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Tag: U.S. Secret Service

PROSECUTION BOMBSHELL(S): ASD Had ‘Special’ Class Of Members; Bowdoin’s ‘Silent Partner’ Was His 12DailyPro Sponsor; ‘North Carolina Lawyer’ (And Co-Owner) Of LaFuente Dinero Told Bowdoin U.S.-Based Attorneys Would Be His Business Partners In ‘Offshore’ Surf; Employees Caught ‘Minister’ Stealing From ASD Before He Launched Golden Panda Ad Builder

Thomas Anderson "Andy" Bowdoin Jr.

EDITOR’S NOTE: First of two parts. Part Two will be published later tonight or tomorrow.

Even as AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin was venturing to Washington in June 2008 to receive what his members and prospects were told was the “Medal of Distinction” from the President of the United States, he was harboring terrible secrets and knew full well his autosurf business was a Ponzi scheme that could collapse at any second and lay waste to thousands of investors, according to court records and an affidavit originally filed under seal by the U.S. Secret Service.

Much of the information from the affidavit, which was filed in February 2009, is being published today for the first time. Companion court documents in ASD-related litigation show that part of a third civil-forfeiture case brought in December 2010 against assets alleged to be owned by ASD and Bowdoin has been put on hold while Bowdoin is battling criminal allegations — and that some individual ASD members whose assets were targeted for forfeiture in the same case have not filed claims for money seized from their bank accounts. Although the forfeiture action against Bowdoin has been suspended, the cases against the assets of the individual ASD members remain active.

Just two months prior to his June 2008 Washington jaunt — in April 2008 — Bowdoin had flown at the prompting of a “North Carolina lawyer” to Panama and Costa Rica with his wife and the lawyer. The purpose of the trip, according to the affidavit, was to incorporate ASD Cash Generator and an entity known known as La Sorta Trading outside of U.S. jurisdiction to create wiggle room if U.S. regulators came knocking.

ASD Cash Generator was the replacement name for the original ASD autosurf business, which was known simply as AdSurfDaily. The first scheme collapsed in 2007, leaving Bowdoin’s first set of investors holding the bag, according to the affidavit. Bowdoin’s later investors were not told about the firm’s dubious history.

La Sorta Trading, whose purpose was not immediately clear, never before has been referenced in the ASD case. La Sorta is the name of a city in Honduras, another country in Central America. It is not known if the firm was named after the city.

Bowdoin also was exploring the possibility that he and his wife would move from the small town of Quincy, Fla., to Costa Rica, the Secret Service advised U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer.

“Bowdoin’s wife did not like Costa Rica, however, and his plans to move ASD’s operations off shore were shelved,” according to the affidavit.

The February 2009 affidavit paints Bowdoin, now 76, as a man experiencing pressure from multiple points of contact — and as a man who made one disastrous decision after another. One of the things allegedly pressuring Bowdoin was fear that the Ponzi could come tumbling down before enough new members were recruited to keep cash churning and the facade of a successful and lawful business in place. Yet-another was fear that insiders, ordinary members and even employees could turn on him. Still-another was fear that a government intervention could occur at any time, according to the affidavit.

Of the millions of dollars that had flowed into ASD, “less tha[n] $25,000 was derived from independent revenue,” according to the affidavit. The rest had come from members and was being recycled in classic Ponzi scheme fashion, with Bowdoin initially empowering himself and a “silent partner” to rake 10 percent of ASD’s “gross sales” and split it evenly: 5 percent each.

But even as he was in Washington in June 2008 to receive an award he positioned as a Presidential acknowledgment of his business acumen, Bowdoin knew that his silent partner posed a risk to him, according to the affidavit.

That silent partner, according to the affidavit, was Bowdoin’s “sponsor” in 12DailyPro, an autosurf the SEC accused of running a massive Ponzi scheme more than two years earlier.

Through his sponsor, Bowdoin had invested $100 in 12DailyPro. The money was lost quickly because the SEC shut down 12DailyPro soon after Bowdoin joined. But Neither Bowdoin nor his silent partner took the clue from the SEC’s action, according to the affidavit. Instead, they worked on ways to channel 12DailyPro-like revenue to themselves and disguise what they were doing.

“Based on his experience with 12daily Pro, and his review of the SEC’s filings against it, Bowdoin knew that a paid auto-surf program that promised returns of that magnitude and recycled member funds was a business model that was both unsustainable and illegal. He also knew that selling an unregistered investment opportunity to thousands of investors was illegal. Nevertheless, after the collapse of 12daily Pro, Bowdoin agreed with his 12daily Pro sponsor to start a similar autosurf program. Both individuals were aware that, before its collapse, 12daily Pro had taken in millions of dollars from its members.”

Under Bowdoin’s agreement with his silent partner, Bowdoin was responsible for managing ASD’s operations. The partner, meanwhile, was responsible for marketing ASD.

In December 2006, about a year and a half prior to Bowdoin’s June 2008 trip to Washington amid claims he was receiving a Presidential award for business smarts, Bowdoin arbitrarily slashed the silent partner’s cut of the upstart ASD business from 5 percent of the gross to 1 percent, according to the affidavit.

Despite the fact Bowdoin had been a 12DailyPro member recruited into that SEC-smashed Ponzi scheme by the same person who’d later emerge as his silent partner in ASD, Bowdoin explained to the silent partner that he — meaning Bowdoin — “was performing most of the work, and bearing most of the risk in operating ASD,” according to the affidavit.

With those words, Bowdoin imposed a pay cut on the silent partner, who later asserted Bowdoin had ripped him off, according to the affidavit.

In August 2008, during a search of Bowdoin’s home in Quincy less than two months after the Washington jaunt and the Presidential claims, the Secret Service found Bowdoin’s handwritten notes from December 2006 that “show his and his silent partner’s awareness of the risks of the auto-surf program they were conducting,” the Secret Service said in the affidavit.

“Bowdoin’s notes indicate that he told his silent partner that the partner should have made him better aware of those risks ‘knowing regulators were on the prowl for surfing sites,’” the Secret Service alleged.

It is known from other documents that the Secret Service opened the ASD probe after becoming aware of the company on July 3, 2008, about 17 days after Bowdoin had ventured to Washington amid claims he’d be be receiving a Presidential award and dining with President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

One of the documents is a 57-page evidence exhibit that includes surveillance photos taken in Quincy prior to the seizure of tens of millions of dollars from Bowdoin’s 10 personal bank accounts, one of which allegedly contained more than $31.6 million. The Secret Service was alarmed as it began the process of peeling back layers of the onion, according to court records

Before July had come to a close, the agency — confronted with a murky fact set and trying to figure out how a man who claimed to have had a remarkable business career that had captured the attention of the President of the United States — had assigned multiple undercover agents to the ASD case.

