreign currency trading, and importing Brazilian emeralds for sale all while promising guaranteed returns of 300 to 500% with no risk to investors.
In its role as a watchdog for consumers, the FTC has sued third-party companies and individuals who have published the logos of prominent news agencies and falsely traded on their trusted identities to sanitize a purported product or opportunity. (See screen shot of Evidence Exhibit from one FTC case below.)
In a new video promo announcing it somehow has gained 550,000 new American customers in less than a month during a probe into its business practices, TelexFree is publishing the logos of 18 prominent media firms, including logos of local-market affiliates of major American TV networks. In certain instances, the logos of the so-called “mother ships” — media parent firms or brand/content licensors of the local affiliates — appear in the TelexFree promo. This could prove to be an epic blunder.
The move by TelexFree occurs on heels of SEC allegations that a Ponzi/pyramid scam known as WCM777 traded on the names of famous brands outside of media.
On Feb. 28, the Massachusetts Securities Division confirmed it was investigating TelexFree. The agency earlier gave WCM777 the boot.
Hong Kong may be emerging as a hotbed of MLM fraud.
TelexFree goes to Hong Kong.
Does anyone in TelexFree’s MLM leadership have a clue — we mean, Freaking Clue One?
More . . .
__________________________________
UPDATED 10:51 A.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Be skeptical of “programs” that imply media ties or suggest media vetting or an endorsement by the media or a famous company in another discipline, including high finance. Brand-leeching “works,” which is why so many fraudulent companies adopt it as a strategy.
On the “we’ve-been-endorsed-by-the-media” fraud front, several instances of this have occurred. In both 2011 and 2012, the blood-sucking, $850 million Zeek Rewards Ponzi scheme pretended that puff pieces about it that appeared in Network Marketing Business Journal constituted real news. Zeek’s court-appointed receiver later auctioned off the puff pieces and the impressive-looking plaques to which they’d been attached.
Zeek and many of its affiliates preferred fantasy constructions. Put another way, they weren’t all that keen on paying attention to actual news occurring in the direct-sales sphere. In April 2011, for example, the Federal Trade Commission brought actions against several alleged scammers pushing acai weight-loss products and making deceptive claims. Among other things, the FTC alleged that the Internet-based hucksters created fake news sites and often used “the names and logos of major media outlets” such as “ABC, Fox News, CBS, CNN, USA Today, and Consumer Reports” to plant the seed the products had the backing of the brands and had been vetted approvingly by reporters.
As the PP Blog wrote in an Editor’s Note at the time (italics added): If this federal and state action doesn’t get the attention of the out-of-control, direct-sales crowd that divines itself the right to plant the seed that an “offer” is endorsed by famous companies and people, well, perhaps nothing will. Even as this story is being written, affiliates of Club Asteria, a purported “passive” investment company, are planting the seed that the firm is endorsed by Google, Yahoo, MSN and America Online. Club Asteria promoters also routinely trade on the name of the World Bank. Club Asteria is being pitched on forums populated by serial Ponzi scheme promoters.
Club Asteria, which had a presence on the Ponzi boards and purportedly had a satellite operation in Hong Kong, had roots in the cash-gifting fraud sphere and planted the seed it provided a return of at least 3 percent a week. It stopped making weekly interest payments to affiliate-investors before 2011 had come to a close.
Flash forward to April 2014, three years to the month after the FTC brought the acai fraud cases against direct-selling companies and individuals using the names and logos of famous media brands. Indeed, on April 5, a new pitch by the TelexFree MLM “program” began appearing in video form online.
And indeed it uses the logos of a whopping 18 media companies famous in local markets. And because some of those locally famous brands also incorporate the logos of their even more famous parent brands or licensors, TelexFree potentially could be risking the wrath of the upstream mother ships, too.
Like Club Asteria, TelexFree has an affiliate presence on the Ponzi boards. Also like Club Asteria, TelexFree has wildly enthusiastic pitchmen who claim the “program” provides preposterous, “passive” returns. (The TelexFree promo referenced in this report by the PP Blog first was noted by a TelexFree skeptic and reader of BehindMLM.com, a site that covers emerging MLM schemes.)
From YouTube. As TelexFree executive Steve Labriola narrates a video, the logos of prominent media companies roll in the background. Red highlight by PP Blog.
At approximately the 4:55 mark in the April 5 TelexFree video, the logos of local television stations — including affiliates of Fox, NBC, ABC and CBS — begin rolling on the screen. (The logo of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the biggest newspaper in Nevada, also rolls on the screen.)
Says TelexFree executive Steve Labriola, while continuing to narrate the video after complaining about Bloggers who are negative on the company:
“But let me tell you what is out there that you haven’t quite seen yet: media that’s talking positive about us. There are articles. There are things out there that you’re gonna have in your back office that you can print, you can read, you can use as a tool within the next few days. These are all media articles that are talking great things about your company. So, we’re excited about that. We’re excited that you can be excited about that. It’s all good news. It’s all reprinted. And it’s all available for you.”
From an FTC evidence exhibit in a 2011 case that alleged pitchmen used the logos of media companies to sanitize an online fraud scheme. Red highlights by PP Blog.
What are these “media articles” to which Labriola refers while logos of local affiliates of the major broadcast networks and the logo of a major American newspaper roll in the background?
Well, unless the media firms published any other “great things” about TelexFree, they’re puff pieces TelexFree itself submitted via one or more PR wires. In instances we observed, several local broadcast affiliates of the major networks republished TelexFree-authored content — but not before slapping on a disclaimer. To see an example of the disclaimer we observed, visit the website of News9.com (KWTV-DT as a broadcast channel), a CBS affiliate in Oklahoma City. From the station’s website (italics added):
Information contained on this page is provided by an independent third-party content provider. WorldNow and this Station make no warranties or representations in connection therewith. If you have any questions or comments about this page please contact [deleted by PP Blog]
SOURCE TelexFREE
You’ll see the same disclaimer at KTEN.com, the website of an NBC affiliate in Denison, Texas, that covers parts of Oklahoma. (KTEN’s logo, which incorporates NBC’s famous “peacock,” is the first to roll in the TelexFree promo.)
In yet another example, a disclaimer appears at the website of KTRE, an ABC affiliate in Pollok, Texas. Other channels or newspapers that might have published TelexFree’s PR talking points also likely added disclaimers or attributions to TelexFree, so readers would make a distinction between actual news content and verbatim PR puff.
Labriola doesn’t mention the disclaimers as famous logos roll in the background. The audience easily could conclude that each of the news outlets whose logos are reproduced had published objective reports about TelexFree and championed the company.
With all things possible in the HYIP sphere, we’re wondering if TelexFree affiliates soon will start whipping those republished PR releases into endorsements of TelexFree by major media firms locally and nationally. After all, some TelexFree affiliates have planted the seed the “program” is endorsed by the SEC and is backed by President Obama.
