Category: The Economy
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CKB168 CASE: 2 Promoters Plead Guilty To Criminal Counts; 3 Others Face Trial
Two U.S.-based promoters of the noxious CKB168 cross-border pyramid scheme aimed at Chinese-Americans have pleaded guilty to wire-fraud, the office of U.S. Attorney Eileen M. Decker of the Central District of California said. The SEC sued Cheong Wha “Heywood” Chang, 48, and his wife, Toni Chen, 47, in 2013. Federal prosecutors later charged them criminally,…
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Payza Reports Web Outage
Payza, an HYIP-friendly payment processor currently under fire from the receiver in the Zeek Rewards Ponzi- and pyramid-scheme case, is reporting on Twitter that it is experiencing a web outage. At the time of this PP Blog post, the outage appears to be more than four hours old. A post with no timestamp at the Payza…
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SEC, Trustee, Defense Attorneys Mum On Possible Deeper Ties Between TelexFree And DFRF Schemes
The SEC declined Friday to say whether two individuals named prospective defendants in a massive class-action lawsuit brought by the Trustee in the 2014 TelexFree bankruptcy case were the same two persons charged with securities fraud last year by the agency in the DFRF Enterprises/Daniel Fernandes Rojo Filho Ponzi- and pyramid-scheme case. On June 30, 2015,…
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Faith Sloan’s Alleged TelexFree Haul: $710,319
UPDATED 3:32 P.M. EDT U.S.A. Faith Sloan received $710,319 from the TelexFree Ponzi- and pyramid scheme, according to filings by TelexFree bankruptcy Trustee Stephen B. Darr. Sloan, whose address was listed as Virginia Beach, Va., is a longtime Illinois HYIP huckster on Ponzi boards and social media. She and three other TelexFree promoters were charged in…
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‘Pay It Forward’ Gifting Scheme Leads To Felony Racketeering Charge, Sparks Child-Porn Probe In Michigan
As the PP Blog reported more than six years ago, Pay It Forward (PIF) “programs” have a noxious history in HYIP and cash-gifting Scamland. A new case in Michigan, however, may be off-the-charts in terms of noxiousness. That’s because investigators looking into a PIF scheme there found child pornography on the alleged PIF operator’s computer,…
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BRIEF: Get Prepared To File TelexFree Claims
Good news for potentially hundreds of thousands of people with TelexFree claims. TelexFree bankruptcy Trustee Stephen B. Darr informed Chief Judge Melvin S. Hoffman yesterday that testing could begin this month on the electronic proof of claim form (ePOC) and the online claims portal administered by BMC Group Inc. If all goes well, the “ePOC…
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Tax Problems Mount For TelexFree In Brazil, As Criminal Investigations Continue
It’s easy enough to forget that TelexFree and its principals have epic legal problems outside the United States, where the company has been found a Ponzi- and pyramid scheme and alleged operators James Merrill and Carlos Wanzeler are under criminal indictment. History shows, however, that the problems began in the Brazilian state of Acre in…
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RECEIVER: (1) Zeek Defendant Class Action May Conclude This Year; (2) Some Claimants Still Haven’t Signed Required Release; (3) $10 Million Settlement With NewBridge Bank
Three significant pieces of news from Kenneth D. Bell, the receiver in the Zeek Rewards’ Ponzi- and pyramid-scheme case: In a March 28 announcement on the receivership website, Bell wrote that a defendant class-action lawsuit against more than 9,000 alleged Zeek winners in the United States may conclude this year. “We hope to bring to…