One of the earliest puzzles to solve, according to court documents, was that Bowdoin had left behind a string of dissolved companies in Florida and professed to be wealthy — but had “earned no significant income from legal employment in the twenty years prior to his commencement of ASD’s operation.”

As the investigation progressed, according to court documents and the February 2009 affidavit, agents discovered that ASD had “special” members who provided Bowdoin start-up capital to varying degrees. These “special” members were grouped as members of ASD’s “President’s Circle,” “President’s Advisory Board” and “President’s Advisory Counsel,” and also knew about the 12Daily Pro Ponzi.

At least “some” of them, according to the affidavit, counseled Bowdoin not to use the name he initially contemplated in 2006 for the upstart enterprise: DailyProSurf.

Some of the special members, who were entitled to higher compensation than ordinary members, “complained” that DailyProSurf sounded too much like 12DailyPro. In response to the concerns, the enterprise abandoned the DailyProSurf name and used the name AdSurfDaily as a means of avoiding “law enforcement scrutiny,” according to the February 2009 affidavit.

The document did not name the “special” members. It was filed under seal on Feb. 26, 2009, during a period in which an autosurf known as AdViewGlobal (AVG) was launching. AVG may represent the fourth iteration of ASD, one launched months after the seizure of Bowdoin’s bank accounts by the Secret Service in August 2008.

AVG’s name is not referenced in the February 2009 affidavit. In June 2009, however, AVG’s name surfaced in a racketeering lawsuit brought against Bowdoin and North Carolina attorney Robert Garner. In September 2009, the government made a veiled reference to AVG in court filings.

Lawyers Referenced In Secret Service Affidavit As Bowdoin’s Partners In LaFuenteDinero, The ‘Spanish’ ASD

NOTE: The PP Blog became aware in 2010 that the government had subpoenaed at least three North Carolina attorneys, including Robert Garner, in the ASD case. The other two attorneys were husband and wife. The husband, who was sentenced to a year in federal prison in 2006 for lying to the FBI in a real-estate case, was disbarred in 2009. Bowdoin challenged the subpoenas, arguing that his communications with the lawyers were privileged. A federal judge ruled that the attorneys had to testify.

The Blog, which previously has published stories that reference Garner, is doing so again today. Garner is listed in Nevada records as a “director” of AdSurfDaily Inc., with Bowdoin as the president, secretary and treasurer. However, the Blog is choosing today not to publish the names of the husband-and-wife attorneys, but reserves its right to do so in the future.

Moving on . . .

One of the most stunning allegations in the February 2009 Secret Service affidavit, which became a public record when the seal was lifted in May 2009 and which the PP Blog is reporting on for the first time today, was that two of the North Carolina lawyers were proposed as Bowdoin’s business partners in LaFuenteDinero (LFD). LFD was ASD’s so-called Spanish autosurf. The proposal was made by one of the lawyers, who described the other lawyer as his “law partner.”

The section below is verbatim from the February 2009 Secret Service affidavit:

“In approximately September or October 2007, ASD’s North Carolina lawyer suggested to Bowdoin that they should start a new site that was in Spanish. In addition, the North Carolina lawyer suggested that the company associated with this site should be set up off shore because when these type of companies raise too much money the government comes in and shuts them down. The North Carolina lawyer recommended that he, his ‘law partner’ and Bowdoin would each share ownership of the Spanish site (as 1/3 share partners). In return for the others’ ownership interests, the North Carolina lawyer and his associate would handle the incorporation work and all of the work needed to move operations offshore.”

By early 2008, with nearly a year and a half of troubled operation under its belt and a Ponzi collapse that had caused ASD to cease operations for weeks in 2007 as it tooled up for a second try under the ASD Cash Generator brand, Bowdoin was growing “suspicious” of at least one of the North Carolina lawyers, according to the affidavit.

“In February 2008, Bowdoin, the North Carolina lawyer and an ‘Internet marketer’ discussed expanding ASD by beginning a new site in Chinese, which would be called Golden Panda Ad Builder,” according to the affidavit. “The North Carolina lawyer suggested a person that would be well suited to run the site offshore, but Bowdoin was beginning to get suspicious of the lawyer. Bowdoin decided, instead, to split the Chinese site with the Georgia minister. Bowdoin told the Georgia minister that ASD had no outside income sources and that ASD’s survival was depend[e]nt on an ever growing base of new contributors. The Georgia minister began working on developing the Chinese auto-surf site.”

‘Georgia Minister’ Allegedly Caught Stealing By ASD Employees; Bowdoin Allegedly Stays Silent About Theft

Bowdoin, according to the affidavit, confronted trouble from any number of fronts. One of his colleagues — the “silent partner” who had been Bowdoin’s 12DailyPro sponsor whose rake Bowdoin allegedly had slashed after they started ASD — told Bowdoin he believed he was owed $20,000 and threatened to expose ASD’s new operation.

“Bowdoin agreed to compensate the sponsor” after initially balking, according to the affidavit.

And Bowdoin also was under pressure from the “North Carolina lawyer” to move the ASD operation offshore — counsel Bowdoin earlier had resisted but agreed to explore in April 2008, despite his suspicions about the lawyer, according to the affidavit.

During the first half of 2008, with Golden Panda still not off the ground during a period in which the “Georgia minister” had access to ASD’s computer system, ASD employees began to complain that the minister was “padding” his ASD account by “secretly using his access to the computer system to increase his/relatives’ number of ad packages,” according to the affidavit.

Bowdoin personally investigated the complaints, comparing the “Georgia minister’s” account with banking records.

Bowdoin “confirmed for himself that the Georgia minister was in fact stealing money from ASD by creating free ad packages,” according to the affidavit. “When confronted, the Georgia minister denied the allegations and asserted that he had proof that the ad packages he created flowed from legitimate deposits of funds into ASD’s bank accounts. The Georgia minister never showed Bowdoin this proof, however, and each time Bowdoin or someone else inquired about the evidence of deposits, the Georgia minister created an excuse to explain why he did not then have it.”

Instead of firing the Georgia minister and ending the relationship, “Bowdoin did not pursue the matter,” according to the affidavit.

