https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLpfbcXTeo8
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I have submitted Eade's court filings to the California Franchise Tax Board's filing enforcement program based on Eades' disclosure that he has a law business located in Los Angeles which he claims is the basis for his income. Therefore he has California income by virtue of it flowing through that LA business. His court filings also indicate that he has not filed California state income tax returns nor paid California state income tax.
He will be contacted by the FTB and I suspect he will be found significantly in arrears in state income tax owed.
Plagiarism and copyright infringement are two separate issues.
BTW, some legal documents are copyrighted. I have seen several US patent applications with copyright notices affixed. Specific phrasing, technical drawings, maskworks, and expressions can be construed as artistic works even though they serve a substantive purpose.
You can be guilty of plagiarism of non-copyrighted texts. Plagiarism is not dependent on copyright. You can plagiarize from public domain works like Shakespeare (or a court pleading) and it is still plagiarism.
It is unlikely that a state bar would disbar of even discipline an attorney solely because of claims of plagiarism. Not impossible, but very, very unlikely because of the nature of the profession most of the members of the disciplinary board will have plagiarized plenty in their careers.
Well, you're right that it is a "no brainer". The CC surely shows that. They can't even get their own address figured out.
"Plagiarism is not something the bar would approve of."
Surely you jest, Mister Feynman. Law is all about plagiarism. One of the most valuable assets in any firm is the server directory with libraries of pleadings, motions, complaints, etc. - from every source they can get them.
First thing to do when filing in an unfamiliar jurisdiction and/or judge is to pull down pleadings/motions/etc. from that jurisdiction/judge in the relevant subject matter area and see what worked and what didn't, then you cut-and-paste what you can from relevant filings that worked or sound good.
It has been this way since forever. Most everything is law is a hodgepodge of plagiarized text and arguments.
The very best televangelist fraudster was Dr. Gene Scott - a Stanford Ph.D. - who operated out of SF and then LA. Had his own network - owned Channel 38 in San Francisco and another UHF station in LA - had a worldwide shortwave service 24/7 out of a transmitter site in Krasnoyarsk, Russia and Anguilla in the Caribbean. The IRS tried to nail him for taxes, but he set everything up offshore in Anguilla and other jurisdictions using trusts and shells.
At 73 he married a Canadian porn star in her 20s, then died at 75 from prostate cancer because he wouldn't consent to surgery that would have left him impotent. His favorite quote was "Hugh Hefner ain't got nothing on me" and he would trot out his "pony girls" onscreen while he puffed a cigar and yelled at his viewers "get on them damn phones!" or he would not preach.
He was a riot. His pornstar wife is now the replacement preacher and runs the show on satellite/cable TV under the name Pastor Melissa Scott. She has to do this in order to access the trusts. Gene set it up so whomever inherited his empire would be forced to continue the show and keep showing his tapes and selling his books. Forever. So she has to pretend to be a preacher to get her paycheck.
Old Gene - quite the fellow. Born in rural northern California - Oroville area - and wound up getting a religious scholarship to Stanford then figured out how to rape the idiot public and pay zero taxes.
"As far as GS shorting, I doubt they do it in house on clients they underwrite. They would get busted. I am sure there are funds in Israel, Switzerland, and Hong Kong that does it for them."
I would venture that GS itself is not involved in such shorting even indirectly, however select GS partners who are involved in the deal or are gatekeepers for approving such deals likely have personal and family ties to offshore accounts that engage is shorting the dotbomb/social media GS IPOs.
There are invisible "firms within firms", as I'm sure you know or may have experienced. Getting a seat on the Management Committee, Ethics Committee, or Business Standards Committee is more sought after than a seat on the Compensation Committee. Why? Because if you sit on those committees you have the power to approve or deny deals, and as a gatekeeper you get an "in" on such deal information and can play on the long and/or short side through your "affiliate" accounts not in your name and fully deniable.
The concept that all partners need to disclose their financial interests to the partnership is a joke to anyone who knows how to paper the transactions.
You get on one of those committees and it is a guarantee of huge money and usually in low-tax/no tax jurisdictions to entities you can drain at your leisure when you retire.
GobbledySpeak! "we have started to collect our accounts"
What does that mean? You've sent out invoices? You've started making a list? Note that he didn't say they have actually COLLECTED anything. Just that they have "started to collect" whatever you want that to mean. Maybe they just have a mental impression of a desire to at some point begin to compile an invoice and then contemplate sending it out.
What a bunch of pure nonsense on this call.
SPNG had a nominal amount of income - a couple million dollars max - and they were caught paying people to buy their sponges from Wal-Marts and other stores to create sales. The sales revenue was a tiny fraction of what they claimed (less than 10 percent, more like 5 percent) and a tiny fraction of what they spent to create those few sales by marketing, paid-for-purchasers, and COGS.
Thye basically spent $4 to get $1 in sales and claimed they were getting $20.
It was a MASSIVE fraud.
Moskowitz is still awaiting sentencing on at least one conviction of securities fraud (the remaining counts are still pending and have not been dismissed) that can be up to 20 years on that one count. The SEC calculated the initial loss estimate at around $52 million (so far) so the sentence will likely be hefty. Mosky made a plea agreement that was contingent on his cooperation in getting some big fish convictions and recovering some of the funds - so far that hasn't panned out. Metter walked. The money has not been found. No big fish have been indicted or convicted. So it looks like Mosky will be left to take the hit at sentencing unless he can pull a rabbit out of his arse and find the money and net some big ticket convictions. Doubtful that.
