UPDATED 8:19 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Motions to intervene in the civil forfeiture case against AdSurfDaily Inc. are pouring into U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
The motions are filed pro se and may be the result of an organized effort by an AdSurfDaily upline. The motions claim the government now owes ASD members funds seized by the U.S. Secret Service last year.
Included among the first five filers are Bruce Disner, Carol L. Rose, Lisa Koehler, Joseph Poggioreale and Jacqueline Poggioreale. It is unclear if other filings will follow.
Disner claims the government owes him $42,000; Rose claims “$140 put in + earnings”; Koehler claims $1,000; Joseph Poggioreale claims $22,000 in a filing that also includes the name Jacqueline Poggiorelae; Jacqueline Poggioreale claims $22,000 in an individual filing.
“At the time the funds were confiscated I had done nothing wrong,” the motions claim. “These funds were not only, in part, mine but the proceeds of ASD’s approximately one hundred thousand customers, contractors, employees and advertisers doing business with and for Ad Surf Daily.”
Five motions have appeared on Judge Rosemary Collyer’s docket for the August forfeiture case so far today. They are styled as motions “to Intervene and Petition to Return Wrongfully Confiscated Funds.” The motions appear to be from a litigation blueprint and blame the government for events, not ASD President Andy Bowdoin.
“This reckless action by the Government and its agents, served to terminate my living, my advertising campaign for my businesses, and my future wellbeing for both myself my family and my customers,” the motions claim.
“This reckless action has prevented me from paying my financial obligations in a timely matter and in some cases not at all,” the motions continue. “This reckless action has done irreparable damage to my reputation with my friends, family and customers and has caused me endless embarrassment and loss of my precious credibility.”
The motions point the finger of blame at prosecutors, not Bowdoin, and include a numbered list and an all-caps subhead:
AFTER ONE YEAR:
1. The U.S. Government has failed to produce any EVIDENCE of alleged wrongdoing.
2. The U.S. Government has failed to produce any WITNESSES of alleged wrongdoing.
3. The U.S. Government has failed to produce any VICTIMS of alleged wrongdoing.
4. The action was based solely on the OPINIONS of the U. S. Government agents.
5. The U.S. Government failed to notify me or any other affected parties as to the whereabouts or disposition of (my) our assets. (See Rule 983, U.S. Rules of Evidence).
“By this reckless action and reckless disregard of the law by my Government to ‘protect’ its citizens, the U.S. Government has made us victims by confiscating our assets and terminally affected our businesses’ and all but wiped away all or part of their incomes both present and future,” the motions claim.
“This reckless action by the Government has served to punish both Ad Surf Daily and its customers, contractors, employees and vendors without the benefit of a trial in a Court of Law,” the motions continue.
“This reckless action by the Government has infringed on my civil rights and my Constitutional Rights to do business in the United States.
“I HEREBY, file this Motion and Petition to Refund my money which includes cash profits, my ad packages and any computer software databases returned forthwith.
“THEREFORE, Petitioner requests the Court to enter an Order Allowing Petitioner to Intervene and Order Authorizing the Return of the above referenced funds to Petitioner,” the motions conclude.
Collyer previously has denied a series of motions to intervene. Prosecutors have argued that the motions are delaying the establishment of a restitution pool for ASD members who certified they were crime victims.
The judge consistently has ruled that the assets seized — including tens of millions of dollars — belonged to Andy Bowdoin, not individual ASD members, and that others lacked standing to intervene in the case.
Unlike previous pro se claims, today’s claims assert that the government has a duty to refund paper profits that showed in the back offices of ASD members. Meanwhile, the motions also demand the return of ASD ad-packs — even though Bowdoin was authorized to display ads after the seizure and did not do so.
Today’s motions also appear to demand the government to return ASD’s database — although to whom was not clear. Members have said ASD itself appears to have sold the database or made it available to other users.
Some ASD members scolded Bowdoin in March, after they began to receive email pitches for a purported surf known as PaperlessAccess. In a video, Bowdoin told members PaperlessAccess was a way for them to make up losses.
People complained as recently as last week that telemarketers using the ASD database were contacting them.
Meanwhile, prosecutors said in April that Bowdoin had signed a proffer letter in the case and acknowledged that ASD was operating illegally at the time of the seizure.
Read the motion by Bruce Disner.