UPDATE: Federal Judge Orders Properties Linked To Alleged WCM777 MLM Scam Listed For Sale

UPDATE: A federal judge has ordered the receiver in the WCM777 case to list for sale three properties linked to the alleged MLM pyramid scheme.

U.S. District Judge Christina A. Snyder is presiding over the SEC’s civil case filed in March. Receiver Krista L. Freitag asked for the authority to sell the properties last month. Snyder granted the authority June 9. The properties are single-family residential homes in Lake Elsinore, Monrovia and Walnut, Calif.

Snyder also authorized Freitag to “close frozen bank accounts of the Receivership Entities and have the balances wired to receivership bank accounts.”

Since the filing of the original SEC pyramid action, the agency has upped the dollar volume of the alleged scam from about $65 million to about $80 million. In April, Freitag said she’d put an end to a nascent MLM scheme with ties to WCM777.

WCM777 purportedly was part of an entity known as World Capital Market.

In an amended complaint last month, the agency accused Vincent Messina, an attorney linked to alleged WCM operator Phil Ming Xu, of self-dealing and distributing millions of dollars in funds linked to WCM777 to other entities.

Certain money disbursed by Messina ended up with “persons in Canada, Abu Dhabi, and to an entity in Hong Kong,” the SEC alleged.

Snyder imposed an asset freeze on Messina last month.

Some promoters of TelexFree, an MLM “program” and alleged Ponzi- and pyramid fraud that gathered more than $1.2 billion, also promoted WCM777.

Like TelexFree, WCM777 was the subject of a state-level securities investigation in Massachusetts. Regulators said both programs targeted individuals who speak Spanish or Portuguese. WCM777 also targeted the Asian community.

Like other HYIP scams, WCM777 traded on the names of famous companies.

The WCM777 and TelexFree “programs” have led to questions about whether MLMers were getting sucked into companies that have cult-like qualities.

Ming Xu reportedly sent a love note to the people of Peru when police there acted against the “program.”

He further reportedly explained that the “program” aims would become clear when “4 blood moons” appeared in the sky in April.