Earlier in the video, Labriola claimed, “Since March 9, since our compensation plan has changed, we have 550,000 new customers in [the] U.S.A. alone. And remember, we’re a global business.”
Whether those talking points later will end up in videos or print material that displays the logos of well-known media companies is, for now, unknown. The stage nevertheless has been set for disingenuous MLM constructions of all sorts, including hypothetical (as of now) constructions such as this one: “according to [Famous Media Company A], TelexFree is in a stunning growth phase that has seen more than 550,000 new American small-business customers enlist since March 9 alone. Because TelexFree is a worldwide phenomenon, tens of millions of customers are destined soon to be in the fold.”
And what about proof? Well, just wrap the logo of a famous media brand around the claim.
This won’t go well if this is TelexFree’s new media strategy.
Branding concerns aside, the practical reality remains that how TelexFree is defining “customers,” like Zeek before it, is far from clear. Beyond that, current TelexFree affiliates are complaining publicly about not getting paid after the company changed its compensation system.
Hong Kong
In the video promo with the media logos, Labriola goes on to note that “I just came back from a Hong Kong trip.” Whether that trip had anything to do with an asserted March 26 TelexFree “conference” in Hong Kong wasn’t explained.
Hong Kong may be emerging as a hotbed of MLM HYIP fraud. For instance, it is a venue in which Club Asteria claimed a presence and also a venue in which a “program” known as “Better-Living Global Marketing” purportedly conducts business. (See reference and related links here.)
In addition, Hong Kong is referenced in the SEC’s Ponzi- and pyramid case last month against WCM777, an alleged $65 million fraud scheme. Hong Kong also is referenced in the SEC’s fraud complaint last month against an entity known as “Mutual Wealth.”
In October 2013, the SEC alleged that enterprises known as CKB and CKB168 were “at the center” of a worldwide pyramid scheme that allegedly featured a purported office in Hong Kong and operations in Canada, the British Virgin Islands and the United States.
TelexFree, alleged in Brazil to be a pyramid scheme, is under investigation by the Massachusetts Securities Division. Some affiliates are deeply concerned about changes in the TelexFree compensation scheme that appear to have dried up or negated payments to them. These affiliates packed themselves like sardines into the “program’s” office in Greater Boston last week. Police were called to the scene.
Just four days after TelexFree affiliates jammed the TelexFree office, the Labriola video with rolling media logos, claims of hundreds of thousands of new customers and the reference to Hong Kong appeared on YouTube. Whether TelexFree has opened new can of worms remains to be seen.
What’s been clear for months is that TelexFree has no cohesive message and throws just about anything against the wall, including rants at prosecutors by a Brazil-based executive while investigations in that country are under way.
A maxim sometimes attributed to Mark Twain and often cited by PR companies and politicians goes like this: “Don’t pick fights with people who buy ink by the barrel.”
To that, we’ll add that it’s also not prudent to tempt fate with media companies that buy bandwidth by the terabyte and employ note-taking reporters and editors and videographers who take spectacularly detailed footage.
This Blog has grave doubts that any of the media firms whose logos appear in the TelexFree promo will be pleased. Their own names could be sullied. If those logos start appearing on marketing materials and plaques, well, hang on to them. They could become the same type of souvenirs the Zeek receiver sold to raise money for victims.
One of the issues in the SEC’s case against WCM777, of course, was the alleged republication of famous logos (nonmedia) and the namedropping of famous companies (nonmedia) to sanitize the alleged WCM777 fraud scheme.
Is any famous company, be it nonmedia or media, safe from MLM hucksters on the Internet? The answer is probably no, given that the vultures apparently think nothing of swiping the brands of government agencies and even of the President of the United States to advance their schemes.
Why TelexFree has ventured down the minefield-laden path of publishing logos of locally or nationally famous brands is truly baffling, especially given the nature of the allegations in the WCM777 case and the fact TelexFree itself already is under investigation.
This circumstance reminded us not only of the Zeek debacle and the SEC’s WCM777 case and the FTC’s acai-berry cases, but also of efforts by the AdViewGlobal Ponzi schemers in 2009 to use an in-house puff piece distributed on PR wires to plant the seed the 1-percent-a-day “program” was endorsed by Forbes magazine, the Washington Business Journal and The Business Review.
Prior to the filing of the SEC’s fraud complaint against WCM777, some apparent cheerleaders for the firm tried to plant the seed that the “program” had been vetted favorably by Yahoo Finance and the Wall Street Journal. One individual tried to drop both famous names at BehindMLM.com, a site that covers emerging MLM schemes.
BehindMLM’s negative coverage of WCM777 was “real non-sense,” the critic asserted on Oct. 11, 2013, pointing to a purported favorable story on WCM777 in the Wall Street Journal. That “story” proved to be a PR puff piece republished with a disclaimer at WSJ.com.
“The Wall Street Journal news department was not involved in the creation of this content,” the disclaimer read.
But with the purported Wall Street Journal “story” in his hip pocket, the WCM777 “supporter” and BehindMLM critic asserted, “I will make the most of it to my enemies’ disgust!” (See this story and Comments thread at BehindMLM.com.)
The SEC was in federal court about five months later, alleging that WCM777 had targeted a massive fraud scheme at Asians and Latinos and had caused the logos of famous brands to be republished as part of a bid to sanitize the $65 million scam.
Honestly, does anyone in TelexFree’s MLM leadership these days have a clue — we mean, Freaking Clue One?
Paul Darby with “President Obama,” apparently on Inauguration Day in 2009 after the U.S. Secret Service infomed the MLM world through the filing of the AdSurfDaily Ponzi case that trading on the name and image of the President of the United States might not be a good idea.
UPDATED 8:37 A.M. EDT (OCT. 21, U.S.A.) Former AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin is continuing to serve 78 months in federal prison at the age of 78 — in part because he borrowed liberally from the MLM scammer’s playbook and planted the seed that the President of the United States (then George W. Bush) backed his “program.” Some MLM prospects joined the ASD fraud scheme — a $119 million Ponzi popularized in part on the Ponzi boards and broken up by the U.S. Secret Service in 2008 — based on pitches highlighting Bowdoin’s purported ties to the White House.
Bush left office on Jan. 20, 2009. Barack Obama then became President.
Records now strongly suggest that Obama was President for only minutes when he became an unwitting salesman for an MLM or affiliate scheme. Indeed, an online pitch featuring “Obama” is dated Jan. 20, 2009, Inauguration Day in the United States and the date upon which Obama took over from Bush.
A Blog on Google’s free Blogspot platform made this headline claim on Jan. 20, 2009: “Barack Obama visits Unimax Services.”