Things took a dramatic turn “in about June 2008,” when ASD employees discovered that “the Georgia minister had been permanently enjoined by a court from committing violations of the federal securities laws.

“When ASD employees disclosed this information to Bowdoin, they told him that ASD needed to distance itself from the minister,” according to the affidavit. “Bowdoin agreed to severe his ties to the Golden Panda operation after several ASD employees indicated that they were unwilling to work with the Georgia minister.”

Walter Clarence Busby Jr. of Acworth, Georgia, has been identified by the government in other court filings as Bowdoin’s Golden Panda partner. Separate court documents describe Busby as a minister and real-estate professional, and the SEC described Busby in 1997 as a prime-bank swindler.

In court filings in the ASD case, Busby advised Collyer that he had prevailed upon another minister to assist him in arranging a relaxing day of fishing with Bowdoin in April 2008. During that same month, according to the February 2009 Secret Service affidavit, Bowdoin ventured to Central America with his wife and a “North Carolina lawyer.”

The fishing excursion took place in Brunswick, Georgia, on April 11, 2008, according to court filings by Busby. Five days later, according to the February 2009 Secret Service affidavit, Bowdoin was in Panama and Costa Rica, discussing ASD business and the formation of the La Sorta Trading firm.

Coming later: Government moves against money in ASD-related bank accounts in Iowa and other states.

June 12 Update: See Part Two here.

Jun 11, 2011
Government Has Andy Bowdoin’s Handwritten Notes And Other Devastating Evidence Against AdSurfDaily — Report Coming Soon . . .

Andy Bowdoin

NOTE TO READERS: Some of the evidence federal prosecutors have in the Ponzi scheme case against AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin is coming into clearer focus. The PP Blog expects to publish a report within the next couple of hours.

Our report is based on an affidavit originally filed under seal by the U.S. Secret Service in February 2009, during a time in which some ASD members were promoting a purported “offshore” autosurf known as AdViewGlobal — even after the August 2008 seizure of tens of millions of dollars from Bowdoin’s bank accounts amid wire-fraud and securities allegations.

The affidavit builds on earlier affidavits and paints a picture of a worried Bowdoin at the helm of ASD — and of astonishing corruption and deceit within ASD leading up to the summertime seizure nearly three years ago.

Instead of pulling the plug on his crime before investors were ruined, Bowdoin ramped up the criminality and sought to sanitize it, going so far as to trade falsely on the name of the President of the United States and permit others to do so, according to the Secret Service affidavit.

Much of the information in the affidavit never before has been published, although it was previously known that Bowdoin allegedly tried to tie ASD to the White House to disarm skeptical investors and keep the firm’s money wheel greased.

Here is a verbatim snippet from the affidavit:

“Hand-written notes that Bowdoin prepared in about December 2006 (which were recovered in August 2008, during a search warrant at Bowdoin’s home) show his and his silent partner’s awareness of the risks of the auto-surf program they were conducting. Bowdoin’s notes indicate that he told his silent partner that the partner should have made him better aware of those risks ‘knowing regulators were on the prowl for surfing sites.’”

Translation: Bowdoin knew at least 18 months prior to his June 2008 trip to Washington to receive the “Medal of Distinction” that ASD was playing with fire.

The “medal” was not a presidential acknowledgment of Bowdoin’s business acumen. Rather, it was a “marketing” memento from the National Republican Congressional Committee, according to the affidavit.

And the affidavit also spells out other things Bowdoin allegedly knew while he was touting Presidential recognition of his business career. (We’ll write about those things in the upcoming story.)

The February 2009 affidavit was prepared in part to seize more than $413,000 held in the bank accounts of certain ASD members from Iowa — and also to seize more than $310,000 in the bank accounts of two other ASD members: one from Florida, the other from Missouri.

At least $10,510 of the amount the government moved to seize was traceable to E-Bullion, according to the affidavit.

E-Bullion is a shuttered California money-services business whose operator, James Fayed, was convicted last month of ordering the murder of his estranged wife, Pamela Fayed, a potential witness against him.

Fayed faces the prospect of execution for the murder. The jury recommended the death penalty earlier this month. Formal sentencing is scheduled for September.

Get ready for some prosecutorial bombshells in the ASD case . . .

Jun 11, 2011
BULLETIN: Thanh Viet Jeremy Cao Pleads Guilty In False Liens Case; Ponzi Schemer Admits He Filed 22 Bogus Claims For Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Against Public Officials

BULLETIN: Thanh Viet Jeremy Cao, the California Ponzi schemer sentenced last month to 30 years in federal prison and ordered to pay $12.4 million in restitution, has pleaded guilty in a separate fraud case.

Federal prosecutors in Nevada alleged last year that Cao filed nearly two dozen bogus liens against SEC attorneys, federal judges, federal magistrate judges, a U.S. Attorney, assistant U.S. Attorneys, U.S. Secret Service special agents and special agents of the IRS.

In an agreement with prosecutors, Cao pleaded guilty today to six counts of filing false liens against public officials. He admitted he filed 22 false liens in all, the Justice Department, the IRS and the Office of the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration said.

The bizarre Cao saga began in 2007, when the SEC named him a defendant in a fraud lawsuit. At the time, Cao also was under criminal investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California and the Secret Service for the same fraud scheme — and by the IRS for a tax scheme.

Cao went on a lien-filing spree in retaliation for the various investigations, claiming in Nevada that various public officials were “debtors” who owed him sums ranging from $25 million to $300 million, according to records.

Sentencing in the false-liens case is scheduled for Sept. 21 in Las Vegas.

Cao’s 30-year prison sentence in the Ponzi case was one of the longest sentences in the history of federal white-collar prosecutions in Southern California.

To keep victims in a state of terror, Cao said he knew people who previously had “chopped up” a baby in front of the baby’s parents, and then killed the baby’s mother, prosecutors said.

Those threats led to an extortion and firearms case brought by the state of California.

And Cao dialed up the terror by referencing an “assassination” and “fatal car accident.” When he was arrested, “he possessed a loaded firearm, and body armor and other firearms were found at his residence,” prosecutors said.

Jun 7, 2011
KABOOM! Web-Based Ponzi Pitchman For Legisi Hit With Judgments Totaling More Than $2.5 Million; Receiver Hires Law Firm To Collect Against Matthew J. Gagnon; Scheme Was Promoted On TalkGold, MoneyMakerGroup, Among Others

Matthew J. Gagnon, an alleged web-based pitchman of Ponzi schemes and Forex frauds, has been hit with judgments totaling more than $2.5 million by the receiver in the Legisi Ponzi and fraud case. Gagnon also was charged separately by the SEC.