In re: any cyberlibel claims - Benz likely would be the recipient of a nice fat anti-SLAPP drafted by one of the original EFF attorneys who is now in private practice and specializes in California anti-SLAPP suits.
Can't wait for that Pandora's box to be opened and see how Benz, Allyn/Allen, Hipple, and Jan respond to discovery requests, subpoenas, and depos by folks who can finance their own work and enjoy it.
Anti-SLAPP verdicts typically include attorney fee awards, BTW.
I believe janice_shell has a nice outstanding judgment against a sleazy SoCal lawyer on a similar basis (not anti-SLAPP specifically).
And then there are the threshold John Doe motions to quash.....
Let's start from the top. OODH claims to be operating gold mining operations in Nevada, but the gold samples shown in the pictures in the iBox are placer (river) gold nuggets and flakes, not from a mine. Almost certainly these nuggets are from Western Slope (California) rivers and he got the photos by visiting a local foothills shop that sells placer gold and asked if they'd let him take digital photos of some of their product.
He can't even tell the difference!
Ooops- whoops.
Just one of a ton of mistakes and lies this chucklehead made/is making.
Hey, are you ready for some prison? Just to start, securities fraud is up to 20 years per count. Amateur hour is held every day in Federal prisons by chuckleheads who thought running a penny stock rig was simple as pie. And do you have ANY idea how many people have been put in Federal prison for pennystock scams by the very people who are now monitoring and documenting your every move?
Bro, you are either a masochist or have a deep desire to live with other men in a dormitory-style setting with meals and showers provided to you for free.
OODH is a SCAM from a dude the the foothills east of Sacramento who splits and sells firewood.
This is one of the less sophisticated scams I've seen in awhile. This clown thinks he can slap together some BS stories and pull a pennystock rig job because he's seen others do it and, well it must be real easy, right, Randy?
LOL @ using an Enrolled Agent working out of her house for the accounting! Even though she's allegedly gone now, that shows you how much of an amateur this dude is.
He's in for some surprises, I think.
How do you feel about Federal prison time, dude?
No wood splitting jobs in the BOP system, bro.
When is SKTO going to PR that they've changed their name to Quanco and are in the "business services" biz?
Somebody needs to give the Dream Team a monthly calendar so they can plan ahead for holidays before they schedule their staged, pre-recorded "conference calls" available by recording only.
I would think a "business services" company could handle routine things like having a calendar and looking at it when planning a date.
Nancy's always saying "You have to pass it in order to find out what is in it." [Larceny] Government-by-trick.
So are the Dream Team of Allyn/Allen and Benz still employees at Hidden Empire Film Group?
They are still listed there on the website: http://hiddenempirefilmgroup.com/
These two dudes are executives at how many companies? Is that why it might be hard to keep office addresses and dates straight?
How many shells are these guys juggling?
It's likely a rent-a-temp-office virtual office thing. There are probably hundreds of businesses at the same basic address. It is like a maildrop but with (if you pay extra for it) a dedicated phone number that a receptionist will answer and answer with your company name. If you need office time, you can reserve a tiny office or a conference room for a hourly/daily rate when you need it.
It's most likely a glorified Mailboxes-R-Us.
Both parties were enthusiastic. My point is only the origin of the changes and the external lobbying forces that supported it. It came out of the non-profit sector and microfinance geeks in the social science/social media industry (yes, academia and non-profits have become big businesses).
It came from the Obama administration who asked the SEC to study it. The proposal came with the JOBS Act and for political reasons the Obama administration had a NC Republican congressman formally submit it.
Where did the changes to 506 come from politically?
Well, it was originally an Obama administration proposal. The idea came out of the Left based on non-profit crowdsourcing and "locavesting" (local investing) microfinance proposals that were most clearly enunciated by the Stanford Social Innovation Review:
http://www.ssireview.org/articles/entry/crowdsourcing_microfinance
and NY Times editorials:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/26/opinion/a-proposal-to-allow-small-private-companies-to-get-investors-online.html?_r=2&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1317044524-UaF+xOX5/6Cbr6Y5lsDUag&
http://www.crowdsourcing.org/editorial/forget-new-crowdfunding-legislation-why-congress-should-democratize-the-existing-laws/10208
and the Obama administration submitted it as part of its Jobs Act through a NC Republican congressman. It passed overwhelmingly with broad bipartisan support.
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/112-2011/h825
Another ill-considered idea that originated from the Left, not from the penny stock scammer community.
Just wanted to make the history of where this came from clear, as some folks seem to imply that it was the scammers who militated for this bad law. It wasn't - it was empty-headed idealists who have little-to-no practical knowledge or ability to foresee the consequences of their "neato, nifty" ideas. Nonetheless, nobody in Congress had the foresight or gumption to argue against this poorly thought out law. The vote was nearly unanimous.
As the ancient aphorism says, "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions".
All of you who think you have great ideas on how to use regulation to reduce penny stock scamming should keep that aphorism in mind.
And the physician's credo - "first do no harm". There are fundamental reasons all centrally-planned economies fail. People are nowhere near as smart as they think they are.
It is not a real office, it is one of those rent-a-room "virtual offices"!
Quanco Office Directory
View local Quanco office information.
QUANCO
448 South Hill Street
Suite 405
Los Angeles, CA 90013
213.293.8983
213.260.9375
info@quanco.la
Just one step up from a Mailboxes-R-Us mail drop!
California anti-SLAPP 2U.
