BULLETIN: MLM Attorney And Companion Entity Received $843,000 Through Sale Of ‘Bogus Compliance Course’ That Served As ‘Window Dressing’ For Ponzi- And Pyramid Scheme, Zeek Receiver Says
BULLETIN: (2nd update 9:54 p.m. EDT U.S.A.) MLM attorney Kevin Grimes and a companion entity known as MLM Compliance VT LLC received $843,000 from the Zeek Rewards pyramid- and Ponzi scheme through the sale of a “bogus compliance course,” receiver Kenneth D. Bell has alleged in an amended complaint.
The amended complaint, filed yesterday, includes MLM Compliance as a defendant. The original complaint filed last month did not. Also new in the amended complaint is the figure of $843,000. The original complaint did not specify a specific sum.
Co-defendants also include Grimes and the Grimes & Reese law firm.
“In total, Grimes and MLM Compliance received approximately $843,000 from RVG for the bogus course,” Bell alleged. “The final payment from [Zeek operator Rex Venture Group] to Grimes and MLM Compliance was, upon information and belief, a check rushed to and indorsed by Kevin D. Grimes for $342,510, which posted on August 13, 2012, less than a week prior to ZeekRewards’ shutdown.”
The course, Bell alleged, served as “window dressing” for the Zeek fraud. The SEC shut down Zeek on Aug. 17, 2012.
Some MLMers immediately raced to other fraud schemes — after participating not only in Zeek, but in the AdSurfDaily MLM Ponzi scheme and other “programs.”
Zeek gathered on the order of $850 million in a combined pyramid- and Ponzi scheme that operated for about two years. It was “an internet based so-called ‘MLM’ (multi-level marketing) program,” Bell said.
Grimes and MLM Compliance engaged in “Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices” by creating the course, which “served to bolster what they knew to be an unlawful scheme,” Bell alleged.
Bell is suing Grimes and the Grimes and Reese firm for a sum in excess of $100 million, alleging they were unjustly enriched and engaged in Legal Malpractice, Negligence, Breach of Fiduciary Duty and Aiding and Abetting Breach of Fiduciary Duty.
Our thanks to the ASD Updates Blog.