A web-based pitchman for the alleged Legisi Ponzi scheme has been hit with separate court judgments of $1.69 million and $810,000. Meanwhile, the court-appointed receiver in the Legisi case has hired local counsel in Oregon to pursue the judgments against Matthew J. Gagnon and Mazu Publishing Inc.

Legisi was alleged by the SEC in 2008 to have operated an international Ponzi and fraud scheme that gathered about $72 million from more than 3,000 investors. The scam was promoted on TalkGold, MoneyMakerGroup and other websites, including Gagnon’s Mazu.com.

MoneyMakerGroup’s name is referenced in federal court filings in the Legisi case — and records show that shills on TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup sought to sanitize the scheme even as the U.S. Secret Service and the Michigan Office of Financial and Insurance Regulation were using undercover agents to gather evidence about the fraud.

The judgments against Gagnon and Mazu illustrate the legal and financial nightmares to which forums such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup contribute. Meanwhile, the fact that Legisi was promoted at the forums even as it was under investigation exposes a myth advanced on such forums that investors would know in advance that a government probe of an “opportunity” was under way.

In this evidence exhibit given to a federal judge prior to the Legisi asset freeze, a Legisi prospect writes the name "Money Maker Group.com" in longhand. The prospect also wrote the name "Matt Gagnon" in longhand and a telephone number for Gagnon.

At the same time, the judgments against Gagnon destroy the myths that online promoters of securities schemes have no legal exposure and that offers positioned as “private” insulate promoters from prosecution.

Indeed, the judgments against Gagnon resulted from litigation brought by Robert D. Gordon, the court-appointed receiver in the Legisi case, in October 2009. The SEC sued Gagnon in May 2010, seven months after Gordon brought his actions.

Among the SEC’s allegations against Gagnon was that he continued to promote fraud schemes online — even after the Legisi scheme was exposed.

“Gagnon has been unrelenting in his efforts to raise money from the public through fraudulent, unregistered offerings,” the SEC said in May 2010. “He remains a danger to the investing public.”

Despite his sales pitches, “Gagnon has never been associated with a registered broker-dealer and has never been registered with the Commission as a broker or dealer or in any other capacity,” the SEC said.

After the Legisi HYIP fraud, Gagnon transitioned to pushing Forex frauds, the SEC said.

Gagnon was hit with an asset freeze after the SEC brought its action.

Records show that Legisi was among a number of “opportunities” that used E-Bullion, which was operated by James Fayed.

A jury in Los Angeles last week recommended the death penalty for Fayed for arranging the slaying of his estranged wife, Pamela Fayed.

Federal prosecutors said in December that AdSurfDaily, yet another alleged Ponzi scheme, had an E-Bullion tie. Records show that Gold Quest International, still another Ponzi scheme, also used E-Bullion.

Jun 7, 2011
OBTAINED: Draft Of Complaint Some AdSurfDaily Members Say They’ll File Against D.C. Prosecutors In Florida; ‘Let The Games Begin!’ Declares Prospective Pro Se Litigant. Document Leads To Questions About Whether ASD Had A Special Class Of Members

Dear Readers,

We are plugging our nose as we publish this document (link at bottom of post). You should know up front that we converted the document to PDF format after receiving it in Microsoft Word format. We did so based on the belief that many readers may not own Word but likely have a free PDF reader among the programs on their computers.

We obtained the document from a source. An email introducing the document prompted recipients to “Please forward this to as many of our people as you can.”

The PDF conversion altered the format of the original document, causing certain typesetting errors to appear — but the text content of the body of the document is unchanged. We did not edit the body text in any way. For the sake of convenience, we named the PDF file declaratoryreliefdraft.

The Word original is titled “T&D v USA UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT.” It purports to be a draft of a “Complaint for Declaratory Relief” some AdSurfDaily members say they intend to file in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The document lists ASD members Todd Disner and Dwight Owen Schweitzer as pro se plaintiffs.

It is unclear if other plaintiffs will emerge. Previous ASD pro se litigants appeared to have shared a do-it-yourself litigation template. U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia was inundated with ASD-related, pro se filings in 2009.

No other plaintiffs are listed in the caption of the draft. The defendant is listed as:

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
c/o United States Attorney’s Office
555 Fourth Street N.W.,
Washington, DC 20530

The address is the office of U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. No individual defendants are named. The document, which references U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer of the District of Columbia, misspells her name as “Collier.”

Disner lost a pro se round in the civil forfeiture complaint against Andy Bowdoin’s assets filed in the District of Columbia in August 2008. His petition — and the petitions of dozens of other ASD pro se filers who sought to intervene in the case amid claims the government “confiscated” their assets “wrongfully” — was denied for lack of standing.

In the original set of pro se pleadings in Collyer’s D.C. court, former Assistant U.S. Attorney William Cowden’s last name was misspelled as “Crowden.”

ASD President Andy Bowdoin advised Collyer in a sworn affidavit nearly three years ago that the seized assets in the U.S. Secret Service probe belonged to him or ASD, not individual members. In short, Bowdoin agreed with the prosecution’s view of the case with respect to the ownership of the seized assets.

In its current form, the draft appears to advance the notion that individual ASD members can gain standing in Florida after having been denied in the District of Columbia, get a judgment against the government and undo the government’s remissions program organized by the Secret Service and federal prosecutors in the District of Columbia. Prosecutors have said the ASD Ponzi scheme case may have 40,000 or more victims.

Among other things, the draft asks a Florida federal judge to declare that the government conducted an “illegal search and seizure in that it failed to meet the requirements of the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution and that therefore the search and seizure of their assets was illegal and void.”

At the same time, the draft appears to suggest ASD had a subset of members who should have been treated differently than ordinary members whose lives were altered by the alleged Ponzi scheme. Meanwhile, the draft makes a puzzling argument that ASD’s Terms of Service superseded federal law.

(In this snippet from the draft, the PP Blog added the emphasis to this Blog post.)

“Among the items seized were the accounts, funds and records specifically identified as belonging to the plaintiffs which were separately accounted for on the computer programs and data seized as they were members of ASD, having bought ad packages as specified in the rules and regulations of the ASD business model,” a section of the draft complaint reads.