GoldnApel....why our reasearch team is here....why I am here:
"Both Dr. Apel and I have personally seen friends and relatives pulled back from the brink of death by this therapy. Mary Ann and I personally witnessed a relative with stage four non-Hodgkins lymphoma rejuvenate with just five weeks of treatment, to the point that doctors could find no trace of the disease. Dr. Apel’s granddaughter went from stage four to stage two in just a few weeks, and celebrated by skydiving."
Oh, the FDA is going to have a field day with this one and these chuckleheads!!!
Where did you get this gem? Link?
A lot of the political pressure came from the social media Left to promote the cause du jour via crowdsourcing and microfinance, the latest fads in the do-gooder Left that is always unable to grasp the concept of unforeseen (by them) consequences.
It was seen by them as a way to cut out the bad Wall Street guys from being the greedy middlemen in capital allocation decisions.
It was a populist-driven, anti-Wall Street motivation.
The Lodge at Lake Louise is no dump either. Another memory - when I was a poor grad student driving to UBC for a conference, I went up to Banff and was at the Lake Louise area but alas, too poor to afford any lodging and basically car-camping. I drove up the service road that goes up the ski hill behind Lake Louise (this was mid-June or so) and found a nice place to park on the gravel service road looking down on Lake Louise. Thought that was a good place to car camp. AM radio reception was great at that altitude and with the ionosphere skip so I had something to listen to. The sky was bright at that latitude in mid-June so I could read until almost 11PM. Fell asleep without turning the ignition key from AUX to OFF and left the radio and dome light on. Woke up out on a gravel service road in summer (obviously no skiing going on) and the battery was DEAD. I had seen no traffic at all anywhere on this gravel road all the way up the ski hill - so I figure I have a long walk down to the Lake Louise lodge to try and hustle up somebody willing to drive up the service road and give me a jumpstart. Figure if I'm lucky I'll get out of here by noon - if I have to call a tow truck I'll be using my limited cash.
So I'm walking down the service road. I don't get more than maybe a quarter-mile and a pickup truck that services the ski hill comes rumbling up the gravel and sees me, stops, I tell him the problem - he says I shouldn't have been there in the first place, but he will give me a ride back to my car and a jumpstart. Everything falls into place - the car starts - I'm off the hill and back on the road by 8:30AM and no money out of pocket.
Canadians can be very friendly folks sometimes. I recall along the highways in B.C. they had "Drive Decent" signs - I think that should be the adverb "Decently", but why quibble. They are generally pretty decent people (Howe Street brokers and mining pennystock scammers excepted).
I don't see any FDA product licenses for any of these products that are touted to treat human health conditions. Nothing on the FDA website. Also no evidence that they are manufactured in GMP-faiclities that have been inspected and licensed by FDA to manufacture these products like the sleep medications.
I foresee some FDA investigations on this one.
It sounds like we may have. I've spent a fair bit of time in Munich, and all around the EU. I read your post about crossing the river in Zurich and I remembered crossing probably the same bridge that had a little waterwheel-type structure kind of 2/3rds of the way across. Seems like we probably have stayed in a lot of similar places.
Wondering if you've ever done the Jungfrau Joch up the hill from Interlochen on the geared railroad through Grindelwald? I was there on a cloudless day in mid-summer and the view from the top of the mountain (you get there via a tunneled in-mountain railway with teethed gears) was amazing. Later, I saw the vintage Clint Eastwood movie "The Eiger Sanction" and I said "wow, that's where I was" - the lodge where George Kennedy watches through the telescope is the place where you change from the toothed-gear railway through Grindelwald onto the toothed-gear mini-railway that goes up into the mountain and delivers you up on top in a large building with an observation area. In summer you go from 70F at Interlochen to 20F and snow at the top of Jungfrau and you look down at the Interlochen train station you were at just a couple hours before. Nice daytrip from Bern.
When you're down in DC I can recommend the Hay-Adams or the Willard (if you're near Treasury). Used to spend a bunch of time in DC going to Crystal City/Pentagon City in the '90s, which usually meant the Crystal City Marriott which was not a great place, but tres convenient. Hay-Adams and Willard are much nicer. Old Ebbitt Grill is a good place for lunch.
BTW, I strongly suggest you add SKTO as a fourth fantasy team in your hobbyist league. I've read a bit on Benz and his Twitter feed and, well, ... I'd just think it would be something that would interest you given what little I know of your past activities and proclivities from reading your posts. I think this one deserves application of your skills.
Have a good trip to DC and think about adding that fourth team.
Victoria on Vancouver Island. My wife and I stayed at the Empress Hotel there. We flew in on a sea plane from Vancouver and landed on the water in front of the hotel. It was a fun short trip, not much to do there. Did you enjoy?
We went visited the gardens as that is what they are known for.
For our honeymoon, we rented a car and drove from the Bay Area up through Idaho, Glacier Natl Park, via Calgary to Banff/Yoho/Jasper, then over to Vancouver. We took the ferry to Victoria, did Butchert Gardens, the Empress, then drove up to Nanaimo and took the ferry back to Horseshoe Bay on the mainland. Then down the coast through Seattle, Oregon coast, and back to the Bay Area.
