With a headline of “Red Carpet Wednesday – URGENT,” the Zeek Blog is reporting that a Red Carpet event scheduled Aug. 22 has been canceled.
Zeek, the operator of the Zeek Rewards MLM “program” and the Zeekler penny auction, provided no explanation for calling off the event. Zeek is a purported arm of Rex Venture Group LLC.
The office of North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper said last week that it had opened an “examination” into Zeek’s business practices.
Zeek has been dogged in recent weeks by PR disasters, including the reported firing of purported MLM expert Keith Laggos as a “consultant.”
Earlier this week, some members of the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme announced a plan to “flood” a federal judge with letters of support for former ASD President Andy Bowdoin, who pleaded guilty to wire fraud in May in the ASD Ponzi case. An email circulating among ASD members that called for the judge to be flooded included two ads for Zeek.
Some Zeek promoters also are known to have promoted ASD, a 1-percent-a-day Ponzi scheme. Two Zeek promoters — Todd Disner and Dwight Owen Schweitzer — sued the United States in November 2011. As part of the lawsuit, Disner and Schweitzer presented a federal judge an opinion from Laggos that ASD was not a Ponzi scheme.
Like ASD, Zeek plants the seed that a return of 1 percent or more per day is possible. And like ASD, Zeek denies it is offering an investment program.
The Dispatch newspaper of Lexington, N.C., published a story today that included a July 31 photograph of Zeek prospects waiting in line, apparently to get a chance to turn over money to the company.
At least one apparent Zeek supporter left a comment that the newspaper’s website that asserted that The Dispatch had printed untrue things about the company and that the reporter who wrote the story had not gone through Zeek “compliance training.”
Some Zeek supporters appear to hold the curious belief that reporters are required not to use the word “investment” when describing the Zeek “program.”
Zeek advises its members not to use the language of investments when describing the “program.” ASD did the same thing.
The U.S. Secret Service raided ASD in 2008, alleging that ASD has a massive Ponzi scheme that sought to avoid the use of the language of investments to keep its 1-percent-a-day program under the government radar.
Bowdoin later was indicted on charges of securities fraud, selling unregistered securities as investment contracts and wire fraud. The 77-year-old ASD patriarch pleaded guilty to wire fraud and faces up to 78 months in federal prison.
Federal prosecutors have asked that Bowdoin be sentenced to the maximum term despite his age, alleging he started a new 1-percent-a-day fraud just two months after the August 2008 Secret Service raid.
This is the entirety of the Zeek Blog post today (italics added):
Fine People,
We regret to inform you that Red Carpet Wednesday, scheduled for Wednesday, August 22, 2012 has been cancelled. Please continue to monitor our websites for more information to be forthcoming.