“Consistent with the rules and regulations applicable to the plaintiffs’ their information was confidential and could only be accessed by them through the use of their password protected account with ASD and their accounts were separate and distinct from any other individuals or businesses who were participants in the ASD advertising program,” the section claimed.

If the document does get filed in a final form — and if the U.S. Attorney’s Office in D.C. gets served and files a response — we sincerely hope the government moves instantly to protect ASD victims at large from further restitution delays caused by pro se sideshows.

Make no mistake: This is gamesmanship.

An email currently circulating among ASD members and attributed to Disner even describes it as such.

“Let the games begin!” the email declares.

It’s as though the first round of games were not enough for some ASD members.

“Here is a draft of the complaint Dwight finished today,” the email, which is dated today, reads.

“I think you will be impressed.

“We will schedule another conference call to field any “feed back” to this motion.

“Please forward this to as many of our people as you can. (As I know you will)

“BEST OF LUCK TO US ALL!!”

_________________________________________________________________________

Click here to read the PDF, which was converted from Word by the PP Blog.

Patrick

May 22, 2011
KABOOM! CFTC/FTC Cases Against American Precious Metals LLC Were Part Of Broader Effort By New Task Force Operating In South Florida; Feds, State Throw Down Gauntlet Against Scammers

Kaboom! It turns out that the cases announced this week against American Precious Metals LLC (APM) by the CFTC and FTC were part of a geographically localized law-enforcement initiative that sprouted from “Operation Broken Trust,” a major national initiative undertaken last year by the U.S. Department of Justice and partner agencies as part of the interagency Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force.

The localized initiative that led to both the CFTC and FTC bringing actions against APM is known as the South Florida Securities and Investment Fraud Initiative. It was created in December 2010 by U.S. Attorney Wifredo Ferrer, the top federal prosecutor in the Miami region.

The CFTC accused APM of running a precious-metals scam. Meanwhile, the FTC opened up a second legal front by charging the company with operating a telemarketing fraud scheme from a boiler room. The effect of the approach is that APM, which both agencies accused of running frauds that had gathered tens of millions of dollars, now has to square off against litigation coming from two different directions.

Ferrer has warned for months that white-collar fraudsters operating in the region had no safe haven either onshore or offshore.

In addition to Ferrer’s office, the CFTC and FTC, members of the South Florida Task Force include the FBI, the IRS, the U.S. Secret Service, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the SEC, the FDIC, the Florida Office of Financial Regulation and ICE Homeland Investigations.

ICE is a division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“Investors lose billions of dollars annually to fraudulent schemes,” Ferrer said in December, when introducing the new task force. “Some victims — the luckier ones — lose only thousands of dollars. Others lose their entire lives’ savings. While the victims of fraud are financially ruined, the fraudsters live a life of luxury. Together with our law enforcement and regulatory partners, we hope to help put an end to this type of fraud.”

May 19, 2011
UPDATE: Thanh-Viet ‘Jeremy’ Cao’s 30-Year Ponzi Sentence One Of Longest In Southern California History; Feds Say He Told Story About A ‘Chopped Up’ Infant And Threatened Victims With ‘Extreme Violence’

Thanh-Viet “Jeremy” Cao, the California Ponzi schemer later accused in Nevada of filing fraudulent liens for enormous sums against public officials and identified by the Anti-Defamation League as a “sovereign citizen,” once threatened to torture and kill his business partner and the partner’s wife and family, federal prosecutors said.

To keep victims in a state of terror, Cao said he knew people who previously had “chopped up” a baby in front of the baby’s parents, and then killed the baby’s mother,” prosecutors said.

Those threats led to an extortion and firearms case brought by the state of California.

And Cao dialed up the terror by referencing an “assassination” and “fatal car accident.” When he was arrested, “he possessed a loaded firearm, and body armor and other firearms were found at his residence,” prosecutors said.

Cao, who was convicted in the state-level extortion case in 2009, was convicted Monday in the federal Ponzi case, which was brought after an investigation by the U.S. Secret Service. He was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns to 30 years in prison and ordered to pay victims $12.4 million in restitution. He is scheduled to stand trial in the false-liens case later this year.

Victims in the liens case included four federal judges, staff members of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California and employees of the SEC, the Secret Service and the IRS, federal prosecutors in Nevada said year.

The IRS Criminal Investigations unit brought the Nevada case, prosecutors said.

Cao filed at least 22 fraudulent liens for astronomical sums, according to records. He turned to filing bogus financial claims after law enforcement, acting with the authority of a court order in the California Ponzi case, seized a $200,000 Bentley Cao had acquired with investor funds and sought to equip with armor.

“Cao is a financial predator who will stop at nothing to cheat his victims out of their life savings,” said U.S. Attorney Laura E. Duffy of the Southern District of California.

“He continues to show no remorse for his actions, which destroyed the finances of many innocent and hardworking people,” Duffy said. “When law enforcement and the federal judiciary stepped in to stop this fraud, Cao retaliated by trying to ruin their finances through the filing of false liens. The sentence in this [Ponzi] case demonstrates how dangerous predators like Cao can be.”

A veteran Secret Service agent said bids to injure victims and the U.S. financial system would not be tolerated.

“The U.S. Secret Service has more than 140 years of experience in investigating criminals like Cao, who target the stability of this country’s financial systems and prey on innocent victims,” said Gregory J. Meyer, special agent in charge.

Cao faces a maximum sentence of 223 years if convicted of all counts in the false-liens case. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in Las Vegas in July 2010.

As part of his liens fraud, Cao developed a “hit list” in which he promised to obtain certain personal information of government offcials “so he could ruin them financially,” prosecutors said.

He also filed for bogus tax refunds, according to records.

Cao’s purported business career was one marked by “cheating” that got him fired from his job for “fraud and misconduct,” prosecutors said, describing him as a “career criminal.”

“When victims asked Cao what happened to their investments, Cao taunted them with profanity,” prosecutors said. “Cao’s victims lost their life savings, retirement funds, and their homes.”

About 190 victims were affected in the Ponzi scheme, prosecutors said, describing his 30-year sentence as one of the longest in a white-collar case in the history of Southern California.

May 18, 2011
URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: Thanh-Viet ‘Jeremy’ Cao Sentenced To 30 Years In Federal Prison; Ponzi Schemer Also Filed False Liens Against Federal Officials, Prosecutors Said

BULLETIN: Convicted Ponzi schemer Thanh-Viet “Jeremy” Cao, who also was accused of filing false liens against federal officials and has been linked to the “sovereign citizen” movement by the Anti-Defamation League, has been sentenced to 30 years in prison in the Ponzi case.