I'd been to Victoria before that. In grad school, I was invited to a summer conference at UBC in Vancouver and drove there. After the conference, I took the ferry to Victoria, but as a poor grad student I could not afford the hotels - not even the cheapies - and I slept on a park bench in front of the Empress overlooking the harbor. So returning again years later on the honeymoon with money for the best lodging was one of those strange circles of life. Honestly, the first time there as a poor student sleeping on a park bench was more memorable. During that poor grad student trip, I also was stopped and detained for 4 hours by Canadian customs/border patrol driving into Canada by Cardston, Alberta, as my car had boxes of canned food and a blanket and pillow (as I could not afford motels on the way except every third day or so). They thought I was an itinerant illegal immigrant seeking an oil field job up in Edmonton, and they held me until they could confirm from UBC that I was indeed a legit conference participant the following week. They searched my entire car and questioned me.
If only the US Border Patrol was that aggressive!
Sadly, there is an irreconcilable tension between what we may feel are outright fraudulent stock scams as seen in the pennystock markets and the more subtle stock promotion that is built into even the most rigorous Big Board blue chips. It is a grayscale with no particular demarcations that would serve as bright lines for drawing rules to separate the "totally fake stock scams and rigs" from the "upstanding, legitimate" Fortune 100 and their forward-looking statements and creative but legal accounting manipulations.
One thing I have learned is that even with top underwriters and analysts, there is so much salesmanship (a.k.a. boolsheet) involved with pitches to institutions, corporate actions, and reporting that one could not formulate rules to exclude even MOST of the what we might consider most outrageous scams from "legitimate" companies.
IMO, this is why no amount of legislation or regulation can put a significant dent in stock scams without negatively impacting other companies that we might consider legitimate enterprises.
Silicon Valley runs on selling hopes and dreams, and is aided by more-than-willing i-banks that in many cases spin the stories more than the company management themselves.
The scamming of NOVICE individual retail investors by the penny stocks is in many ways not a whole lot different than what I have seen routinely in presentations by many/most Silicon Valley tech companies to institutions like Fidelity, T. Rowe, and Vanguard.
I have seen noted, reputable GS-level i-banks (without naming names) be much more interested in reworking a PowerPoint deck to make it sizzle to the institutions than to ensure the correctness or propriety of the content of the deck.
And this includes the Googles, Ciscos, Applied Materials, Oracles, and Intels.
It is all just a matter of degree. Salesmanship is largely clever lying, with the goals of walking the legal tightrope and having the buyer *never* discover that they have been creatively misled.
Ultimately, equities are all share-printing/PPS-pumping scams, and business valuation metrics are nothing more than a variety of illusionist tricks based on assumptions and guesses. Accountants employ standards and rules to provide the patina that their work is an accurate model of reality. However, even the most rigorous accounting reports are not to be treated with the reverence of empirical data in a hard science.
So I am sorry to report that efforts to purge fraud from the markets without significantly damaging investment in new products and services is largely, IMO, a fool's errand. We would be better served with a pure "caveat emptor" system than we would by a system preoccupied with squeezing out the pennystock frauds.
Of course we have an intermediate system now, so perhaps that helps, but maybe not. I run across many penny stock suckers who invested on the belief that the SEC was protecting them and only legitimate businesses could trade publicly. We might be better off in a pure caveat emptor system where investors do not suffer from the delusion that a listed (or unlisted) stock must be legit because "they can't lie or the SEC would throw them in jail, so the PR must be true unless they are crazy and want to be in prison".
Maybe depressing, but that is where I come out on this. Even though I enjoy seeing scammers sent to the BOP and uncovering the way the lower-level weasels con the rubes, we must also recognize that there are much more sophisticated and subtle levels of scamming that go on everyday in every equity issue to some degree.
Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming.
I have a horrible fear of heights. I can't get close to the edge of a cliff at the beach, I won't go near the floor length windows of skyscrapers, I even chickened out and lost face with my buds on the "Big Shot" atop the Stratosphere in Vegas when I couldn't face getting on and had to climb down the stairs while my buddies went.
But I've been a private pilot (VFR only, not licensed anymore) and done a bunch of skydiving. No problems with that. Not ever.
It is totally different in a way that you can't explain. Above a certain height or enclosed inside a plane it is an abstraction, whereas at the cliff edge or looking down at a street below, the risk is very concrete (pun partially intended).
Hell, I start sweating when I get up on my roof to do maintenance.
A colleague was in 1 Market Plaza in SF during the earthquake of 1989 and the building swayed so much that his chair rolled back from his desk to the window-wall and he was looking straight down over the divider between the first lane of Market Street and the MUNI rails. After hearing his story, I avoided the 1 Market Plaza office and chose a satellite office in a nice three story building instead.
Alfred Culbreth - Tec9Com - M5Com ripoff fraud financial fraud Miami Beach Florida
Alfred Culbreth has been the President / Ceo of several companies. He has been sued twice for luring investors to invest in his businesses only to take the money and run.
Case # 03-5407-CACE
Location: Circuit Court 17th Judicial Circuit, Broward County, Florida
Plaintiff: Victor Velasco
Defendant: M5COM Inc and Alfred Culbreth
Result: Judgment in favor of the Plaintiff in the amount of $101,000 plus costs of $1,560.
Status: Judgment was Satisfied
Date: January 8, 2004
Attorney for Plaintiff: Gideon Schwartz (FL Bar # 0165719)
Contact Info for Attorney: 80 SW 8 Street, Suite 2803, Miami, FL 33130 / Tel (305) 536-6177 / Fax (305) 536-6179
Case # 03-04896 CA (03)
Location: Circuit Court, 11th Judicial Circuit, Miami-Dade County, Florida
Plaintiffs: Alfredo Camacho and Jose Baptista
Defendant: TEC9COM Inc and Alfred T. Culbreth
Result: Ongoing Lawsuit
Reason for Lawsuit: Breach of Contract. Two Venezuelan investors gave Alfred Culbreth $350,000 in total and he did not honor their contract and took the money and ran with it.
