Convicted Ponzi Schemer Andy Bowdoin Of AdSurfDaily Now Listed As Inmate In Florida Federal Prison [UPDATED FEB. 8]

EDITOR’S NOTE: This post originally was published Jan. 24 at 7:33 p.m. It was updated Feb. 8 to include this editor’s note reflecting that Andy Bowdoin now is listed as an inmate at the federal prison camp in Pensacola, Fla. (Pensacola FPC.)  The original story published Jan. 24 appears below and includes some edits to reflect the latest information . . .

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UPDATED 9:08 A.M. ET (JAN. 27, U.S.A.) Thomas Anderson “Andy” Bowdoin, the 78-year-old AdSurfDaily Ponzi patriarch, is listed today as an inmate at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tallahassee. His estimated release date is Feb. 7, 2018. [New on Feb. 8: Bowoin has been transferred to Pensacola FPC.)

In August 2008 — after federal prosecutors in the District of Columbia initially filed civil allegations of Ponzi fraud against Bowdoin and ASD after an investigation by the U.S. Secret Service — Bowdoin was defiant. The government was “Satan,” he claimed. And he compared the Secret Service to the 9/11 terrorists.

Bowdoin was described as a head of a “flock,” a man who had “followers.” What transpired in the years that followed was the stuff of fiction — but it was very, very real. After initially demanding an evidentiary hearing and insisting ASD’s online “program” was not a Ponzi scheme, Bowdoin did not take the stand at the hearing he requested.

He was “too honest” to testify, explained one of his followers.

Prosecutors had a different take: Bowdoin, they said, was a recidivist securities swindler with a felony record in Alabama from a previous fraud scheme in the 1990s. One of his business partners also was a veteran swindler who once pushed “prime bank” frauds, according to court filings.

Other Bowdoin followers planted stories that prosecutors secretly had admitted ASD was not a Ponzi scheme but were clinging to the case in a bid to save face. One follower ventured that a prosecutor should be placed in a medieval torture rack. Another ventured that a “militia” should storm Washington.

In the bizarre world of ASD, there were efforts to enlist public support for Bowdoin by mailing packets of Kool-Aid to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly. There was a corresponding effort to enlist support for an investigation into a Florida TV station, apparently for having the temerity to cover negative news about ASD. Some of Bowdoin’s followers also wanted to investigate then-Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum, apparently for holding the view that ASD was a pyramid scheme.

On Sept. 11, 2008, the seventh anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, some Bowdoin followers prayed for the prosecution to be struck dead.

By July 2010, purported “sovereign citizen” Kenneth Wayne Leaming had entered the ASD fray. He is now jailed near Seattle on charges of filing false liens against at least five federal officials involved in the ASD case: a federal judge, three federal prosecutors and the Secret Service agent who did the early investigative legwork in the case. Leaming, according to court filings, was harboring two federal fugitives from Arkansas, had tried to pass a bogus “Bonded Promissory Note” for $1 million and assisted in the filing of false liens against other federal officials in cases presumably unrelated to ASD.

Leaming, prosecutors said, was instrumental in the founding of the so-called “County Rangers,” an armed enforcement wing for a “sovereign” group in Washington state. The “Rangers” carried fake badges, according to court filings. And when Leaming, a convicted felon, was arrested in November 2011 by an FBI Terrorism Task Force on the false-liens charges, several firearms were found.

One of them was an “AK-47 style assault rifle with a bayonet,” according to court filings.

Bowdoin was charged criminally in November 2010, when an indictment was unsealed. By October 2011, Bowdoin was trying to sell a “program” known as OneX to the members he was accused of defrauding in the ASD case. Conference-call listeners were told they could earn $99,000 very quickly through OneX, which federal prosecutors later described as yet another fraud scheme pushed by Bowdoin.

In May 2012, Bowdoin pleaded guilty to wire fraud, acknowledging that ASD was a Ponzi scheme and that his Florida-based firm had never operated lawfully from its inception in 2006.

Even after Bowdoin pleaded guilty, some of his followers continued to insist that ASD was a legitimate business. Bowdoin was jailed in June 2012, after prosecutors proffered evidence that he continued to promote fraud schemes even after the Secret Service seized $80 million in the ASD case and even after he was charged criminally.

Bowdoin spent the early days of his sentence in a District of Columbia jail. Earlier this month, he was listed as a prisoner at a federal holding facility in Oklahoma City.

And today he apparently has arrived in Tallahassee to serve out the remainder of his 78-month term. [New on Feb. 8: Bowdoin has been transferred to Pensacola FPC.) The prison is only a short [Feb. 8 edit: roughly two-and-a-half hour] drive from Quincy, the town from which Bowdoin pulled off a $119 million Internet fraud.