Cao was convicted in December 2010. The U.S. Secret Service and the IRS handled the probe.

In July 2010, Cao was charged criminally with filing false liens for tens of millions of dollars against federal officials. He also was accused of filing for a false tax refund for the astronomical sum of $82 billion.

See KFMB website story on Cao’s sentencing in the Ponzi case.

May 16, 2011
RECEIVER: ‘Insiders And Related Parties’ Of Commodities Online Took Out Twice What They Put In; Shuttered Florida Firm Had Office With ‘Boiler Room’; Winners Received ‘Fraudulent Transfers’

James Clark Howard III: At the center of three Florida fraud investigations. (Photo source: Boca Raton Police Department,)

The court-appointed receiver unraveling the affairs of a Florida firm accused by the SEC of operating a $27 million commodities fraud and selling unregistered securities says the company had “insiders and related parties” who took out twice what they put in.

Clawback actions are anticipated against unspecified “targets” because the money they received constituted “fraudulent transfers,” receiver David S. Mandel advised a federal judge.

Meanwhile, Mandel says Commodities Online shared office space with a law firm. On the second floor of the shared space was a “boiler room” with 12 cubicles, phone lines and computers.

At the same time, Mandel says an early analysis of records shows that the company had at least five bank accounts, including accounts at Bank of America, Fifth Third Bank, JP Morgan Chase, PNC Bank and Wachovia.

The insiders at Commodities Online put more than $5.36 million into the firm between Jan. 1, 2010, and April 1, 2011, and took out more than $10.84 million, according to the early analysis.

“[T]he Receiver was able to identify potential targets who received fraudulent transfers under §726.101 of the Florida Statutes,” Mandel said. “In the upcoming weeks, the Receiver intends to send letters to each of these targets demanding the disgorgement of profits and the recovery of fraudulent transfers.”

Although the firm operated only for about 16 months and allegedly told investors they would “earn 5% or more per month without price speculation,” Mandel’s preliminary analysis suggests more than $885,000 was allocated for “salaries” and more than $523,000 was allocated for “Legal and Professional” fees.

The firm was not registered with the SEC, according to court filings. Mandel said a forensic analysis continues and that records, including computer records, are being scoured for clues.

“Existing email from the Defendants has been downloaded and is being searched for potential transfers of funds or other related activity that may yield additional assets to be acquired for the receivership estate,” Mandel said.

And, he noted, there are “preliminary indications” that Commodities Online “may own a substantial quantity of iron ore located in Mexico,” but that ownership has not been verified.

“The Receiver has retained Mexican counsel to attempt to determine if the Defendants do, in fact, own the iron ore, and if so, to take whatever steps are required to safeguard the ore for later sale or liquidation, for the benefit of the receivership estate,” Mandel said.

At least two persons associated with Commodities Online have criminal records for offenses ranging from “narcotics and firearms felonies” to bank fraud and “transmitting a threat to injure,” according to the SEC.

Although the SEC did not identify the individuals, records show that Commodities Online figures James Clark Howard III and Louis Gallo were charged with the offenses. Implicated in a drugs and weapons case, Howard was sentenced to 57 months in federal prison in the 1990s.

Gallo was implicated bank-fraud and threats cases, and was on supervised release while the firm operated.

Howard is at the center of at least three financial storms in Florida, including the SEC case against Commodities Online. Separately, private litigants — including SSH2 Acquisitions, a company that listed former AdSurfDaily (ASD) member and Surf’s Up Mod Terralynn Hoy as a director — alleged last year that Howard was part of a separate Ponzi scheme that gathered at least $39 million.

Florida authorities charged him criminally in 2010 in a fraud scheme that allegedly targeted the Haitian American community.

ASD was implicated by the U.S. Secret Service in an alleged $110 million Ponzi scheme. Hoy has not been accused of wrongdoing.

See earlier story.

May 6, 2011
SPECIAL REPORT: SEC Sues Commodities Online LLC, Alleging Massive Fraud; Firm That Listed Surf’s Up Mod Terralynn Hoy As ‘Director’ Says It Plowed $39 Million Into Alleged Ponzi Scheme Operated By James Clark Howard III And Others

James Clark Howard: Source: Boca Raton Police Department

UPDATED 2:25 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) In a complex case unfolding in Florida, the SEC has filed fraud charges against two companies that allegedly sold unregistered securities and conducted a $27.5 million “investment scheme” involving “purported commodities contracts.” A receiver has been appointed to marshal the assets of the murky businesses, which are known as Commodities Online LLC and Commodities Online Management LLC.

Millions of dollars generated in the scheme were moved to Mexico and the Netherlands even as the SEC was issuing subpoenas in the case last month, according to court filings. The agency described the transactions as “extremely suspicious.”

Although the SEC successfully halted the alleged Commodities Online scheme on April 1, the only defendants named to date are the companies themselves. The agency described the individuals presiding over the scheme — a former managing member and a vice president — as convicted criminals.

One of the individuals, according to the SEC, was a “convicted felon who was, in March 2010, charged with grand theft and organized scheme to defraud in conjunction with an unrelated Ponzi investment scheme.”

The other, according to the SEC, was an individual who “pled guilty to bank fraud and narcotics charges in 2005 and to transmitting a threat to injure charge in 2007.”

The PP Blog confirmed that, on March 5, 2010, the Boca Raton Police Department arrested James Clark Howard, who is listed as a “managing member” of Commodities Online LLC in documents filed with the Florida Department of State on Jan. 26, 2010.

Howard was charged with grand theft and organized scheme to defraud in a Ponzi case that may involve as many as five companies and their associates acting in concert to scam investors. Boca Raton authorities said the Florida Office of Financial Regulation also was conducting an investigation.

On Feb. 11, 2011, Louis Gallo was identified as a manager of Commodities Online Management LLC in records filed with the Florida Department of State. The Sun Sentinel newspaper reported that Gallo is “on probation for bank fraud and a cocaine charge out of New Jersey federal court.”

AdSurfDaily Member And Surf’s Up Mod Emerges As Figure In New Florida Flap

Other records show that, on Sept. 15, 2010, a Nevada-based company that listed former AdSurfDaily member and Surf’s Up moderator Terralynn Hoy as a “director” sued Howard and others in federal court in Fort Lauderdale. The Nevada company — SSH2 Acquisitions Inc. — alleged that Howard and the others were running a Ponzi scheme into which SSH2 had plowed $39 million.

