Amazonas Florestal Ltd (AZFL)

[janice shell]

Rick Fernandez was no criminal mastermind. He started off in SLJB. He got tight with Peter Vucicevic, the CEO, and by all accounts accepted some money or stock from him for touting. He started a stock chat site chiefly intended to push SLJB; he hoped he could branch out to getting stock or cash from other CEOs to promote their companies. At the time, he briefly had a partner who told me over lunch that he wanted to do "real DD" on the companies, and warn potential investors if he found anything wrong. I doubt Rick was much interested in that; the partner withdrew from the project quickly. The website did launch, but never attracted much traffic, and Fernandez eventually abandoned it.

Somewhere along the line, he met Donna Levy. She used to give regular parties at her rather lavish home, to which she invited people she thought she might be able to use as promoters. Rick evidently believed that'd be just up his alley, and signed on. Reportedly he was beyond shocked when he was arrested a few years later.

He was just a not-terribly-bright mark who thought he saw easy money, and got a term in federal pen instead.