Archive for March 2012

EDITOR’S NOTE: Law enforcement has warned that “shell companies” are playing an increasingly larger role in criminal schemes, as scammers turn to them to sanitize their capers, disguise fraud, disarm skeptical investors and keep large sums of cash flowing. The threat to the U.S. economy and the corrosive effects on legitimate commerce cannot be overstated […]

BULLETIN: A federal judge in California has ordered the operators and top promoters of the BurnLounge MLM scam to pay nearly $17 million. The FTC brought the BurnLounge pyramid-scheme case in 2007, saying the program “primarily provided payments to participants for recruiting of new participants, not on the retail sale of products or services.” In […]

BULLETIN: A joint investigation by offices of Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette and Commissioner Kevin Clinton of the Office of Financial and Insurance Regulation has led to criminal charges of racketeering against two men accused of targeting the elderly in a $9 million Ponzi scheme. Charged in the alleged caper were Jeffrey Ripley, 59, of […]

“The Government has provided over 2742 pages of discovery consisting of: liens, police reports, [Bureau of Prisons] records, pictures, surveillance photos, internet search records, audio subpoenas and over 1000 pages of documents seized.” — From March 5 court order in false-liens case involving accused AdSurfDaily figure and purported “sovereign citizen” Kenneth Wayne Leaming and former […]

“In law enforcement, we look into the IP address and whether is real or not (proxy). Then your service provider gives the account information with the customer’s name and address, then a warrant is made, then a police task force is dispatched with agents to raid your home or office, arrests you and seizes all […]

BULLETIN: (UPDATED  at 8:35 P.M. ET U.S.A.) The Grays Harbor County Sheriff’s Office now confirms that Steven Daniel Kravetz has been apprehended. Local media are reporting his mother negotiated his surrender, which occurred without incident. Our earlier story is below . . . Authorities in Grays Harbor County, Wash., have identified Steven Daniel Kravetz as […]

BULLETIN: Philip Lochmiller Sr., the Colorado recidivist securities huckster and Ponzi schemer whose case drew comparisons to the AdSurfDaily Ponzi case for a lack of key disclosures to investors, has been sentenced to 405 months in federal prison and ordered to pay restitution of $18.6 million. The term amounts to nearly 34 years. Lochmiller is […]

BULLETIN: Multiple media outlets are reporting that a judge was stabbed and a sheriff’s detective shot with her own weapon at the Grays Harbor County Courthouse in Montesano, Wash. The alleged assailant reportedly is on the loose, possibly with the detective’s handgun. A massive manhunt reportedly is under way. Early reports suggest the victims survived. […]

Here is an imponderable: Is there any ceiling to the absurdities in the HYIP sphere and the destructive force it exercises around the web? On Wednesday, the PP Blog received repeated spams from U.S.-based IPs. The spammer used the handle “invest liberty reserve” and targeted two threads, including this one about JSS Tripler 2, a […]

UPDATED 7:43 A.M. ET (MARCH 9, U.S.A.) If ever there has been a cautionary tale for HYIP pitchmen, it is Jeffrey Lane Mowen’s Utah Ponzi scheme. Mowen and at least six promoters ended up inspiring litigation on multiple fronts, with Mowen charged criminally. At issue was Mowen’s Forex Ponzi scheme, which allegedly was funded in […]

This is a links post on the prison sentence of more than 14 years handed down to Kautilya Nandan Pruthi, the so-called Bernard Madoff of Britain. See The Sun’s coverage here. Outtake (italics added): “Judge Michael Gledhill QC said: “You are an extremely intelligent, articulate, sophisticated and plausible liar. In short, a professional fraudster.” See […]