Bowdoin Had Tax, Vendor Troubles In Previous Firm Dissolved By State Of Florida; Lien Stayed On Books For 12 Years As 6 Other Bowdoin-Connected Businesses Failed
UPDATED 12:47 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) His promoters said he was a hugely successful businessman, a visionary who entered technology markets and made money before others even had recognized the opportunities. Andy Bowdoin, they said, had cleaned up in the communications business and, for good measure, old-fashioned markets such as dry cleaning. He’d trained thousands of successful salespeople over the years, they said, and now was setting his sights on the online advertising business.
Google, they said, had entered into an agreement with his company, AdSurfDaily, and even the President of the United States had singled out Bowdoin as a man of genuine distinction.
Federal prosecutors and a task force consisting of agents from the U.S. Secret Service and the Internal Revenue Service, however, said in court filings that the adjectives associated with Andy Bowdoin in promotional materials for ASD often contradicted the nouns.
Bowdoin, they said, had left behind a string of failed businesses. And despite reports about his remarkable record of commercial achievement, Bowdoin was a felon who’d fleeced people in a previous securities scheme — and hadn’t told his members about it. And Bowdoin had not reported any significant income for two decades.
“Bowdoin earned no significant income from legal employment in the twenty years prior to his commencement of ASD’s operation,” prosecutors said. “But, no information about Bowdoin’s record of business failures and fraud accusations is contained on ASD’s website.
“Nor was Bowdoin’s true past mentioned to prospective members during the ASD rally at which he spoke . . . or during the conference calls that he, or others promoting ASD on his behalf, participated in during ASD’s operations,” prosecutors said.
Bowdoin In The 1980s
It is possible that investigators knew a lot about Andy Bowdoin before they began early last July to subject ASD to scrutiny.
Andy Bowdoin had a lien placed against him in Perry, Fla., in 1982, for failure to pay $2,559.65 in taxes due the IRS, records show. The lien reflected a time period in which Bowdoin was associated with a failed energy-saving business.
In 1984, a local credit union sued Bowdoin for $2,759.78 — an amount about $200 above the amount owed on Bowdoin’s unpaid tax bill from 1982 — although it is not clear if Bowdoin borrowed from the credit union to pay his taxes.
What is clear is that the tax lien was not removed until 1994, 12 years after it was filed. In the intervening years, six other Bowdoin ventures were dissolved, including five involuntary dissolutions by the state of Florida because Bowdoin had not filed required paperwork.
In the 1980s, Bowdoin was sued by a Florida television station for an unpaid bill of $3,494.66. He also was sued by a local building-supply company for an unpaid bill of $510.05, and the Florida Department of State involuntarily dissolved Bowdoin’s energy-saving business. (The August forfeiture complaint listed 12 failed Bowdoin business ventures, including six between 1983 and 1987, but not the energy-saving business.)
The name of the corporation not listed in the federal complaint was Energy Saving International Inc. (ESI), which was dissolved immediately prior to Bowdoin’s launch of six other businesses between 1983 and 1987, including the five that Florida dissolved involuntarily for Bowdoin’s administrative oversights.
ESI began operating in Florida in 1978; the involuntarily dissolution occurred in 1981, after about four years of operation. Bowdoin filed annual reports in 1978, 1979 and 1980, but did not file one in 1981, the year before the IRS filed the tax lien.
Bowdoin’s tax trouble dated back to 1978, when he failed to pay $2,349.48 due the IRS. In 1981, he failed to pay $210.77, and in 1982 the IRS placed the lien, records show. The records are public documents and are on file in Taylor County, Fla.
The records also show a mortgage foreclosure, which appears to have been connected to a Trust set up to manage the affairs of Bowdoin’s mother, who was nearing the end of her life. It appears as though the home was spared in the end.
Although he was hailed a visionary by his supporters, Andy Bowdoin seems to have forgotten that he’d told investigators one story and a federal judge another. ASD asked the judge last year for emergency release of funds seized by the government because the firm could not pay its rent or hosting bills.
Bowdoin, however, appears to have asked for the relief while not initially disclosing that ASD had more than $1 million sitting in a bank in Antigua.
“Bowdoin tells this Court that ASD is out of money,” prosecutors said last year. “But he told the Secret Service that an Antigua account (in another name), holds over one million ASD dollars.”
Yes, prosecutors said, the account was “in another name.”