The Blog, which remains online well into Obama’s second term that began on Jan. 20 of this year, features a knockoff of the Seal of the President of the United States. “Presidents Club,” it screams. Recruits for a “program” known as Net Millionaires Club apparently were accorded the title of Presidents — not of the United States, but of the “Unimax States.”
This is straight out of MLM or affiliate scheme La-La Land.
Paul Darby, who describes himself as “President of the Unimax Services Corporation” on the Blogspot site with the “Barack Obama visits Unimax Services” headline, is featured alongside a cardboard cutout of Obama in a video playing on the site. In the bizarre video, Darby bizarrely describes the cutout of Obama as the “featured guest” and suggests the Net Millionaries Club he’s promoting with the knockoff of the U.S. Presidential Seal is an “economic stimulus package.”
If you don’t go any farther than the headline — if you don’t take the time to view the video showing the Obama cutout — you could reasonably conclude that Obama actually visited Unimax Services and endorsed the “program.” Put another way, it’s a contemptible, backdoor way to use the Internet to turn the White House and the Commander-in-Chief into a spokesman for a highly dubious MLM or affiliate scheme.
If all of this seems altogether too much, altogether too bizarre, consider that the Secret Service, through the filing of the ASD Ponzi case in 2008, informed the MLM world that it wasn’t a good idea to go around trying to tie the President of the United States to your scheme. Next consider that the ASD scheme had its own form of a Darby-like Net Millionaries Club; the ASD version was multipronged and was called the “President’s Circle,” the “President’s Advisory Board” and “President’s Advisory Counsel.” Then consider that the Darby Blog — in January 2009, months after the ASD case had been filed — led with the “Barack Obama visits Unimax Services” headline on the date the President was inaugurated.
Did the President of the United States really visit Unimax Services, purveyors of the Net Millionaires Club? And did the White House somehow give Darby permission to alter the Seal of the President of the United States as a means of driving traffic to the “program? Did Paul Darby learn nothing from the ASD case?
But it gets worse . . .
Flash forward to 2013 (while considering that MLM schemes such as BidsThatGive and Lyoness also have tried to tie themselves to the U.S. Presidency or the Presidency of other countries), and you’ll find Darby as the braintrust behind yet another “program.” This one is called “YouGetPaidFast.”
Like ASD before it, YouGetPaidFast has a presence on the Ponzi boards. The new “program” appears to be a cash-gifting scheme. Ponzi-forum pitchman “Ken Russo,” previously of the ASD Ponzi scheme, the GNI and NewGNI Ponzi schemes, the Zeek Rewards Ponzi scheme, the MPB Today pyramid scheme, the Club Asteria fraud scheme and the Profitable Sunrise fraud scheme, is helping lead the YouGetPaidFast charge.
“Ken Russo” appears even to have coined a new acronym to deflect attention away from the critical issues surrounding online fraud schemes. Critics, according to a post attributed to “Ken Russo” at the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum, are “NAG[s].” NAG stands for “Naysayers Anonymous Group.”
According to “Ken Russo,” in apparent defense of YouGetPaidFast (italics added):
“The NAG (Naysayers Anonymous Group) are doing their best to deter you from joining an excellent program which offers one of the best opportunities I have ever seen for average folks to develop a substantial additional income stream. The NAG is relentless in their efforts to denigrate this fine program . . .”
This is occurring after the United States charged three women criminally in Connecticut for pushing a cash-gifting pyramid scheme. Two of the three women were sentenced earlier this year to lengthy terms in federal prison.
It also is occurring against the backdrop of bids earlier this year by enthusiasts of other Ponzi-board “programs” to trade on images of Obama and the prestige of the U.S. Presidency. Those “programs” included Empower Network and “Ultimate Power Profits.”
Unlike his Net Millionaires Club scheme, however, Darby’s YouGetPaidFast scheme appears no longer to be interested in trading on the name of the President of the United States and the seal of the President of the United States.
No, this time Darby is planting the seed that the FBI backs his “program.”
Darby is trotting out some of the same sort of MLM La-La Land talking points advanced by self-styled Zeek Rewards consultant Robert Craddock — that is, if you speak out against a “program,” you’re going to get sued and perhaps even paid a visit by its backers in law enforcement.
As BehindMLM.com is reporting today, Darby now claims to have FBI agents on “speed dial.” And at least one of those agents purportedly has vetted YouGetPaidFast and given it the all-clear.
Beyond that, according to the BehindMLM.com report, one or more Christian pastors is encouraging Darby to sue his detractors.
If that seems altogether too odd, consider that purported Christian pastors also are backing Empower Network and its purported “Badass” content, including the reported death by suicide of a top Herbalife MLM distributor.
David Wood, one of the top dogs at Empower Network, once advised critics to “Back the fuck down.”
“Be warned: BIG, SCARY WARNING,” Wood wrote. “I’m in the process of having lawyers research into whether or not we can sue the shit out of you.”
Whether Wood lost any pastors after the remark is unclear. At least one purported pastor encouraged Empower Network affiliates to overlook the nasty language and simply concentrate on making money. Pastors also backed the ASD Ponzi scheme and the Profitable Sunrise scheme — to cite just two of the MLM fraud schemes that recently have fleeced people of faith. ASD’s Bowdoin, before becoming a pitchman for a scheme known as OneX, once described himself as a Christian “money magnet.”
There is plenty of God talk in YouGetPaidFast, too.
HourlyRevShare, another in a long list of incongruous HYIP Ponzi-board “programs” pushed by serial huckster “Ken Russo” (also known as “DRdave”), reportedly has collapsed after taking a second bite of the Ponzi apple (purportedly as HRS II) after the original iteration collapsed. Other recent “programs” pushed by “Ken Russo” include Zeek Rewards and Profitable Sunrise, both of which cratered after regulatory actions in the United States.
“Ken Russo” also pushed Felmina Alliance, which became the subject of an Investor Alert in Canada; AdSurfDaily, a $119 million Ponzi scheme that put operator Andy Bowdoin in federal prison in Florida; MPB Today, a scheme that led to racketeering charges being filed in Florida against operator Gary Calhoun; Club Asteria, a scheme that falsely planted the seeds it was endorsed by actor Will Smith and the American Red Cross while also trading on the name of slain human-rights champion Mahatma Gandhi; a scheme known as Gold Nugget Invest that cratered in at least two forms; JSS Tripler/JustBeenPaid, a multiple-name scheme purportedly operated by Frederick Mann that promised a return of 730 percent a year and has encountered regulatory actions in Italy and the Philippines; knockoff scams known variously as JSSTripler 2 and Compound 150 purportedly operated by “Dave” between purported bouts with Dengue Fever; and Wealth4AllTeam, a “program” that experienced business halts and relaunches with new names, at one time claiming it was impervious to U.S. regulators at the state and federal level while incongruously claiming disputes would be settled under California law.