The modus operandi of Alfred Culbreth is to open a business, lure investors, steal the funds, then declare bankruptcy / close the business and open a new business in the same location (same office or a different office in the same building).
He currently has opened 2 businesses in the same office where he previously had M5COM called White Light Communications LLC and Miami Telegraph & Telephone Inc.
No one should invest any money in these two businesses if they don't want to lose their investment.
Anonymous
Miami, Florida
U.S.A.
This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 03/24/2005 09:53 AM and is a permanent record located here: http://www.ripoffreport.com/r/Alfred-Culbreth-Tec9Com-M5Com/Miami-Beach-Florida-33140/Alfred-Culbreth-Tec9Com-M5Com-ripoff-fraud-financial-fraud-Miami-Beach-Florida-136251. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year.
NOW THERE IS ONE OF ALFIE-BOY'S ACCOMPLISHMENTS!
Accomplishments? LOL! Alfie has a long string of FAILED business ventures and I can't find a single successful one:
Alf Failures:
For the past 12 years, Alfred T. Culbreth has drawn upon his entrepreneurial acumen to form a succession of full-service telecommunications organizations, including Miami Telephone & Telegraph, Inc., Telecom Debit, Tec9COM, Inc., the M5COM Corporation, Teleport Services, and Standard Communications Corporation, Inc. At present, Alfred T. Culbreth serves as CEO of TelTec Communications, Inc. and Chairman of White Light Communications Corp. To see more information on Alferd T. Culbreths work with both of these firms, visit telteccom.com and whitelightcommunications.com.
Conducting Telecommunications Business In Cuba
November 15, 2010
By: Al Culbreth
President Obama significantly eased restrictions that affect telecommunications service providers’ access to the Cuban market in 2009, paving the way for customers in that country to receive the excellent services most of the world takes for granted. Moreover, this will enable people in the U.S. and around the world to stay in close touch with relatives in the isolated country of Cuba. Obama’s new rules altered the manner in which telecommunications traffic may be routed. Under prior restrictions, the federal government limited companies to indirectly accessing phone and Internet traffic with Cuba, blocking direct connection. The new rules provide the potential for direct communications via optical cable devices and satellite facilities, as well as the ability to negotiate agreements with operators in the country itself. In response to the ease on restrictions, companies have begun significant construction on a major underwater cable network to the tiny island. Industry experts expect that this cable, which will link Cuba to Venezuela, will be completed within the year. The project will provide greatly enhanced telecommunications access for customers in Cuba who eagerly await full service. The cable will also benefit telecommunications service providers in that it will expand their client base. Alfred Culbreth, a pioneer and entrepreneur in the telecommunications field, leads TelCoCuba. Culbreth anticipates the opportunity to provide enhanced services to customers in the emerging market of Cuba.
Australian by L’Alpina Sportswear Company
October 1, 2010
A former top-ranked tennis player, Mr. Alfred T. Culbreth is in the process of acquiring Australian by L’Alpina sportswear company. The brand was founded by Leardo Gabrielli in 1946 as L’Alpina Maglierie Sportive. Gabrielli first designed sportswear for skiers, but was convinced by the Australian tennis players Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall to start manufacturing tennis wear. Adopting the kangaroo as the brand’s symbol, Gabrielli renamed the line “Australian” in honor of the two players that encouraged him to enter a new market. In 1970, Giordano Maioli assumed control of the company and shortly thereafter adopted a rising Czech tennis star, Ivan Lendl, as a spokesman for the Australian brand. The Australian name gained increased popularity in the nineties and was worn by Wimbledon competitor Goran Ivanisevic, a winner of the Australian Open. In the past decade, Australian signed a three-year contract with the Italian Tennis Federation to supply its teams’ official uniforms. At present, Australian by L’Alpina produces high-quality towels, tennis outfits, tracksuits, and bathing suits that are designed to mimic the natural curves of the body, allowing athletes to forget about their clothing and concentrate on the competition. The product is defined by its attention to detail and subtle elegance, which appeal to many athletes’ personal aesthetics. Australian by L’Alpina continues its dedicated research to fashion trends and materials technology, consistently striving to deliver exceptional products in styles that makes them appealing both on and off the court.
At least you now know where Alf ripped off the L'Alpina name from, even if his deal didn't come through.
Anyone have any successful business ventures that Alf pulled off?
http://alfredculbreth.wordpress.com/tag/alfred-t-culbreth/
While many other penny stocks have seen ample opportunities to collect on the hype of marijuana legalization, even from prior to the November elections where Colorado and Washington State said "Yes", the Robert Hipple and Henry Jan scam promoted ticker, SKTO, which spammed their way to selling worthless shares of Healthcare of Today Group for years, decided to join the group of marijuana stocks:
Top Marijuana Stocks
Medical Marijuana Inc. (MJNA)
Cannabis Science Inc. (CBIS)
Growlife Inc. (PHOT)
HEMP Inc. (HEMP)
MediSwipe Inc. (MWIP)
GreenGro Technologies, Inc. (GRNH)
Terra Tech Corp. (TRTC)
What's more than peculiar, actually fraudulent, is that, after not doing any filings with OTCMarkets for more than 2 years, the PR announcements are signed by A. Mayor. Short for Artemus Mayor, Mayor is the Vice President of (non-existent) Sales for HealthCare of Today. Other insiders like Jason Fu., creator of all of Hipple and Jan connected websites in the past, is also directly linked to Medical Greens.