What name could it be, when records show that Bowdoin used at least 15 corporate names between 1978 and 2006? It’s one of the enduring mysteries of the ASD case.
And if posts here by the owners of STP are to believed, there was a further $2M in Canada via Solid Trust Pay.
Well anyway, Patrick are you going to be posting soon after your investigation of Randall Jenkins and Rick Jackson of AVGA? I hope so I need to know who they are. Of course I’ll have to take about 1/4 of what you say as truth or at least unravel what you say since you’ll never speak highly of them, I don’t care if they just won the Nobel peace prize. It should be a little easier, they do have the same initials. That’s gotta be significant one way or another.
I remember back when we first got involved in ASD, Jack Arons posted all the failed businesses of Andy’s. One astute businessman claimed it was “smart” of Andy to allow these companies to be dissolved as it was cheaper than renewing the names,and it allowed him to retain ownership of the names.
They ridiculed Jack, and told him he didn’t know what he was talking about, and it made no difference because Andy was a genius; we all know the mantra. Even those of us who joined with Jack in disproving all of Andy’s accomplishments were treated the same way. But as the number of us exposing ASD was increasing, the veneer was slowly being peeled away for all to see.
My point being the information was out there, people were just too lazy to find it. They wanted to believe all the hype that surrounded Andy since they believed the people saying it had actually verified what wsa being said about Andy. When the truth was they had done nothing. They were just parroting what Andy fed them. Instead of embracing this information being provided, they attacked those who presented it as an attempt to destroy a good Christian man.
I had always though that “good Christian men” didn’t need to announce that they were good Christian men; their actions were supposed to be proof. That was one of the first Red Flags with ASD, the fact the promoters felt the need to throw Andy’s Christianity all over the place.
This was sort of like spraying air freshener over rotting corpses in an attempt to hide the smell; it will only work for so long. He is about as Christian as the majority of TV preachers who want your money before they will pray for you.
I hope Andy likes small rooms, as that’s where he is headed.
little joe, How does the Nobel Peace Prize enter into this picture?
Big Joe
I think Judy and George Harris are going to be nominated for one for having a brilliant open and transparent global business opportunity.
I did a search on “Rick Jackson” & found a “Richard Jackson” based in the UK – is this the person you were referring to? This person is promoting something called “My Internet Business” – just the usual “sign-up & be my downline” nonsense. However, one of his web sites showed up the name of “Stuart Ross” also in the UK, who is also promoting something called “YourNetBiz” – same usual MLM nonsense. But who else is a part of “YourNetBiz”?
http://www.ecademy.com/module.php?mod=extprofile&uid=217618
Scroll down a bit & you’ll see that their attorney is none other than GERALD P. NEHRA, he who appeared for ASD at the hearing a while back.
As a former cheerleader of ASD (now completely cured) who nearly dies of shame reading her old posts about Honest Andy Bowdoin and his integrity, I am delighted to see the truth of Bowdoin’s past come out.
Many of us didnt fall for the Click Fraud attempt, and some of us reported it, but, of course, we thought it was that nasty MLMer, Bob Cefail, behind the attempt and not Innocent Andy. (In fact we reported it to Saint Don Peterson, the Sompliance Hero – AAAaaggghh)
Lynn, it wasnt laziness on some of our parts – I searched constantly during 18 months on the internet for anything bad about Andy Bowdoin and couldnt find anything – and so did many others. Ok, we might not have known where to look, but believe me, we looked and looked.I iput the lack of info down to his career being mainly pre internet – stupid wasnt it?
The good thing is that, because of all the internet publicity that ASD has had since the Secret Service raid, neither Andy Bowdoin, nor some of his chums, will be able to start up any other scams so easily. the information on them is now easily searchable
And yes, I am one of those who owes Jack an apology for mocking him when he posted the list of failures, amongst other things. Sorry, Jack – with all those silly pictures, I thought you were just a clown with a grudge. Just goes to show how easy it is to make poor assessments of people’s motivations on the internet. ANOTHER lesson learnt.
Alascia,
Whatever you’re mistakes in the past, and I can relate to them having made the same mistakes myself, you have done nothing less than an extraordinary attempt to get the word out and been forthright and humble in your responsibility. Your actions over the past 9 months show a noteworthy personal integrity. I think you have been effective in helping others see the light.
Victims should remember they were just that, “victimised”
Intentionally and skilfully “victimised”
We are talking about a multi hundred million dollar international fraud here, not some mild hiccup in the development of a legitimate business.