Among other things, the lead pitchman for HourlyRevShare on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum claimed that the “program” offered “Daily guaranteed Payouts.” The promoter also claimed (italics added):
“Earn 4.5% to 6.5% daily for 20 days.”
“Earn 135% to 195% on your shares.”
“Earn 0.18 to 0.29 every hour.”
On April 9, 2013, less than a month after the Profitable Sunrise HYIP scheme collapsed amid SEC allegations a ghost might have been at the wheel, Ken Russo (as “DRdave”) claimed on TalkGold that he’d just received a payment of $4,850 from HourlyRevShare, which was using a Gmail email address. Critics of HourlyRevShare claim the “program” is linked to individuals known as Analie or Anelie Steinway and Dr. Leiven Van Neste.
Whether these individuals actually exist remains an open question.
“Ken Russo” also has been leading cheers for a “program” known as NEOMutual, yet-another Ponzi-board darling. NEOMutual is being pushed alongside a “program” bizarrely known as “CashCropCycler.”
In this evidence exhibit given to a federal judge prior to the Legisi asset freeze in 2008, a Legisi prospect writes the name “Money Maker Group.com” in longhand. State and federal probes into Legisi were under way long before members knew — and undercover agents were part of the probe.
EDITOR’S NOTE: As the PP Blog reported Wednesday, HYIP Ponzi-scheme pitchman Matthew John Gagnon has been sentenced to five years in federal prison. On Thursday, the SEC released the statement reproduced below. Here’s hoping it will be the shot heard around the HYIP Ponzi World.
Still pushing HYIPs on your websites and social-media sites, in your emails and on the Ponzi boards? Still pushing them after the Legisi, AdSurfDaily, Zeek Rewards and Profitable Sunrise debacles? Is someone like “Ken Russo” or “10bucksup” or “strosdegos” enlisting you to enter Ponzi World?
Are you listening to Faith Sloan, when she shows you an investment-earnings calculator and plants the seed that the TelexFree action in Brazil is a yawner because it was brought in a “small” state that’s “literally in the middle of the jungle” — all while she further risks offending one-fifth of the world’s population by advising you not to engage in a “panic-like-Chinese-fire-drill” over your legitimate TelexFree concerns?
If you are turning a blind eye to all the incongruities of HYIP Ponzi Land, you may have the chance to be the next Matt Gagnon, meaning the next several years of your life will be consumed by court actions. First, you’ll watch your “program” get sued by the SEC. After that, you’ll get sued by the SEC and a court-appointed receiver. On top of those unpleasantries, you’ll be called a threat to the investing public in newspaper stories across the land, then charged criminally, and then sent to jail for years you’ll never get back while being ordered to pay back either the money you stole or the money you helped someone else steal.
A final note: More than FIVE years after the SEC filed the first of the Legisi-related fraud charges in May 2008, Legisi victims continue to visit the PP Blog for updates on the various Legisi-related actions, including the multiple actions against Gagnon. Scams may fall out of the headlines for a while — but the fleeced masses never forget them. For posterity, the PP Blog has inserted a section of a Legisi evidence exhibit into the SEC’s statement. It may be the strangest Terms of Service you’ve ever read.
** ______________________________________ **
U.S. SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION Litigation Release No. 22749 / July 11, 2013 Securities and Exchange Commission v. Matthew J. Gagnon, Civil Action No. 10-cv-11891 (E.D. Mich.)
Serial Fraudster Matthew J. Gagnon Sentenced to Five Years in Prison
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced that on July 9, 2013, the Honorable Mark A. Goldsmith of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan sentenced Matthew J. Gagnon to five years of incarceration followed by three years of supervised release and ordered Gagnon to pay over $4.4 million in restitution to his victims. Gagnon, 45, of Portland, Oregon, pleaded guilty to one count of criminal securities fraud for promoting a securities offering without fully disclosing the amount of his compensation in connection with his promotion of the $72 million Legisi Ponzi scheme in 2006 and 2007, in violation of Section 17(b) of the Securities Act of 1933.
The criminal charges arose out of the same facts that were the subject of a civil injunctive action that the Commission filed against Gagnon on May 11, 2010. The Commission’s complaint alleged that since 1997, Gagnon had billed himself as an Internet business opportunity expert and his website as “the world’s first and largest opportunity review website.” According to the SEC’s complaint, from January 2006 through approximately August 2007, Gagnon helped orchestrate a massive Ponzi scheme conducted by Gregory N. McKnight and his company, Legisi Holdings, LLC, which raised a total of approximately $72 million from over 3,000 investors by promising returns of upwards of 15% a month. The complaint also alleged that Gagnon promoted Legisi but in doing so misled investors by claiming, among other things, that he had thoroughly researched McKnight and Legisi and had determined Legisi to be a legitimate and safe investment. The complaint alleged that Gagnon had no basis for the claims he made about McKnight and Legisi. Gagnon also failed to disclose to investors that he was to receive 50% of Legisi’s purported “profits” under his agreement with McKnight. According to the complaint, Gagnon received a net of approximately $3.8 million in Legisi investor funds from McKnight for his participation in the scheme.
The SEC’s complaint further alleged that beginning in August 2007, Gagnon fraudulently offered and sold securities representing interests in a new company that purportedly was to develop resort properties. The complaint alleged that Gagnon, among other things, falsely claimed that the investment was risk-free and “SEC compliant,” and guaranteed a 200% return in 14 months. In reality, however, Gagnon sent the money to a twice-convicted felon, did not register the investment with the SEC, and knew such an outlandish return was impossible. Gagnon took in at least $361,865 from 21 investors.
The SEC’s complaint also alleged that in April 2009, Gagnon began promoting a fraudulent offering of interests in a purported Forex trading venture. Gagnon guaranteed that the venture would generate returns of 2% a month or 30% a year for his investors. Gagnon’s claims were false, and he had had no basis for making them because Gagnon never reviewed his friend’s trading records before promoting the offering, which would have shown over $150,000 in losses over the previous nine months.
The SEC’s complaint charged Gagnon with violating Sections 5(a), 5(c), 17(a) and 17(b) of the Securities Act of 1933 and Sections 10(b) and 15(a)(1) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 thereunder. The complaint sought preliminary and permanent injunctions, disgorgement, and civil penalties from Gagnon. On May 24, 2010, the SEC obtained an emergency order freezing Gagnon’s assets and other preliminary relief. Subsequently, on August 6, 2010, the Court granted an order of preliminary injunction against Gagnon pursuant to his consent. On March 22, 2012, the Court granted the SEC’s motion for summary judgment and entered a final judgment against Gagnon. The Court found that Gagnon violated the registration, anti-fraud, and anti-touting provisions of the federal securities laws. The Court’s final judgment against Gagnon permanently enjoined him from future violations of Sections 5(a), 5(c), 17(a) and 17(b) of the Securities Act of 1933 and Sections 10(b) and 15(a)(1) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 thereunder, and ordered Gagnon to pay $3,613,259 in disgorgement, $488,570.47 in prejudgment interest, and a $100,000 civil penalty.