The website for Medical Greens, incubated on February 25, 2013 (see here), was not even completed when the first news came out on March 13. After announcing on Friday that more than $30 million in contracts have been secured (see here) in the first month under control by SK3 Group, the website still offers nothing of detail to secure the roughly $10 million of SKTO stock which has been traded in the last 10 trading sessions.
Pumped incessantly by well-known names on iHubwho have historically worked collectively with fraudulent CEO's to revive old ticker symbols, few have even gone out to check that the address used by Medical Greens company is a UPS mailbox located in Pasadena, CA. (see here)
Regardless of the fact that Medical Greens is not a registered business entity, that their presence on the web never existed until a month ago, or that they are even a trademarked name as they claim, without filing updated financials or backing up their story strong enough to hold water, the SKTO scam has been extremely hot heading into the weekend.
Although some of the iHub message board pumpers claim to have taken $500 and turned it into more than $40,000, chances are that, come next week, the early "April Fools" joke is released and share prices of SKTO stock come crashing down from its augmented reality.
Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.
Themes: SKTO, SKTO Stock, SKTO Stock Quote, SKTO Stock review, SK3 Group Inc., OTC SKTO, SKTO.PK, Medical Greens, hot penny stocks, hot OTC stocks, penny stocks on the rise, OTC stocks on the rise, SKTO Scam, Robert Hipple, Henry Jan Stocks: SKTO.PK, MJNA.PK, HEMP.PK, TRTC.OB, MWIP.OB, PHOT.OB, CBIS.OB, GRNH.PK
http://seekingalpha.com/instablog/1073130-pablopicker/1681031-the-sk3-groups-newest-scam-build-a-website-slap-the-word-marijuana-on-it-and-sell-skto-stock
SKTO is a Robert Hippel company. Who is Robert Hippel?
III.
On the basis of this Order and Hipple’s Offer, the Commission finds that:
A.
SUMMARY
Robert Hipple, a lawyer and the former CEO and CFO of now-defunct business development company (“BDC”) iWorld Projects & Systems, Inc. (“iWorld”), overstated the value of iWorld’s primary asset – its investment in several portfolio companies – in three consecutive quarterly filings in 2005. Hipple, who personally performed iWorld’s accounting and financial reporting functions, also misled iWorld’s auditors into believing that the company had independently evaluated the worth of its portfolio companies. As a result of his conduct, Hipple i) violated the antifraud provisions of the Exchange Act, filed false Sarbanes-Oxley executive certifications, misled iWorld’s auditors, falsified books and records, and knowingly circumvented internal controls; ii) violated Se ction 57(a)(1) of the Investment Company Act; and iii) aided and abetted and caused iWorld’s violations of the reporting, books and records, and internal controls provisions ofthe Exchange Act, and iWorld’s violations of the BDC books and records provision of the investment Company Act.
B.
RESPONDENT
Robert John Hipple, age 64, resides in Cocoa, Florida. He is an atto
rney licensed in Florida and Georgia. Hipple and an associate controlled the management and operations of iWorld Projects and Systems, Inc. (“iWorld Florida”), a private Florida company, when it was acquired in early 2005 by iWorld Projects & Systems, Inc. (“iWorld”), a business development company. At the time, Hipple was the CEO of iWorld Florida. After the acquisition, Hipple formally became iWorld’s CEO and remained in that position until he resigned in March 2006. He also acted as iWorld’s principal financial officer.
http://www.sec.gov/litigation/admin/2010/34-61688.pdf
Marijuana Stock Scams
With medical marijuana legal in almost 20 states, and recreational use of the drug recently legalized in two states, the cannabis business has been getting a lot of attention—including the attention of scammers. FINRA is issuing this alert to warn investors about potential scams associated with marijuana-related stocks.
Spotting a Potential Scam
Like many investment scams, pitches to invest in potentially fraudulent marijuana-related companies may arrive in a variety of ways—faxes, email or text message invitations to webinars, infomercials, tweets or blog posts. Regardless of how you first hear about them, the offers almost always contain hallmarks of "pump and dump" ploys. Specifically, fraudsters lure investors with aggressive, optimistic—and potentially false and misleading—statements or information designed to create unwarranted demand for shares of a small, thinly traded company with little or no history of financial success (the pump). Once share prices and volumes reach a peak, the cons behind the scam sell off their shares at a profit, leaving investors with worthless stock (the dump).
One company, for example, promoted its move into the medical cannabis space by issuing more than 30 press releases during the first half of 2013. These releases publicized rosy financial prospects and the growth potential of the medical marijuana market. The company was also touted on the Internet through the use of sponsored links, investment profiles and spam email, including one promotional piece claiming the stock "could double its price SOON" and another asserting the stock was "poised to light up the charts!" Yet the company's balance sheet showed only losses, and the company stated elsewhere that it was only beginning to formulate a business plan. {GEE, I WONDER WHAT PENNYSTOCK FINRA IS REFERRING TO????}
Smart Tips
To avoid potential marijuana-related stock scams:
Ask: "Why me?" Why would a total stranger tell you about a really great investment opportunity? The answer is there likely is no true opportunity. In many scams, those who promote the stock are corporate insiders, paid promoters or substantial shareholders who profit handsomely if the company's stock price goes up.
Consider the source. It's easy for companies or their promoters to make exaggerated claims about lucrative contracts, the company's revenue, profits or future stock price. Be skeptical about companies that issue a barrage of press releases and promotions in a short period of time. The objective may be to pump up the stock price. Likewise, be wary of information that only focuses on a stock's upside with no mention of risk.