Kindly ol’ Unca Andy has had 70 odd years of life experience and 20 years of “no visible income” to prepare and execute the plan.
People didn’t find information on the ‘net because it was either buried or intentionally removed over a long period of time.
People who, for any reason, underestimate the lengths to which fraudsters will go to gain access to the amounts we are looking at are doomed to repeat the experience.
Does anyone really believe that with probably over a quarter of a BILLION dollars passing through the unregulated, untaxed, unaudited and largely undocumented books of ASD and its’ under the radar payment processors, the fraudsters and “playas” haven’t used every conceivable means to skim off as much as possible ????
Think about it, skimming off a “mere” 5% of the billions involved through untraceable means would give playas/terrorists/crime gangs how much ????
How long would you be prepared to spend planning such a payday ???
It may be “fun” to debate, but, “funny” it most surely ain’t.
I warned and warned and warned people about this crook and it got me banned at the ASA crime forum. Shad Foss I think is the one who got me kicked out because I went head on with that conman. Live and learn. I have been there myself but never ever again.
Jenny, you don’t even live in this country, and many people who not only live in the U.S. but who live in Florida and are familiar with the terminology of our court system, and the searchable government websites, apparently didn’t search very hard for court records. If they had, they certainly would have found them!
• Anyone who knew that Bowdoin lived in Quincy, Florida was only a few clicks away from locating the county name, Gadsden, which takes you to the official government website, gadsdengov.net. A few clicks more and you’re at the Clerk of the Court( http://www.clerk.co.gadsden.fl.us/) and totally impartial proof that Andy Bowdoin was no successful business man and was no successful visionary in the GPS industry.
• By typing in just the last name BOWDOIN on the Official Records/Courts Records sites you’d see that in 2004 a $14,206 FINAL JUDGMENT had been filed in Circuit Court against a company named Creative Retailing located at 13 S. CALHOUN STREET, and that Creative Retailing was owned by one ANDY BOWDOIN.
• Trimble Navigation sells GPS equipment. They filed the lawsuit in 2003 but the highly ethical, successful business man Mr. Bowdoin ignored all summons and failed to appear in court. In January of 2004 the final judgment was filed.
• So, the company Andy bought the GPS equipment from had to sue him for $14,206 and a judge filed a judgment against in him civil court — in my book that’s a lot worse than a $2.00 speeding ticket. And Andy couldn’t claim he thought it would never come to light, so that’s why he lied.
hi joe,
Can you give us a clue as to the significance of “Randall Jenkins” and “Rick Jackson”? Probably most have not heard of them. Rick JAckson was linked by Patrick to credittechs.net, and the credit repair industry has long been linked to shady behavior…. Thx….
Entertained,
Straight from AVGA breaking news.
Member Update
Dear Valued AVGA Members,
We are currently working through several issues affecting the structure of AVGlobal Association. At this
time, we are pleased to announce that Randall Jenkins has been appointed Special Trustee for the
AV Global Association. Randall will fulfill all responsibilities assigned to the office of Trustee.
Please join us in wishing the former Trustees best of luck in their future pursuits.
We also have a new Protector for our Association. The new Protector is Rick Jackson, and he now has
the responsibilities that are detailed for that office in the Articles of Association.
More announcements will be forthcoming.
We sincerely appreciate all of the cooperation and patience you, the members,
have extended to the Association.
There’s a “Randall Jenkins” that appears to be a member of something called “Online Business Alliance – (OBA) #1 Affiliate Program”. Donna had links to similar “business”, and assuming that no real business would touch AVGA with a barge pole, it might be him.
Does anyone really believe that with probably over a quarter of a BILLION dollars passing through the unregulated, untaxed, unaudited and largely undocumented books of ASD and its’ under the radar payment processors, the fraudsters and “playas†haven’t used every conceivable means to skim off as much as possible ????
You are so right LRM – the pantomime by ASD and AVGA may be laughable, but it is not funny.
Funny thing you should mention the above. My first thought when they raided ASD and declared first the 53$ million and later another 40$ million was “there is money missing”. They took in over 95$million just on the rallies. Payments were coming in every day for from thousands of members. There were tens of thousands of dollars waiting to be credited to people’s accounts that hadnt come from rallies, but were “held up in a bottleneck”
When the AG does the forensic accounting of the money that actually came into ASD and compares it with what was paid out and what was left, it looks as if we may be in for some more nasty surprises..
