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Tag: Paul Ray Burks

  • URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: Charles Schwab Accounts Holding Nearly $18.6 Million In Name Of Accused Zeek Operator Paul Ray Burks Or Rex Venture Group Have Been Frozen

    URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: (UPDATED 12:16 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) The office of the corporate counsel for Charles Schwab in San Francisco has informed a federal judge that it is holding almost $18.6 million in two accounts linked to the alleged Zeek Rewards’ Ponzi scheme.

    One of the accounts is in the name of Rex Venture Group LLC and has more than $10.3 million in cash and more than $4.94 million in securities, according to court filings. Rex Venture is Zeek’s purported parent company.

    The second Schwab account, meanwhile, holds more than $2.3 million in cash and more than $1.3 million in securities, Schwab informed the court. The second account is in the name of Paul Ray Burks, Zeek’s alleged operator.

    Schwab has “frozen” the assets in both accounts under court order, the firm said in a court filing.

    Separately, North Carolina-based NewBridge Bank has certified in court filings that it is holding more than $11.64 million in an account under the name of Rex Venture Group LLC, Zeek’s purported parent company. Zeek announced suddenly on May 28 (Memorial Day) that it was closing its NewBridge account and advised members to cash checks before June 1 or they would bounce.

    Why so much money remained in the account was not immediately clear.

    Other court filings suggest that Rex Venture also had money on deposit at Four Oaks Bank & Trust Co. Inc., a bank in North Carolina. Four Oaks has asked the court to give it until Sept. 3 to comply with an order to specify precisely how much Rex had on deposit at the institution.

    Extra time was needed because of the “complexity of the financial information that must be analyzed and the need to obtain relevant information from a third party,” the bank informed the court.

    Four Oaks did not identify the third party.

    When the U.S. Secret Service brought the AdSurfDaily Ponzi case in 2008, it was discovered ASD President Andy Bowdoin had more than $65.8 million in 10 personal bank accounts.

    On Aug. 17, the SEC alleged that Zeek was a massive Ponzi- and pyramid scheme that had gathered about $600 million.

    ASD operator Andy Bowdoin is scheduled to be sentenced tomorrow on a charge of wire fraud.

    Zeek is known to have members in common with ASD. The U.S. Secret Service also is investigating Zeek.

     

     

  • DEVELOPING STORY: New Mystery Emerges: North Carolina/Nevada Entity ZeekRewards.com Was Served With California Cyberpiracy, Infringement And Unfair Competition Lawsuit In Flushing, N.Y.

    Screen shot of page from November 2011 lawsuit that named ZeekRewards.com a defendant. (Red highlight by PP Blog.)

    ZeekRewards.com was accused of cyberpiracy, unfair competition and benefiting from copyright infringement in a trademark-dilution and defamation lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Nov. 7, 2011. The action demands an accounting, disgorgement of alleged ill-gotten gains and treble damages.

    The PP Blog was unable to reach Zeek immediately by phone this morning for comment on the lawsuit, which may involve the actions of a Zeek affiliate. The Blog followed up with an email and is awaiting a response.

    The docket of the case shows a summons was issued to ZeekRewards.com and several co-defendants on Nov. 7, the same date the lawsuit was filed.

    A process server served the complaint on ZeekRewards.com at 136-20 38th Street, Suite 9H3, Flushing, N.Y., 11354, on Nov. 21, 2011, at 7:28 p.m., according to court filings.

    An individual who accepted process for ZeekRewards.com at the Flushing address stated “they are authorized” to do so, according to court filings.

    But Zeek says it is an arm of Rex Venture Group LLC, an entity registered in both Nevada and North Carolina. In North Carolina records, Paul Ray Burks is listed at the registered agent of Rex Venture at an address in Lexington, N.C. In Nevada records, meanwhile, Nevada Corporate Planners Inc. of Las Vegas is listed as the registered agent of Rex Venture.

    The docket of the case strongly suggests that neither ZeekRewards.com nor any of the other defendants has entered a defense to the claims and that an attorney for the plaintiff has moved the court for a default judgment to be entered. No attorney appears to have filed an appearance notice for ZeekRewards.com or any of the other defendants. On Jan. 26, 2012, the clerk of courts recorded an “ENTRY OF DEFAULT” against all of the defendants.

    Here are the named defendants: Lewis Liu, also known as Wei Liu; www.eadgear.ca; www.zeekrewards.com; Xinzheng Wire Mesh Co. Ltd.; Xinzheng Companies (America) Inc.; and “DOES 1-10, inclusive.”

    The plaintiff is eAdGear Inc., which does business as www.eadgear.com.

    eAdGear contends that Liu, a former eAdGear affiliate, copied eAdGear’s .com website to a top-level domain in Canada and used the site to promote ZeekRewards.com and to defame eAdGear.

    “In early October 2011, [Liu] published written defamatory statements on ‘www.eadgear.ca,’” the plaintiff alleged. “As shown in Ex. 3, [Liu] stated that plaintiff was not an accredited business by [the Better Business Bureau] and that BBB would soon publish an extremely low rating on Plaintiff. [Liu] further asserted that Plaintiff’s holding company in Hong Kong had never existed. All [Liu’s] statements are false. [Liu] started to use ‘www.eadgear.ca’ to promote his own online advertising business ‘www.zeekrewards.com.’ He asked all his customers under his Plaintiff account (eAdGear ID #127264) to transfer business to ‘www.zeekrewards.com.’ He promised with a low monthly service fee and other incentives to customers who were willing to transfer to ‘www.zeekrewards.com.’”

    The PP Blog also sought comment from Zeek today on why auctions for sums of U.S. cash appear to have been removed from Zeekler.com, the penny-auction arm of Zeek. Zeek Rewards is the MLM arm.

    Zeek Rewards plants the seed that a return of between 1 percent and 2 percent a day is possible, although it claims it is not offering an investment program and has preemptively denied it is a pyramid scheme.