Do your research. Search the names of key corporate officials and major stakeholders, as well as the company itself. Proceed with caution if you turn up recent indictments or convictions, investigative articles, corporate name changes or any other information that raises red flags. For example, the CEO of one thinly traded, yet heavily touted, company that purports to be in the medical marijuana business spent nine years in prison for operating one of the largest drug smuggling operations in U.S. history. The former CEO of a similar company was recently indicted for his role in a multi-million dollar mortgage-based Ponzi scheme. Check the Federal Bureau of Prisons Inmate Locator to determine if a solicitation is coming from someone who has served time in a federal prison. Many states also have similar prisoner locator systems.
Know where the stock trades. Most unsolicited spam recommendations involve stocks that do not trade on The NASDAQ Stock Market (NASDAQ OMX), the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE Euronext) or other registered national securities exchanges. Instead, these stocks may be quoted on an over-the-counter (OTC) quotation platform like the FINRA-operated Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board (OTCBB) and the platform operated by OTC Markets Group, Inc.
Generally, there are no minimum quantitative standards that a company must meet to have its securities quoted in the OTC market.
Many of the securities quoted in the OTC market don't have a liquid market. They're infrequently traded and can move up or down in price substantially from one trade to the next. This may make it difficult to sell your security at a later date.
Read a company's SEC filings, if available. Most public companies file reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Check the SEC's EDGAR database to find out whether the company files with the SEC. Read the reports and verify any information you have heard about the company.
Remember that just because a company has registered its securities or has filed reports with the SEC does not mean it will be a good investment—or the right fit for you. Also, be aware that not all financial information filed with the SEC, or published elsewhere, is independently audited. Unaudited financials are just that—not reviewed by an independent third party.
Be wary of frequent changes to a company's name or business focus. Name changes and the potential for manipulation often go hand in hand. One low-priced stock now claiming to be in the medical marijuana business has had four name changes in the past 10 years. Another company switched from the coffee business to focus "on the rapidly emerging medical marijuana industries." Name changes can turn up in company press releases, internet searches and, if the company files periodic reports, in the SEC's EDGAR database.
Check out the person selling the stock or investment. A legitimate investment salesperson must be properly licensed, and his or her firm must be registered with FINRA, the SEC and a state securities regulator—depending on the type of business the firm conducts. To check the background of a broker or investment adviser, use FINRA's BrokerCheck. You can also call your state securities regulator. When using BrokerCheck, research the name of the person who contacted you, as well as the name of the firm they claim to work for. Verify the caller's identity using the phone number on the firm's website or in a publicly available telephone directory.
If a Problem Occurs
If you believe you've been defrauded or treated unfairly by a securities professional or firm, file a complaint. If you suspect that someone you know has been taken in by a scam, send a tip.
Additional Resources
FINRA and SEC Alert: Inbox Alert—Don't Trade on Pump-And-Dump Stock Emails
FINRA Alert: Avoiding Investment Scams
SEC Alert: Be Alert When You Receive Spam E-mail or Faxes And When You See "Unsolicited Quotations" Posted for Stocks
To receive FINRA's latest Investor Alerts and other important investor information, sign up for Investor News.
The villa I was in is shown on page 18 (lefthand side). I had the second floor of the grey stone building. Page 18 (lefthand side) shows the villa from the north looking south, and on page 18 (righthand side) is the villa from the south looking north.
http://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/uploads/files/b5ded188-9d03-4ad8-afd8-143cde38f497.pdf
Page 19 shows the ruins of the original Roman fort that was the first known structure in Bellagio and is on the Villa Serbelloni grounds and not open to the general public.
Page 20 shows the conference center at the top of the hill and the road leading down to the villas and artists-in-residence lodgings.
Page 21 shows the conference center from the opposite side (i.e., from the west looking east).
Page 22 is the view from the conference center down the opposite side of the hill - looking west towards the shore your hotel was likely on. The Grand Hotel is directly below with the 4 bright lights on top and and just to the left (south) you can see the ferry landing with the two pillars.
What a spectacular place!
I hope some of you appreciate this brochure and the neat photos of this unique place. The Villa Serbelloni is the top of the hill in Bellagio and the site of the Roman fort was the original structure on the peninsula and that is what the town Bellagio was based around. The only way to see this is via this brochure or if you get invited there by the Rockefeller Foundation (yes, you can apply to hold a conference there or try to get in as an artist-in-residence). Otherwise, it is closed to the public and the normal tourists don't even know about it.
http://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/uploads/files/b5ded188-9d03-4ad8-afd8-143cde38f497.pdf
The US Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, Pub. L. No. 91-513, 84 Stat. 1236 (Oct. 27, 1970); The Psychotropic Substances Act of 1978, 21 USC §801; The Controlled Substances Penalties Amendments Act of 1984, 98 Stat. 2068 (21 U.S.C. § 841(b); The Chemical Diversion and Trafficking Act of 1988, implementing the United Nations Convention against Illicit Traffict in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances; and the Federal Analog Act (a specific section within the CSA), constitute the comprehensive regulation of illegal drugs and narcotics in the United States.
Thus, with the existence of this stringent legislation, the question is, how may these online dealers actually sale their products? They may only know. Online marihuana dealers and their buyers may straightforwardly be charged under Federal and state law for this practice.
The US Supreme Court has been consistent in holding that the Federal Government has the power to regulate and prohibit the possession of any and all drugs, even if state law favors them, under the Congressional power to "regulate commerce...among the several states." Online sales of marihuana will undisputedly fit within this Federal power.
