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Tag: U.S. District Judge Michael M. Baylson

  • URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: Ponzi Schemer And Recidivist Felon Robert Stinson Jr. Sentenced To More Than 33 Years For ‘Life’s Good’ Caper

    URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: Robert Stinson Jr., the Philadelphia-area Ponzi schemer who was wiring stolen funds from one account to another even as the FBI was conducting a raid in 2010, has been sentenced to 400 months in federal prison. The term amounts to more than 33 years.

    Stinson, a 57-year-old securities huckster and recidivist felon whose criminal record dates back at least to 1986, defrauded more than 260 investors out of more than $17 million in his most recent scam, federal prosecutors said.

    The scam operated through an entity known as Life’s Good Inc.  and featured false claims that Stinson was a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a fabulously successful businessman.

    In reality, he was a serial huckster who’d twice filed for bankruptcy and was enjoined in a 1990 SEC case from breaking federal securities laws.

    At 12:06 p.m. on June 29, 2010 — the date of the raid and while federal agents were executing search warrants and seizing two Mercedes Benz sedans Stinson had purchased with money stolen from investors — Stinson began a series of wire transactions in which he moved at least $225,000 to prevent the cash from being seized, according to the indictment.

    Two of the transactions occurred during the same minute and involved two separate banks, according to the indictment.

    Stinson’s wife, Susan L. Stinson, is scheduled to be sentenced tomorrow on charges of obstructing the SEC’s 2010 investigation into her husband.

    U.S. District Judge Michael M. Baylson of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania presided over Robert Stinson’s sentencing today. In addition to ordering Stinson jailed for decades, Baylson ordered restitution of $14 million and three years’ supervised release when Stinson leaves jail.

    Stinson will be close to the age of 90 if he survives the term of incarceration.

    Court filings suggest Stinson tried to defeat a court-ordered asset freeze and continued to commit fraud even after the actions by the FBI and SEC in 2010.

    The Philadelphia Daily News is reporting tonight that Stinson told the judge today that he’d “changed” while awaiting sentencing and had dedicated his life to serving God.

  • BULLETIN: Receiver Seizes Website Of EclipseChannel.TV ‘Advertising’ Venture, Saying Recidivist Felon And Accused Ponzi Schemer Robert Stinson Jr. Hatched New Fraud Scheme After Asset Freeze; Cash Used To Pay ‘Mansion’ Rent

    BULLETIN: A federal judge in Pennsylvania blocked the launch of an online venture known as EclipseChannel.TV after reviewing evidence that recidivist felon and securities huckster Robert Stinson Jr. was at the helm and had thumbed his nose at court orders and an asset freeze.

    Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Inquirer, quoting federal prosecutors, reported that Stinson, who is African American, had been using the alias of Jon P. Sascha II online to solicit money for the video venture.

    “The Facebook page for Sascha, who counts Stinson among his ‘friends,’ depicts a white man with short brown hair and sunglasses on a beach,” the newspaper reported.

    Part of the evolving EclipseChannel fraud involved naming conventions, according to court filings. An earlier iteration of the enterprise initially was part of Stinson’s overall, $17 million fraud, which led to the SEC filing a civil lawsuit and prosecutors charging Stinson criminally.

    After Stinson’s assets were frozen, new shell companies were formed to continue the fraud, and the Eclipse Channel was renamed “Eclipsechannel.tv Global Broadcasting Network Inc.,” according to court filings.

    Kamian Schwartzman, the court-appointed receiver, said a “flurry of incorporations” had occurred to drive money to the scheme, but that most of the money was used to pay “past due rent” on the Philadelphia-area “mansion” of Stinson and his wife.

    Prosecutors moved to revoke Stinson’s bail. That issue will be decided April 27. For now, Stinson has been placed under “house arrest” and U.S. District Judge Michael M. Baylson ordered that his computers be taken to keep him offline, according to the Inquirer.

    Court filings in the SEC case quote Stinson as saying the charges against him were “bullsh*t” peddled by a “disgruntled employee.” He told people he had “proof” the case against him was false and confidently predicted he would “beat it.”

    But he offered no “proof” and did not “beat it,” Schwartzman said.

    Instead, he was charged criminally and failed to defend against the SEC action.

    Rather than adhere to the conditions placed on him by a federal judge, “Stinson has busied himself with efforts to evade this Court’s Freeze Orders and Receivership Order,” Schwartzman said.

    U.S. District Judge Berle M. Schiller authorized Schwartzman to take control of the EclipseChannel website, its Facebook and Twitter accounts and “any and all other Eclipse Channel II content or promotional material.”

    EclipseChannel was positioned as an “advertising” venture and was actively soliciting money despite the swirl of litigation around Stinson.

    Remarkably, a number of people continued to do business with Stinson despite the Ponzi allegations and his felonious history, according to court filings.

    In 1986, he was convicted of wire fraud and larceny in U.S. Court in Delaware, according to records. In 1987, he was convicted of forgery and larceny in New Jersey state court. During the same year, he was convicted of mail fraud in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

    Meanwhile, in 1996, he was convicted of criminal conspiracy in state court in Pennsylvania. In 2001, he was convicted of bank fraud in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

    Stinson filed two bankruptcy petitions in 1999, one in October and another in December, according to records.

    Nine years earlier, in 1990, he was charged with fraud by the SEC. He was ordered to pay a judgment of $7,680, but the judgment remains unpaid, according to court filings.

    See earlier story.