I said at the time of the raid that ASD must have had accumulated liabilities of at least $400 million dollars based on the rallies alone and possibly as much as $750 million (yes, three quarters of a billion dollars) in total liabilities. I think the high end of that is a little high, but from the numbers that have been reported from court documents, ASD would have needed about $500 million dollars to meet the promised rebate liability. So yes, some money was missing, about 5-10 times what was seized.
What’s going to make it harder for the “true believers” to accept what amount (if any) is available for return to the defrauded, is the difference between what is “missing” (as in: skimmed off) and what is “missing” (as in: paid out to members)
Remembering that, by the very fact there is little or no “outside income” every single cent paid out as a “legitimate” rebate or referral commission decreases the amount of the pot leftover for any eventual redistribution.
Add in the fact that “playas” notoriously utilize untraceable, anonymous payment processors of the ilk of SolidTrust, multiple accounts, fake names and international money transfer.
Add in insider theft and lack of accurate account keeping and it’s not hard to see many millions of dollars which have effectively “disappeared”, virtually without trace.
LRM,
There is little doubt that ASD had favored money-laundering and wire-fraud partners within the ranks. It’s probable, I believe, that lots of money collected at rallies never made its way into ASD accounts proper.
Rather, the money was kept in the bank accounts of specific members for distribution later. It seems likely that millions of dollars were collected at rallies and deposited into the bank accounts of certain members, rather than ASD’s accounts, and that at least some of that money later was moved to achieve a specific objective.
It is known, for example, that some ASD members sold ad packs directly to other ASD members, deposited the money into their personal accounts, and then transferred the ad packs to the members using ASD’s internal system.
Any number of private deals would have been made: ASD to specific preferred partners, and specific preferred partners to downline members.
“Rebates aren’t guaranteed” basically was a license to steal. But it’s disingenuous in other ways, too.
A preferred partner who had a pile of ad packs could collect money from individual downline members, deposit it in their personal accounts, transfer the ad packs to the members through ASD’s internal system — thus realizing a guaranteed rebate. If a person had enough ad packs, he or she could realize a guaranteed rebate simply by selling their ad packs and whatever bonuses applied to them for cash.
It could have been corrupt in other ways, too. For example, if a rally was upcoming that offered bonuses, an upline sponsor with a ready supply of ad packs could sell them in advance of the rally to prospects, deposit the money into their private bank accounts, and then use the prospects’ money at the rallies to pay for ad packs for the sponsors themselves.
This would have allowed them not only to make cash on off-the-book sales of ad packs, but also to qualify for matching bonuses by using the prospects’ money to pay for them!
Sitting on $50,000 in prospects’ money? Use it to buy ad packs for yourself at a rally to get an amplified bonus, transfer 50,000 ad packs to your downline at rally time so they could get their rally bonus — and pass off the cost of all the manipulations to unwise people just entering the system.
You have the money in cash in your personal account — a guaranteed rebate, as it were — and you’ve paid for it with other people’s money and handed off the liabilities to still other people.
Patrick
Quick note: Wanted to add that what’s particularly insidious is that ASD later could say — regardless of the hijinks described above — that “rebates aren’t guaranteed.”
All kinds of manipulations could have occurred involving ASD and specific partners to create off-the-books cash — and all of the liabilities could have been wiped away by the disclaimer.
Patrick
Thanks Gregg for confirming my suspicions from a more mathematical point of view.
When the final forensic audit is carried out by the Gov – one would expect to see a list of Ad packs issued against monies paid in and paid out. It is my guess that there will be a lot of money missing. There is a second task to be carried out too, to distinguish those ad packs paid for in real money by real players and victims alike and those that were “gifted” in return for favors (or wages in the case of some people) or bought with “ASD monopoly money” for other people and the cash retained by the promoter.
Not an enviable task,in view of the can of worms that an an audit will undubtedly open up.
We have been led to believe that the Government is not going to let this one go with the prosecution of half a dozen leaders, so, it is to be hoped that this time they will get some of the behind the scenes players who usually escape the net when these schemes fail or are closed and simply move on.