Hoy, who has not been accused of wrongdoing, was a member of Florida-based AdSurfDaily, which the U.S. Secret Service said in August 2008 was conducting an international Ponzi scheme involving tens of millions of dollars. After the ASD seizure, Hoy became a moderator at the pro-ASD “Surf’s Up” forum, which mysteriously vanished in January 2010 after cheerleading nonstop for ASD President Andy Bowdoin for more than a year.

Bowdoin was the target of a federal criminal probe the entire time Surf’s Up operated, according to court filings. In November 2008, just days after a key court ruling went against ASD, the firm endorsed Surf’s Up as its mouthpiece.

By February 2009, Hoy became a conference-call host and moderator of a now-defunct forum that promoted the now-defunct AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf. AVG, which had close ties to ASD, launched in the aftermath of the federal seizure of more than $80 million in ASD-related assets, the filing of two forfeiture complaints against ASD-related assets and the filing of a civil racketeering lawsuit against Bowdoin.

On June 30, 2009 — one day after Bernard Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in federal prison for his colossal Ponzi scheme — lawyers suing Bowdoin for racketeering alleged that AVG was an extension of ASD. In September 2009, federal prosecutors made a veiled reference to AVG in court filings in the ASD case.

AVG disappeared in June 2009, about a month after the grand jury that ultimately indicted Bowdoin for wire fraud, securities fraud and selling unregistered securities as investment contracts began to meet. The indictment against Bowdoin was unsealed in November 2010, and Bowdoin was arrested in Florida on Dec. 1, 2010.

Surf’s Up was known for unapologetic, unabashed cheerleading for Bowdoin, whom prosecutors said had swindled investors in Alabama in a previous securities caper during the 1990s. Clarence Busby, an alleged business partner of Bowdoin and the operator of the Golden Panda Ad Builder autosurf, swindled investors in three prime-bank schemes in the 1990s, according to the SEC.

More than $14 million linked to Golden Panda was seized as part of the ASD case — and yet the cheerleading for Bowdoin continued on Surf’s Up. The forum labeled ASD pro-se litigant Curtis Richmond a “hero” after he accused the judge and prosecutors of crimes in 2009.

Richmond was associated with a Utah “Indian” tribe a federal judge in a separate case ruled a “complete sham” after it filed enormous judgments against public officials in performance of their duties. Regardless, the cheerleading on Surf’s Up continued — even after it was revealed that Richmond had a contempt-of-court conviction for threatening federal judges and had been sued successfully under the federal racketeering statute by the Utah public officials and was ordered to pay nearly $110,000 in penalties and damages.

Federal prosecutors now say they have linked ASD to E-Bullion, a shuttered California payment processor whose operator — James Fayed — is accused of arranging the contract murder of his wife, a potential witness against him in a fraud case. E-Bullion has been linked by investigators in the United States and Canada to multiple Ponzi schemes.

SSH2, the company that listed Hoy as a director, alleged in September 2010 that Howard was part of a Ponzi scheme that also involved Patricia Saa, Sutton Capital LLC and Rapallo Investment Group LLC.

Howard had been arrested by the Boca Raton Police Department in March 2010, about six months before SSH2 accused him in the September 2010 lawsuit of operating a Ponzi scheme. In the lawsuit, SSH2 said it had conducted business with the defendants from “early 2009 through March 2010,” and ultimately turned over $39 million.

Howard and the defendants, according to the lawsuit, told SSH2 it was trading in commodities and “would produce profits of 40% per month or more, while not risking any of the invested funds.”

SSH2 did not say in the complaint how it had come to believe that a return of 40 percent a month with no risk was possible. Nor did the company describe its efforts to conduct due diligence on Howard and the other defendants.

Of the $39 million directed at Howard and the other defendants, SSH2 received back approximately $19 million in “fake and fraudulent ‘profits,’” according to the lawsuit.

If SSH2’s assertions that it conducted business with Howard and the others beginning in “early 2009” and expected a return of 40 percent a month are true, it means that the business was being conducted in a period after which both the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme and the alleged AdSurfDaily Ponzi schemes were exposed.

Both Madoff and ASD bragged about returns that were far less than the monthly returns allegedly offered by Howard and the other lawsuit defendants.

Madoff’s fraud was exposed in December 2008, about four months after ASD’s alleged fraud was exposed.

And if SSH2’s assertions against Howard and the others are true, it also means the transactions occurred during a period in which Hoy, later to emerge as an SSH2 director, also was moderating forums for ASD and AVG and also was serving as a conference-call host for AVG, which purported to operate from Uruguay and enjoy protection from U.S. regulators because of its purported “private association” structure.

ASD’s Bowdoin initially ceded the money seized by the Secret Service in January 2009, dropping his claims to the cash “with prejudice.” By the end of February 2009, however, Bowdoin sought to reenter the case as a pro se litigant and renew his claim to the money, which totaled about $65.8 million.

Bowdoin’s sudden reappearance in a case he had abandoned coincided with a meeting AVG reportedly conducted with Karl Dahlstrom, a convicted felon. In March 2009 — in a letter posted on Surf’s Up — Bowdoin claimed he had decided to reenter the case after consulting with a “group” of ASD members. Bowdoin did not name the members, but chided federal prosecutors in his letter, writing that his pro se pleadings should “really get their attention.”

For the balance of 2009, Surf’s Up continued to cheerlead for Bowdoin, despite the fact he never told the membership at large about a second forfeiture complaint that had been filed against ASD-connected assets in December 2008. Bowdoin also did not inform ASD members that he had been sued for racketeering and had signed a proffer letter in late 2008 or early 2009 and acknowledged that prosecutors’ material allegations against ASD were all true.

Surf’s Up continued to operate even after prosecutors revealed the existence of the proffer letter. In Bowdoin’s own court pleadings, he had acknowledged he had given information against his interests to prosecutors. Bowdoin said he hoped to work out a deal by which he could avoid prison time, despite the fact prosecutors had alleged he was at the helm of a massive Ponzi scheme.

In October 2008 — at the conclusion of an evidentiary hearing ASD had requested — Surf’s Up conducted an online party for ASD members, complete with images of champagne and fireworks. Members were fed one-sided accounts of what had happened at the hearing, and a federal prosecutor was described derisively as “Gomer Pyle.” ASD’s lawyers were described as the “Perry Mason” team.