On May 2, 2012, the SEC instituted related administrative proceedings against Gagnon to determine what, if any, remedial action was appropriate and in the public interest. On July 31, 2012, the SEC issued an Order Making Findings and Imposing Sanctions by Default barring Gagnon from association with any broker or dealer.
For further information regarding this case, see Litigation Releases No. 21532 (May 25, 2010), and 22310 (March 27, 2012).
Felmina Alliance, another in a long line of HYIP “programs” pushed on the Ponzi boards by serial huckster “Ken Russo,” appears to be DOA. “Ken Russo” also is known as “DRdave.” His record in promoting scams, pooh-poohing or ignoring regulatory actions and engaging in willful blindness may be unparalleled.
Regulators in the United States and Canada issued an Investor Alert against Felmina Alliance earlier this year.
The server for Felmina Alliance now has been throwing an error message for days. Other recent “Russo” disasters include NewGNI, an apparent knockoff scam of an earlier scam known simply as GNI (Gold Nugget Invest), Zeek Rewards and Profitable Sunrise. On the TalkGold Ponzi forum as “DRdave,” “Ken Russo” was promoting Zeek and NewGNI simultaneously.
NewGNI appears to have collapsed in February.
Previous “Ken Russo” scams include AdSurfDaily, a $119 million Ponzi scheme; Club Asteria, a venture that traded on the name of the World Bank and listed a serial-cash gifter and former ASD Ponzi promoter as one of its managers; and MPB Today, a “program” that claimed a one-time purchase of $200 in groceries could lead to free food and gasoline for life.
MPB Today operator Gary Calhoun is awaiting sentencing in Florida on a racketeering charge. ASD operator Andy Bowdoin is serving a federal prison sentence for wire fraud after being sued for racketeering by some of his own members. Club Asteria, which falsely planted the seeds it was endorsed by actor Will Smith and the American Red Cross, suspended interest payments long ago. Club Asteria also traded on the name of slain human-rights champion Mahatma Gandhi.
Club Asteria misspelled Gandhi’s name in promos.
“Ken Russo” dubbed Zeek an “AMAZING PROGRAM” in May 2012. Three months later the SEC dubbed it a $600 million Ponzi- and pyramid fraud. The original GNI collapsed in 2010 into a sea of incongruity, amid reports the operators were seeking a “crystal clear vision of our financial vortex.”
In April 2013, the SEC said ProfitableSunrise was conducting an international fraud scheme and may have gathered tens of millions of dollars through a mail drop and a series of offshore accounts.
Records strongly suggest that Felmina Alliance was using an address of 50 Street, Global Plaza Tower, 19th Floor, Suite H, Panama City, Panama. That address also shows up in court filings by the SEC in the Profitable Sunrise action.
There are Ponzi-forum reports today that “Wealth4AllTeam” has suspended operations. Wealth4AllTeam was a “program” pushed by legendary Ponzi-forum huckster “Ken Russo,” also known as “DRdave.”
“Ken Russo” regularly made “I Got Paid” posts for Zeek Rewards on the TalkGold Ponzi forum. He also led cheers for Club Asteria, a “program” that encountered trouble from CONSOB, the Italian securities regulator. Meanwhile, Ken Russo led cheers for the bizarre JSS Tripler 2 “program,” which appears to have based its name on the JSS Tripler/JustBeenPaid scam-in-progress purportedly operated by Frederick Mann.
JSS/JBP appears now to be morphing into a scam known as “ProfitClicking.”
Among other things, the JSS Tripler 2 scam touted by “Ken Russo” hatched a companion fraud scheme known as “Compound150.”
A message today on the Wealth4All website accessible by clicking a link styled “Click Here for Other Forms of Payments” says “Temporally [sic] Down Please Check your e-mail.”
Separately, a message on the Ponzi boards attributed to “Wealth4allteam Management” in part says this (italics added):
As you are aware from previous communications, we have been working hard at getting our Project Genesis off the ground. The goal of Project Genesis is to create a business model that offers the right balance between a product and a rewarding financial opportunity. We’ve created an amazing model that will offer several income opportunities to a wide spectrum of people, from beginners to the more experienced network marketers.
In the past, we also informed you that we were consulting with both our legal team and with a compensation consulting firm to help us integrate our existing pay structure with the new model. During these consultations, it has become clear to us that the required changes to the current compensation plan are too drastic and complicated to be done effectively. Based on that, our counsel has advised us to create a completely new business model that will better serve everyone for our new business.
On Aug. 17, the SEC called Zeek a $600 million Ponzi- and pyramid scheme. Just weeks earlier, “Ken Russo” left a series of “I Got Paid” posts for Zeek on the TalkGold Ponzi forum.
Included in his signature line was a link for the Wealth4AllTeam “program.”
Precisely what Wealth4AllTeam’s “Project Genesis” entails is unclear. The name, however, is reminiscent of an earlier scam known as the “Alpha Project” that was linked to another scam known as FEDI.
Read more on the FEDI scheme. FEDI operator Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari, also known as “Michael Mixon,” pleaded guilty in September 2009 to fleecing investors out of millions of dollars and to financing terrorism.
EDITOR’S NOTE: In Ponzi Land, HYIPs that suggested returns of 1 percent (or more) per day “worked” to line up lambs for the slaughter. So did autosurfs that planted the 1 percent a day (or more) seed. Now, 1 percent a day (or more) “auction” sites are “working.” Will they mushroom globally like HYIPs and autosurfs, setting the stage to fleece participants in unprecedented numbers?
Apparently now fully recovered from his purported bout with Dengue fever, legendary HYIP huckster “Dave” is back — this time with something called “DailyCashMania” (DCM) that appears to be married to a nascent penny-auction site known as “HawkPay” that is luring affiliates amid DCM promises it will offer a “mega-prize” of a $10,000 cash voucher.
One MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum promoter of DCM declared it “The ONLY Matrix supported by a [sic] Auction site.”
HawkPay says it will offer “scratch” auctions. A graphic for a “test listing” (Canon camera) on the site reads “SCRATCH TO SEE YOUR PRICE.” When that graphic is clicked, this message loads: “Your scratch will cost 1 bid and the product price will be lowered with $.10.”
ASD’s chatter about the Presidency quickly brought out the U.S. Secret Service, which discovered ASD affiliates were being paid with money from other affiliates: a classic Ponzi scheme. The Secret Service also discovered that political donations made by ASD President Andy Bowdoin came from Ponzi money.
