UPDATED 3:59 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) An email attributed to an AdSurfDaily member claims “We are now playing offense” and “We plan to go after Akerman Senifit (sic) next.”

Why the pronoun “we” was used was not immediately clear. Also unclear is why Akerman Senterfitt has been identified as a prospective target of litigation and what, precisely, constituted “offense” on the part of the unidentified “we.”

Akerman Senterfitt is the Florida-based law firm that represented ASD President Andy Bowdoin in the immediate aftermath of the August 2008 federal seizure of tens of millions of dollars from Bowdoin’s personal bank accounts by the U.S. Secret Service. The initial forfeiture case — and a subsequent forfeiture case brought by federal prosecutors in December 2008 — were filed as civil actions. ASD lost the cases in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and in the U.S. Court of Appeals — long after Akerman Senterfitt withdrew as counsel to Bowdoin and ASD.

Charles A. Murray was Bowdoin’s counsel of record when final orders of forfeiture were issued against proceeds seized from Bowdoin and when both appeals were decided against Bowdoin, who once claimed as a pro se litigant that he’d been denied “fair notice” of illegal conduct.

The email, which was attributed to ASD member Todd Disner, did not explain who comprised “we.” Nor did it explain how and why an apparent group of ASD members intended to “go after” the firm, Florida’s largest and one of America’s largest.

Akerman Senterfitt appears only to have represented Bowdoin and former ASD Chief Executive Officer Juan Fernandez in the August 2008 civil case. There is no record of the firm filing an appearance notice for individual ASD members on the docket of the case, giving rise to questions about how individual ASD members ever could succeed in a bid to sue a law firm that never represented them. In the earliest days of the litigation, some ASD members compared the legal skills of the firm in its representation of Bowdoin and ASD to those of “Perry Mason” — while at once describing a government attorney as a bumbling, hapless “Gomer Pyle.”

After a key court ruling went against Bowdoin and ASD in November 2008, some ASD members backed away from their earlier “Perry Mason” boast and blamed Akerman Senterfitt for Bowdoin’s legal troubles. The record of the case, however, shows that the government used ASD’s own words against it at an evidentiary hearing conducted in the fall of 2008 at Bowdoin’s request.

A voicemail message left by the PP Blog for comment at Akerman Senterfitt in Miami was not immediately returned. Bowdoin fired the firm without notice in 2009, according to court records.

On Jan. 13, 2009, with Akerman Senterfitt as counsel, Bowdoin submitted to the August 2008 forfeiture “with prejudice” and “consent[ed] to the forfeiture of the properties.” More than a month later — on Feb. 27, 2009 — Bowdoin filed a pro se pleading styled “NOTICE of Rescission and Withdrawal of Release of Claims to Seized Property and Consent to Forfeiture.”

In April 2009, Akerman Senterfitt advised U.S. District Justice Rosemary Collyer that Bowdoin and ASD “have decided to represent themselves without consulting their counsel.

“By way of example only,” the firm advised Collyer, “Mr. Bowdoin has recently filed, on a pro se basis, a series of motions. Mr. Bowdoin filed these motions without consulting with counsel and without bothering to advise counsel that he would be submitting motions on his own. Under these circumstances, the Akerman Senterfitt Law Firm cannot render effective assistance of counsel.”

The firm, which was still Bowdoin’s counsel of record when he began to file freelance motions, asked for leave to withdraw from the case, explaining that its representation had become “unreasonably difficult.”

Collyer released Akerman Senterfitt from the case on April 15, 2009.

By the close of April 2009 — in response to one of several pro se pleadings by Bowdoin — prosecutors advised Collyer that he had signed a proffer letter in the case and acknowledged that the government’s material allegations were all true.

Bowdoin himself later acknowledged that he had met with prosecutors over a period of at least four days in December 2008 and January 2009 and had provided information against his interests.

Neither Bowdoin nor the government has said whether Bowdoin had provided information against the interests of others. Bowdoin claimed in September 2009 that he had been “hoodwinked” into releasing his claims and cooperating with prosecutors by Steven Dobson, a criminal attorney recommended by Akerman Senterfitt.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit unanimously rejected Bowdoin’s hoodwinking claim in March 2011.

There was no basis “to conclude that appellants were somehow tricked into releasing their claims,” the panel ruled. “Despite Bowdoin’s protests to the contrary, his own affidavit shows that he understood well that he was receiving no promise in return for relinquishing his claims.”

In his own court filings, Bowdoin acknowledged that his decision to withdraw his claims to $65.8 million seized by the Secret Service was made because of a “possibility” that he could avoid a jail term.