Joe,
I’m intrigued. If you only believe 1/4 of what Patrick writes, what fraction of what you’re told by AVGA do you believe? Patrick has zero financial stake in whether or not you believe him; AVGA lives or dies day-to-day based on their ability to string out information long enough to keep cash coming in (or the Feds away from the door) until they reach their financial goal or solidify their plans to hide out until people give up. They seem to be sending signals that they’re not quite ready to cut and run, but I hope no one who has money in AVGA ever expects them to open for business again, because nothing could be clearer than the fact that they are dead, perhaps just not buried. They don’t need a new Trustee they need a mortician. Bet me! If AVGA ever opens for business again, I’ll buy you 100 page impressions with my own hard-earned money (I work full time in one of those dreaded J.O.B.’s they’re so scornful of in the autosurf world.)
So Joe, if you trust a secretive business with strong ties to, and to some extent operated by insiders of the Bowdoin/Harris Crime Family Enterprises, can you help me understand why you trust them, when you’re skeptical about 3/4’s of what Patrick writes? For the life of me I can’t figure out how you determine who is trustworthy and who isn’t. It’s totally baffling and I’d really like to know your rationale.
Marci:
Your wasting your breath talking to Joe about anything bad about AVGA. Joe is an insider with AVGA and a major promoter. From a confidential source I have been told that Joe’s down line is massive and one of the few people besides his personal friend and ex-con buddy Uncle Andy that is or has made money (lots) in AVGA. Just the other day our friend Joe personally received a large check from Andy for allowing Andy to live comfortably while he waits for what is going to come. In fact Joe and Andy have been in many scams together.
Just remember Joe that scamming ones friends will come back to bite you in the butt especially when you are the only one making any money.
I have found the idea of an association needing a “Protector Trustee” quite interesting. Just what is the “Protector Trustee” protecting the associatin from?
The angry members, Lynddel. When they find out that there is no more money and noone is going to get paid they will be as made as h*ll.
Hi Lynn;
My perception is that the term “Protector”, as used in the AVG articles of association, means something entirely different from most people would usually think. Read the relevant section of one edition I found (quoted below) and you’ll see that it seems to mean “supreme authority”, “big cahuna”, “sovereign commander” or some such thing.
______________________
ARTICLE V
Trustees
1. All Trustee(s) will be members of the Association.
2. The Trustee(s) will assume control and the legal, liable, financial and tax responsibility of the Association as the principal. The Trustee(s) will set the compensation of the Officers, Trustee(s) and any other employees of the Association. The liability of the Association is limited to the assets and property of the Association and does not extend to the Trustee(s) individually.
3. The Trustee(s) may appoint a Special Trustee for the limited purposes of representing the Association in court or other legal proceedings as either plaintiff or defendant. The Trustee(s) may appoint a Special Trustee for the limited purposes of maintaining, preparing and filing all local, state and federal tax returns.
4. The Trustee(s) will have the power and responsibility to select from the membership the member(s) who will perform assistance in educating and administering advertising and marketing information to fellow members in accordance with the Declaration of Purpose and to contract with them for such purpose. The Trustee(s) will not contract for any advertising or marketing that would constitute a clear and present danger of substantive evil.
5. The Trustee(s) will have the power and responsibility to determine levels of membership, levels of membership benefits, what benefits will be offered to all members free of charge and for what benefit and at what amount of cost to the member “special assessment” fees will be levied.
6. All official decisions and actions of the Association will be upon majority consent of the Trustee(s), memorialized by minutes.
7. The original Trustee of the Association will be: First Trustee, Judy S Harris.
8. The Successor Trustee of the Association will be George F. Harris III.
9. In the event of death of the First Trustee or should he become mentally or legally incapacitated and unable to perform her duties, the Successor Trustee shall assume the position of First Trustee. The First Trustee hereby authorizes any and all successor trustee(s) to this “Association” access to the association information and conduct concerning the First Trustee for the evaluation of mental or legal incapacity of the First Trustee at any time.
10. Provided, however, that a Trustee may be removed by the Protector of this association when the Trustee has been guilty of mismanagement, fraud, malfeasance or any other overt acts that do not work in the best interest of the association and its members. The guilt of the Trustee is to be determined by the sole discretion of the Protector. The Protector shall have the sole authority to appoint a replacement Trustee in any event other than himself or herself who will remain as Trustee unless replaced by the Protector or a vote of the membership according to these Articles of Association. The Protector of this Association is Nate Boyd. In the event of death of Nate Boyd, Protector, the Successor Protector will be George Harris III.
11. When the Association membership achieves one million (1,000,000) members, they will have the power to replace with a member of their own choice the Trustee and his successors upon two thirds (2/3) majority vote.