Other prelaunch hype for BidsThatGive claimed that affiliates of the “program” could get filthy rich, so rich the company would pay to name a hospital or orphanage after them.
Meanwhile, the Zeek Rewards MLM “program,” which is married to a penny-auction site known as Zeekler, has announced a new slate of officers at Rex Venture Group, the purported parent company of the Zeek businesses. Even as the company was making the announcement, posters on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi board were sharing “I Got Paid” posts. Another poster placed a link to something called ZeekCalc, a purported earnings calculator apparently created by a Zeek fan.
“This is a online FREE Zeekrewards Profit Calculator that allow [sic] you [to] predict your profit from the Zeekrewards Program,” the calculator site claimed. “With this tool it’s easy and fast [to] calculate your future income or future earnings of the new people who join the program.”
Among the apparent Zeek affiliates bragging about their Zeek payouts at MoneyMakerGroup in the run-up to Zeek’s announcement about its new officers yesterday was legendary Ponzi promoter “strosdegoz,” a former cheerleader for “Dave’s” scams, along with the OneX scam and the ClubAsteria scam — and many others. “strosdegoz” has claimed to be a member of 35 HYIP boards.
Among other things, Club Asteria traded on the names of the World Bank and the American Red Cross. Hank Needham, one of Club Asteria’s purported managers, was a former AdSurfDaily pitchman and cash-gifting enthusiast shown on videotape opening packages of cash from at least two countries.
“Just received two payments now,” “strosdegoz” posted of Zeek on MoneyMakerGroup on July 29. He simultaneously was promoting Bidify, yet another emerging penny-auction site. Others joined “strosdegoz” in the Zeek “I Got Paid” cheerleading chorus on MoneyMakerGroup, including a poster known as “jumpin.”
“You’ve got cash!” a post yesterday from “jumpin” began. “Rex Venture Group LLC . . . just sent you money through Payza.”
The post went on to claim a July 30 Zeek payment of $23.98 from Rex Venture, Zeek’s purported parent company.
“Ken Russo,” another Ponzi forum legend, also has made “I Got Paid” posts that cited payments from Rex Venture. In May, “Ken Russo” claimed on the TalkGold Ponzi forum that he’d received $34,735 from Zeek since Nov. 14, 2011. “Ken Russo” posts on Talk Gold as “DRdave.”
Just plain “Dave” of the emerging DCM scam perhaps is most infamous for a “program” known as JSS Tripler 2, which appears to have based its name on the JSS Tripler/JustBeenPaid “program” purportedly operated by Frederick Mann, a former ASD pitchman. JSS Tripler 2 soon morphed into something called T2MoneyKlub and launched a companion scam known as Compound150.
T2 Money Klub and Compound150 appear to have collapsed after “Dave” purportedly was battling back from a bout with Dengue fever.
But now “Dave” appears to be back with DCM and its work-in-progress “scratch” auction.
The new Rex Venture Group officers announced yesterday, according to Zeek’s news Blog, include Greg Caldwell as “acting COO”; Josh Calloway as CTO; Clifton Jolly “to head up PR”; Angie Fiebernitz as CFO; and Alex de Brantes as executive director of training and support services.
Meanwhile, according to the Zeek Blog, Peter Mingils “is rockin’” over the “Certified Trainers course curriculum as Zeek’s Training & Incentives Coordinator,” and “Robert Mecham and OH Brown are banging out video after video and Zeek’s “FANTASTIC NEW BUSINESS CARDS!”
Dawn Wright-Olivares is Zeek’s new “Chief Marketing Officer,” after previously serving as “acting COO,” according to the Zeek Blog.
“It’s gonna blow up; it’s gonna be an ugly blow-up. It’ll probably happen sooner, not later. And it will leave a trail of devastation behind it. And I urge you to not even consider them.” — Comment on Zeek Rewards by Randy Schroeder, president of North America and Europe for Mona Vie, July 16, 2012
Randy Schroeder
UPDATED 7:10 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Randy Schroeder, the president of Mona Vie for North America and Europe, has done what few major figures in multilevel marketing have been willing to do: comment about the menace posed by the Zeek Rewards MLM program.
It was a most unexpected and welcome development, something that speaks well of both Schroeder and Mona Vie. But some Zeek apologists immediately (and predictably) accused Schroeder of meddling in North Carolina-based Zeek’s affairs and defaming the company, which suddenly announced on Memorial Day evening (May 28) that it was closing accounts at two U.S. banks and mysteriously claimed that affiliates had to cash or deposit checks drawn on the banks before June 1 or they would bounce.
Just 22 days earlier — on May 6 — Ponzi-forum huckster “DRdave,” also known as “Ken Russo,” claimed on the TalkGold Ponzi forum that he’d received $34,735 from Zeek since Nov. 14, 2011. The Zeek money, according to the post, was delivered largely if not wholly by AlertPay and SolidTrustPay. Both companies are offshore payment-processing firms linked to fraud scheme after fraud scheme promoted online.
Hucksters such as “Ken Russo” and myriad others use “I Got Paid” posts on the Ponzi forums as a means of creating the appearance a scheme is legitimate. Included in “Ken Russo’s” signature at TalkGold today is a link to a “program” known as “NewGNI,” which purports to pay “up to 6% weekly.”
"Ken Russo," as "DRdave," brags on the TalkGold Ponzi forum about a purported Zeek payout of $2,164.80 from Rex Venture Group LLC while pitching an emerging HYIP known as "NewGNI."
GNI may be a knockoff scam to the collapsed Gold Nugget Invest HYIP Ponzi, which also used the acronym GNI while purporting to pay a Zeek-like 7.5 percent a week. The government of Belize issued a warning about GNI in November 2009. In December 2009 — after the GNI warning by Belize — the “program” nevertheless was pitched (with three others HYIPs) by a member of the “Surf’s Up” forum, which existed to shill for accused AdSurfDaily Ponzi schemer Andy Bowdoin.
Any number of Zeek affiliates, including individuals Zeek has described as “empoyees,” hail from the ranks of ASD’s $110 million Ponzi scheme and various other interconnected fraud schemes. Some Zeek affiliates, for example, also are promoting JSSTripler/JustBeenPaid, which purports to pay 2 percent a day and may have ties to the “sovereign citizens” movement.
Zeek promoters also have been associated with a “program” known as OneX, which U.S. federal prosecutors described in April as a “fraudulent scheme” and pyramid cycling money in ASD-like fashion.
In addition to pushing Zeek, ASD, the NewGNI knockoff and a JSS/JBP knockoff known as JSS Tripler 2 that hatched a companion fraud scheme known as Compound150, “Ken Russo” pushed Club Asteria, which purported to provide a Zeek-like payout of between 3 percent and 8 percent a week before promoters came under the lens of CONSOB, the Italian securities regulator.