These are among the phrases to which Bowdoin swore on Sept. 15, 2009:

• Dobson represented to me that I could possibly avoid prison or get a reduced sentence if I agreed to disclose details concerning ASD and releasing the assets.
• I also signed a document stating that I would release my claims in the abovecaptioned civil in rem forfeiture proceeding, again thinking that necessary for a possible avoidance of a prison term.
• I did all of this on the understanding that by cooperating I could possibly avoid a prison sentence.
• I agreed not to exercise my rights in the civil forfeiture proceeding, anticipating from representations made by Dobson that this could possibly keep me out of prison.
• Dobson lead [sic] me to believe that if I cooperated there was a possibility that I would not be incarcerated or imprisoned.
• I believed that my cooperation would still result in a criminal sentence that could possibly not include imprisonment or incarceration.
• I slowly came to understand what I understood from Dobson not to be the case: that my agreement to cooperate provided me no benefit in the criminal matter except the possibility of a reduced sentence if the judge desired which would still be a life sentence.

New Email Circulating Among ASD Members

Here, verbatim, is a new email circulating among ASD members. The email was attributed to Todd Disner. Disner, like Bowdoin, is among dozens of litigants who filed pro se pleadings in the civil portion of the case. (Italics added.)

Hi folks,

I talked to Andy the other day. He was in Atlanta airport coming home from his hearing in Washington .
He said the government gave his attorney 10 discs full of files .
The judge gave his attorney only 90 days to review all the documents .
This was not fair but this is what the judge determined .

But what was really interesting was when he told me that the
prosecution was very proud of 11,000 affidavits they received from us through Rust
Incorporated. .

They “think” that they have evidence that now ASD was an investment.

Of course we knew that that was a trap to get unsuspecting and desperate
people to sign just about anything in an effort to get their money back .
(My question is where of the other 107,000 people who did NOT sign the
affidavit?)

I’m sure that Andy’s attorney will speak to the coercive nature used to created that questionable evidence. To me it appears more and more that our
government is operating with malice in this case. I think that will be apparent
to any jury.

Andy’s attorney is filing a motion to REDO the affidavit, This is a powerful attempt to get our money back by asking the court to make the government issue a “reasonable” form; one that does not make us perjure ourselves in an effort to recover what is rightfully OURS.

Remember when we enrolled in ASD, we signed the “Term and Conditions” explicitly stating the ASD was NOT AN INVESTMENT. The existing form make liars out of us, one way or the other.

Andy was in good spirits and very confident about his case .
Dwight helped him get money back from his second attorney .
This is a story in itself. Its shows the way Andy has been treated
by his previous attorneys.

We plan to go after Akerman Senifit next. (Andy’s first attorneys)

It is a tragedy how the government must stoop to such tactics in
order to prove their case against Andy and ASD.

We are now playing “offense” and will see what happens.

Keep your spirits up and try to help the cause.

Best Regards,

Todd Disner
[Phone number deleted by PP Blog]

Rust Consulting Inc. is the government-approved claims processor for victims of the alleged ASD fraud. ASD members who certify themselves crime victims through a process known as remission may be eligible to receive compensation through seized proceeds. The government announced nearly three years ago that it was establishing a restitution program.

Some ASD members have described the remissions program as a government plot. Meanwhile, two ASD figures — Kenneth Wayne Leaming and Christian Oesch — sought to sue the government last year for the spectacular sum of more than $29 TRILLION.

Disner started a drive earlier this year to raise money to help him and onetime attorney Dwight Schweitzer file a pro se lawsuit against the government.

In recent weeks, other ASD members have started a fundraising drive for Bowdoin, who was arrested on ASD-related criminal charges in December 2010.

There have been at least four efforts by subgroups of ASD members to raise money to litigate against the government since August 2008. Some ASD members who provided funding have contributed multiple times, becoming members of subgroups within subgroups that issued appeals for cash.

A defunct organization known as ASD Members International (ASDMI) purported in October 2008 to be a Missouri nonprofit whose aim was to litigate against the government even if it was proceeding lawfully and perhaps have prosecutors and investigators charged with crimes.

Separately, a group known as the ASD Members Business Association (ASDMBA) claimed it had gathered more than $100,000 to challenge the forfeiture and speed the return of seized funds. ASDMBA’s de facto head was Bob Guenther, a convicted felon.

ASDMBA members complained that Guenther provided no transparent accounting after soliciting funds.

Disner’s apparent group of ASD members is known informally as “ASD Justice,” the title of a Blog. No accounting has been released of the sums it collected. A plan by Disner and Schweitzer to sue the government in Florida’s federal courts appears to have stalled.

Bowdoin’s apparent group is calling itself “Andy’s Fundraising Army.” It has missed two launch dates this month, but now says it will launch tomorrow. The group has positioned Bowdoin as “David,” with the government cast as a lawless “Goliath.”