A month later — in November 2008 — U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer ruled at ASD had not demonstrated at the hearing that it was a lawful business and not a Ponzi scheme. The AVG forum led by some of the Surf’s Up mods, including Hoy, launched shortly thereafter, and the Surf’s Up forum soldiered on.

AVG was positioned as a way for members to make up their losses in the alleged ASD Ponzi scheme.

Surf’s Up became infamous for deleting comments and information unflattering to Bowdoin. The forum also was used to hatch a rumor that the prosecution secretly had admitted ASD was not a Ponzi scheme but was clinging to the case in a bid to save face.

As time progressed, dozens of pro se litigants attempted to intervene in the ASD case, claiming the government had no “EVIDENCE.” These filings occurred despite the fact that some of the evidence had been a matter of public record since August 2008.

Critics referred to Surf’s Up, whose formal name was the ASD Member Advocates Forum, as the AS[Delusional] forum. Various tortured explanations for Bowdoin’s conduct appeared on the forum, and there were calls for a “militia” to storm Washington, D.C., and for a prosecutor to be placed in a medieval torture rack. Prosecutors and federal agents were derided as “goons” and “Nazis,” and critics were derided as “maggots.”

The SEC’s Case Against Commodities Online

On April 1, the SEC filed an action against Commodities Online that alleged it was selling unregistered securities and operating a commodities fraud that had absorbed at least $27.5 million. Florida attorney David S. Mandel was appointed receiver.

“In connection with the unregistered securities offerings, the Defendants made numerous material misrepresentations and omissions regarding the nature of Commodities Online’s business model and operations, the risks and earnings associated with investing in its securities, and the background of its co-founder and vice-president,” the SEC charged.

“On December 15, 2010, Commodities Online announced on its website that ‘[t]o date, we have 32 contract offerings that have been completed for which our steadfast subscribers have been paid. The dollar total of these contracts is approximately $7.5 million and the payout was in excess of $8.5 million, producing an average earning of over 14.5%.’

“That statement was untrue,” the SEC charged. “There is no evidence to support this amount of investor return. In fact, Commodities Online’s bank records show a net loss for the companies associated with these promised contracts. Further, the company’s records show a net outflow of cash for each of these associated companies.”

By March 14, 2011, the SEC charged, Commodities Online had upped its number of purported successful contracts to 48. That claim also was untrue, the agency charged.

Referring to Howard but not naming him, the SEC said that the company “failed to disclose that in 1997, he was convicted of federal narcotics and firearms felonies and sentenced to 57 months in prison. The Defendants never disclosed his past criminal background to investors either through the Commodities Online website or any other company communication to investors.”

Referring to Gallo but not naming him, the SEC said that, in 2005, he “pled guilty in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey to bank fraud and narcotics charges.

“In 2007, in the same court, he pled guilty to transmitting a threat to injure,” the SEC continued. “He is currently serving a three-year term of supervised release, which expires in July 2011.”

In a separate filing accompanying the complaint filed on April 1, the SEC said that Commodities Online “recently sent approximately $3.8 million to entities and individuals in Mexico and the Netherlands.”

Investigators deemed the transactions “extremely suspicious,” given that the transactions allegedly occurred between March 15, 2001, and March 25, 2011. The SEC said it issued subpoenas to the defendants on March 15, the same day the international transactions began to occur.

Apr 23, 2011
URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: Andy Bowdoin, AdSurfDaily Lose Appeal Of $65.8 Million Forfeiture Order; Panel Unanimously Upholds District Judge

Andy Bowdoin

BULLETIN: Andy Bowdoin and AdSurfDaily Inc. have lost their appeal of a January 2010 order by U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer that $65.8 million be forfeited to the government in the August 2008 civil Ponzi scheme case against Bowdoin’s assets.

The U.S. Appeals Court for the District of Columbia unanimously upheld Collyer, rejecting Bowdoin’s claims he had been denied due process and been hoodwinked by his former attorneys into releasing his claims to the seized cash in January 2009.

“To begin with, there can be no doubt that appellants meant to withdraw their claims,” the panel ruled. “Their withdrawal motion expressly stated that they wished to ‘withdraw and release with prejudice’ their verified claims and that they ‘consent[ed] to the forfeiture of the properties.”

“Nor is there any basis to conclude that appellants were somehow tricked into releasing their claims,” the panel continued. “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.”

Bowdoin’s withdrawal of his claims was “free and deliberate,” the panel ruled.

Although Bowdoin blamed one of his former lawyers for giving him bad advice, the appeals panel said nonsense.

“[F]ar from being negligent, appellants’ attorney had sound reasons for recommending that they cooperate with prosecutors by relinquishing their claims,” the panel ruled.

The ruling means that the government now has title to about $80 million seized in the ASD case. Bowdoin lost a previous appeal for a smaller sum in a separate forfeiture action brought in December 2008, and Collyer ordered the forfeiture of more than $14 million from Golden Panda Ad Builder in July 2009.

Golden Panda was the purported “Chinese” arm of ASD. It was operated by Clarence Busby, whom the SEC had implicated in three prime-bank schemes in the 1990s, according to court filings.

About $65.8 million of the total sum seized in the August 2008 forfeiture case was in Bowdoin’s personal bank accounts, including one account that contained more than $31 million.

Bowdoin initially released his claims to the money in January 2009. By late February of the same year, he sought to reassert his claims as a pro se litigant. He ultimately retained new counsel, and unsuccessfully sought to have Collyer removed from the case.

Collyer refused to step down, and issued the forfeiture order for $65.8 million in January 2010. At least one other ASD member also sought unsuccessfully to force Collyer to disqualify herself from hearing the case.

That member — Curtis Richmond — accused the judge of treason. In a separate case in Utah in 2008, Richmond claimed a federal judge owed him $30 million. That judge, too, refused to step down, finding that a purported Indian tribe with which Richmond was associated was a “sham.”

Richmond has claimed to be a “sovereign” being, as have other people with ties to ASD.

Bowdoin was charged criminally with wire fraud, securities fraud and selling unregistered securities in December 2010. The U.S. Secret Service said he was operating a Ponzi scheme that had gathered at least $110 million by disguising itself as a “advertising” business.

ASD perhaps created as many as 40,000 victims, according to court filings. The civil portion of the case featured dozens of templated, pro se filings from ASD members who asserted the government had no “EVIDENCE” of wrongdoing.

Almost three years into the case, some ASD members still are claiming the government has no evidence — despite the fact that the evidence has been discussed in open court and in public filings dating back to August 2008.

Read the ruling.

Mar 28, 2011