Amid these ruinous circumstances that are creating monumentally bizarre PR and legal disasters for the MLM trade, what did certain purported MLM experts do?
Why, boo Mona Vie’s Schroeder, of course — for the apparent high crime of trying to protect his own company and affiliates from these interconnected, international cancers.
Here is hoping that other influential MLM executives and trade groups follow Schroeder’s lead, including the Association of Network Marketing Professionals. Its name is being used to sanitize the Zeek scheme — and if it continues to permit that to happen, it risks a future in the dust bin of irrelevance.
While we’re speaking of hope, here’s hoping that Mona Vie will not shy away from Schroeder’s Zeek comments and actually will join him in the remarks, which he says were made as a concerned individual, not as a Mona Vie executive. Mona Vie should back Schroeder to the hilt.
A ‘Messy Fact’
It’s a “messy fact that periodically a company comes along and sweeps people along into a trail that turns into a trail of devastation,” Schroeder said about Zeek Rewards during a July 16 conference call with Mona Vie distributors.
Schroeder, of course, was alluding to Zeek’s AdSurfDaily-like business model that solicits participants to shell out sums up to $10,000, offers a dubious “product” (or a “product” that is just lipstick on a pig), plants the seed that spectacular returns on the order of 500 percent a year are possible and insists participants who buy into the scheme are neither making an investment nor purchasing a security.
“My own opinion is that that company will come to grief, that it will come to grief in the relatively near future, not farther future,” Schroeder said of Zeek.
If history is any guide — and Schroeder, with considerable justification, suggests that it is — Zeek will encounter a regulatory action that will cause it to crater.
But those words and others — including the use by Schroeder of “pyramid” and “Ponzi” in the context of Zeek — did not sit well with MLM Blogger Troy Dooly. (See PP Blog June 10 editorial.)
Dooly Takes Schroeder To The Woodshed
Dooly wrote Thursday that he “started getting the links and downloads of Randy Schroeder’s call” on July 18, took some time to digest the call and to shoot off a text message to MonaVie founder Dallin Larsen about Dooly’s “concerns” about Schroeder’s remarks.
And then Dooly ventured that Rex Venture Group LLC, the purported parent company of Zeek, just might sue Schroeder and perhaps MonaVie itself. Dooly wrote (italics added):
As the leader of a billion dollar multi-national health and nutrition company in the network marketing community, Schroeder should be very careful what he has to say about any other company. Although he made it clear he was not speaking on behalf of MonaVie, as an officer of the company, he places the company and their distributors in jeopardy if Rex Venture Group LLC were to file some form of civil action.
Good grief. The world is facing the greatest white-collar fraud epidemic in history, much of the money is routed through murky businesses and shell companies with accounts at offshore payment processors such as AlertPay and SolidTrustPay and banks that are asleep at the switch because staying awake is bad for fee revenues, many of the corrupt “programs” use MLM or an MLM-like component — and Troy Dooly, apparently with a straight face, is telling Randy Schroeder that he’d better tread lightly on Paul Burks because Zeek just might sue.
In the same column in which he bizarrely took Schroeder to the woodshed for holding a view about Zeek that is wholly responsible and serves the best interest of the MLM community moving forward, Dooly equally bizarrely extended an olive branch to the subject of his fresh scorn. Indeed, Dooly suggested a bunch of legal messiness could be avoided if Schroeder and Dallin Larsen saddled up Mona Vie’s corporate jet and deposited themselves in North Carolina at Zeek’s next Red Carpet event.
While ensconced in North Carolina as Dooly’s guest, they could hear Zeek boss Paul Burks deliver the good word about the company and could get some extra education from the Zeek “team.”
Dooly wrote (italics added):
I challenge Randy and Dallin to take the corporate jet and travel to N.C. next week as my guests to the Red Carpet Day event. I will introduce you to Paul Burks, and his team and let you better understand their drive and mission for the company.
Dooly did not say whether Burks and Zeek would make their Ponzi-board team available to educate the Mona Vie executives on Zeek’s drive and mission. Nor did he say whether Zeek would make “Ken Russo” available to explain the differences between Zeek and, say, NewGNI or Club Asteria or JSS Tripler 2.
We sincerely hope Schroeder and Larsen decline Dooly’s offer to parachute into North Carolina to break bread with the Zeek pope and the “team.”
Dooly is engaging in pandering of the worst sort. It’s also caustically amateur PR because it raises the specter that an aggrieved Zeek might use legal muscle to silence Schroeder, who, like Larsen, is a prominent figure in MLM circles. Zeek’s Stepfordian cheerleaders will love it, of course, because it gives them a new supply of red meat and raises the prospect that, if Schroeder speaks his mind against Zeek and gets sued, the Bloggers and critics may be next.
History An Appropriate Guide
Intimidation campaigns did not work for AdSurfDaily; they will not work for Zeek, either directly or through proxies. Beyond that, Schroeder has the weight of history on his side: the notoriousness of the ASD Ponzi case, Andy Bowdoin’s guilty plea in that case and the guilty plea of Gregory McKnight in the Legisi HYIP Ponzi case. Of course, Schroeder also could point that accused Pathway To Prosperity HYIP operator Nicholas Smirnow is listed as an international fugitive wanted by INTERPOL. And Schroeder also could point out that Robert Hodgins, an accused international money-launderer for narcotics-traffickers, also has been linked to the HYIP “industry” and also is wanted by INTERPOL.
Just days ago, a federal grand jury returned a 49-count indictment against alleged HYIP purveyor Terrance Osberger, 48, of Genoa, Ohio. In March, a top U.S. Department of Justice official speaking in Mexico City commented on some of the challenges law enforcement is facing in the Internet Age, including bogus libel lawsuits filed to silence critics and protect ventures that engage in organized crime. In May, a top INTERPOL official speaking in Israel said the cost of cybercrime was approaching $1 trillion a year in Europe and that U.S. banks lost $12 billion to cybercrime last year.
Regardless, we have to concede that Zeek/Rex Venture might be stupid enough to try to score points by suing Schroeder and MonaVie. Back in 2008, then-closeted Ponzi schemer Andy Bowdoin of ASD planted the seed that he might just sue “MLM Watchdog” Rod Cook for $40 million. Bowdoin even announced that he’d filled a pot with $750,000 and was going to use it to start suing critics of his 1-percent-a-day “program” back to the Stone Age.
Cook, who is a board member of ANMP and holds the title of chairman emeritus, didn’t blink.
When the Feds noticed the lawsuit threats, they thought them important enough to bring to the attention of a federal judge. They simply called it “GOVERNMENT EXHIBIT 5.”
On Aug. 5, 2008, the U.S. Secret Service raided ASD. What occurred after that from the ASD side left an indelible stain on MLM. Bowdoin compared federal prosecutors and the Secret Service, the agency that guards the life of the President of the United States and has the companion duty of protecting the U.S. financial system from attack, to “Satan.” He further compared the raid to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Over time, the ASD case turned into a symphony of the bizarre. “Sovereign citizens” entered the fray. One of them accused a federal judge of “TREASON.” Another allegedly filed bogus liens against five public officials involved in the ASD case, including a federal judge, three federal prosecutors and a special agent of the U.S. Secret Service who led the Ponzi investigation.
These episodes were to the utter humiliation of MLMers who value the reputation of the trade. The ruinous PR fallout continues even to this day.
What did Zeek do? Why, it wrapped what effectively is ASD’s 1-percent-a-day compensation model into its payout plan, thus raising the stench of ASD all over again and adding to the stench by effectively paying out an affiliate-reported average of about 1.4 percent a day. Zeek promptly found favor on the Ponzi boards and benefited from promoters of fraud schemes such as ASD and JSS Tripler/JustBeenPaid (730 percent a year). It also picked up some hucksters from OneX, a “program” in part responsible for the fact ASD’s Bowdoin is now jailed in the District of Columbia.
There can be no doubt that Zeek also attracted promoters of AdViewGlobal (AVG) into its fold. The Feds now have linked Bowdoin to AVG, a 1-percent-a-day “program” that collapsed in 2009 under circumstances both mysterious and bizarre. Before AVG went missing, its braintrust tried to plant the extortive seed that lawyers were going after the critics and that “program” members themselves were at risk of getting sued for sharing negative information. For good measure, AdViewGlobal tried to plant the extortive seed that it would report its own members to their Internet Service Providers if they continued to question the “program” in public.
‘MoneyMakingBrain’ Reemerges In Bid To Chill Critics
Today on the RealScam.com antiscam forum, a notorious cyberstalker and JSSTripler/JustBeenPaid apologist known as “MoneyMakingBrain” is planting the seed that JSS/JBP is going to use its lawyers to come after critics. “MoneyMakingBrain” previously claimed he’d defend Frederick Mann, JSS/JBP’s purported operator, “so help me God.” And then “MoneyMakingBrain” started attacking Lynn Edgington, the chairman of Eagle Research Associates, a California nonprofit entity that works proactively with U.S. law enforcement to educate the public about online financial fraud. Edgington is a longtime contributor to the PP Blog and, like the PP Blog, is a member of RealScam.com, a site that concerns itself with international mass-marketing fraud.
(IMPORTANT NOTE: The PP Blog is providing a link to the RealScam.com thread in which “MoneyMakingBrain” has (for months) been engaging in efforts to intimidate JSS/JBP critics. MoneyMakingBrain has a history of emailing threatening communications to the PP Blog. Among other things, he purports to have an ability to track IP addresses and to be keeping a “dossier” on critics. If these things are true, it could mean that “MoneyMakingBrain” will seek to target you in harassment and intimidation campaigns. [** Caution duly advised. RealScam link. Caution duly advised **])
The PP Blog commends Randy Schroeder for his remarks about Zeek. It encourages Mona Vie to back him. Zeek is awash in the stench of ASD, AVG, JSS/JBP, OneX and the serial scammers who populate the Ponzi boards.
Such “programs” put economic security at risk and thus national security.
Period.
Stories Wouldn’t Sell As Fiction
Thank your lucky stars that Zeek’s apologists and Stepfordians are not the fire department. If they were, they wouldn’t be fighting fires. Instead, they’d be standing in the parking lot, deducing the red glow under the roof of the building to which they’d been dispatched was an optical illusion and that the man on the roof with the gas can wasn’t really there. All the acrid, billowing smoke would be ignored in favor of a theory that smoke doesn’t always mean flame.
“No need to bring out the hoses,” they’d say. “This is nothing.”
And when the cops showed up and observed firefighters standing around watching a blaze and ignoring their duty to put it out, they’d be told to mind their own damned business or get busy hiring a lawyer to defend against a defamation lawsuit.
It wouldn’t sell as fiction — and yet somehow passes the plausibility test with thousands or even hundreds of thousands of individuals who call themselves MLMers.
Bravo to Randy Schroeder for advising the members of his trade to open their eyes and choose to see.
UPDATE: The website of TheBizVideos.com has gone missing, taking with it sales promos for JSS Tripler and other purported “opportunities” in the wake of an action by the Italian securities regulator CONSOB. The site, which appears to use nameservers in New York, is returning a “Server not found” error in Firefox. When pinged, it returns an “Unknown error: 1214” message.
It is at least the second website with a direct or indirect tie to JSS Tripler to have gone missing in recent days. A site styled JSS-Tripler.com, which was hosted in Utah, went missing last week under mysterious circumstances.
Precisely why the sites have gone dark is unclear. Also unclear is who caused the sites to disappear.
What’s known about TheBizVideos.com is that it hosted JSS sales promos linked to alleged JSS Tripler promoter Andrea Viz and a website known as vizconsigli.com. (See CONSOB reference from last month.)
Whether JSS Tripler plans to help its affiliates mount a defense in Italy or any other country that may open a probe is unknown. Individual JSS Tripler promoters could find themselves holding the bag for both financial losses tied to their JSS Tripler participation and legal bills. Ponzi-forum posters flogging JSS Tripler have largely ignored the CONSOB action.
Separately, JustBeenPaid — the purported operator of JSS Tripler — has changed information on its website that references a “patent.”
The site previously made this specious claim: “JustBeenPaid! (JBP) and its related programs, including JSS-Tripler, are licensed under United States Patent 6,578,010.”
JustBeenPaid, however, now makes this equally specious (and even more bizarre) claim: “JustBeenPaid! (JBP) and its related programs operate in accordance with United States Patent 6,578,010 (now public domain).”
Precisely when and why the change was made is unclear, but the site was offline last night briefly in the the United States. JBP purportedly is operated by Frederick Mann, who claimed in 2008 to have been a promoter of AdSurfDaily. The U.S. Secret Service described ASD as a massive international Ponzi scheme.
Some JSSTripler promoters also have been linked to ClubAsteria, a purported “opportunity” that caused promoters to come under the CONSOB lens last year.
As things stand on the JustBeenPaid domain, how a securities scheme operates “in accordance with” a U.S. patent is left to the imagination. The JSS Tripler-related CONSOB probe is about securities and securities licensing, not about patents and inventions.
Prior to going offline, the BizVideos site made this claim. (Emphasis added.)
“TheBizVideos is 100% free and is designed for those who want toadvertise (sic) a business and then using the video, but without limitations.“