Some US states have tried to pass legislation legalizing the use of small quantities of marihuana but most of they have been preempted by Federal law. For instance, California passed a bill allowing the use of marihuana for medical reasons with a valid doctor's prescription. This bill was invoked in the well-known case of Ashcroft v. Raich in 2004. Yet, the US Supreme Court ruled against Raich, a terminally ill woman who filed a lawsuit against the Federal government arguing that California law should apply in her case instead of the CSA. The Supreme Court held against Raich and found the California law was preempted by the CSA.
California: Group Busted For Selling Marijuana Over The Internet
Published by: Hemp.org on July 25, 2013
By Steve Elliott
Hemp News
A group using a little-known part of the Internet to sell California marijuana to people in at least 16 other states has been broken up by federal investigators.
Matthew Gillum, 29, of Loomis, and Jolene Chan, of Roseville, each face charges of marijuana distribution, unlawful use of the mail, conspiracy to distribute marijuana and avoiding currency reporting transaction requirements, reports Dave Marquis at News 10.
The investigation began last year when Sacramento postal inspectors found several Express Mail packages sent to the region containing large sums of money. The packages were sent to are post office boxes, and addressed to fictitious businesses with names like American Sound Concepts and Granite Cove Property Management.
A "controlled delivery" from Granite Bay to New Jersey by postal inspectors in December 2012 led to recipient who "cooperated" with law enforcement. The snitch said he'd bought the marijuana from the website Silk Road, using a fictitious name.
- See more at: http://medicalmarijuana.com/medical-marijuana-news/title.cfm?artId=981#sthash.1MhjBrjJ.dpuf
California: Group Busted For Selling Marijuana Over The Internet
Published by: Hemp.org on July 25, 2013
By Steve Elliott
Hemp News
A group using a little-known part of the Internet to sell California marijuana to people in at least 16 other states has been broken up by federal investigators.
Matthew Gillum, 29, of Loomis, and Jolene Chan, of Roseville, each face charges of marijuana distribution, unlawful use of the mail, conspiracy to distribute marijuana and avoiding currency reporting transaction requirements, reports Dave Marquis at News 10.
The investigation began last year when Sacramento postal inspectors found several Express Mail packages sent to the region containing large sums of money. The packages were sent to are post office boxes, and addressed to fictitious businesses with names like American Sound Concepts and Granite Cove Property Management.
A "controlled delivery" from Granite Bay to New Jersey by postal inspectors in December 2012 led to recipient who "cooperated" with law enforcement. The snitch said he'd bought the marijuana from the website Silk Road, using a fictitious name.
- See more at: http://medicalmarijuana.com/medical-marijuana-news/title.cfm?artId=981#sthash.1MhjBrjJ.dpuf
Cash flow? They don't even have an office. They don't have FDA approval for any of their extracts that are being sold for human consumption and medicinal use. They don't have an FDA-inspected and FDA-licensed manufacturing facility for said extracts.
The only cash flow I can see them potentially having is from printing shares and selling them via private placements. And that is not revenue, it would be paid-in capital.
Or is Allyn/Allen going to start selling off his massive collection of photos of himself with every celebrity he can chase down?
I'll bid $20 for a photo of Allyn/Allen flanked by John Kennedy and Chester Nimitz on the PT-109.
Since Benz and Allyn/Allen were last teamed up at EFGU.PK (aka HEFG) - Hidden Empire Film Group (iHub board: EFGU), why don't they just use the Hidden Empire address as the mailing address for SKTO?
Save money and they would still be able to claim they are sharing office space with another company.
The question would be, how can Benz and Allyn negotiate with themselves to establish an arm's length market rate for subleasing Hidden Films space to STKO? LOL!
Or they could just centralize it all in Allyn's house, with one bedroom allocated to Hidden Film Group and a half-bath allocated to SKTO so they have a facility to flush their PRs.
Integral,
You must have looked across the lake right at Tremezzo and my hotel on the lake front.
I think not, because my villa was on the shore of the other (west?) side of the peninsula (opposite side of where the ferry landing is) with my window looking ENE or E. IIRC, the ferry landing is on the east side of the peninsula with the Grande Hotel immediately north of the ferry landing. My view was looking east (and a bit north) across a wide arm of the lake with the hill behind me and even the main lodge/villa building at the top of the hill looks mostly ENE.
I suspect your hotel was on the west side of the lake, which is the side our minibus drove up to the westside ferry landing. Once I got the ferry over to Bellagio, I had to walk with all my luggage up all those steps until I got to the gate of the Villa Serbelloni, at which point there was a phone box that I called to summon the white van to come pick me up and drive me up the hill to the main villa, then down the other side to my villa on the east coast of the peninsula.
This sucked because (1) I had influenza that started on the plane flight to Milan and felt like crap, (2) I had just bought a large suitcase-style set of high-end hand-crafted wooden building blocks in Milan as a present for my 2 year-old son and had to carry that 20 lb set in addition to my luggage up all those damned steps while suffering from the flu and with no free hand to wipe my profusely running nose.
More info than needed, I know, but these types of things are what makes those memories so memorable - the things that go wrong, the immense joy at finally reaching the gate and phonebox after all those steps.
Seems like the most memorable trips are those when things were not according to plan or unexpected problems arise.
Like on our honeymoon when I locked our car keys in the rental car at the ferry landing in Twassen, B.C. while waiting to catch the ferry to Victoria, Vancouver Island (we went inside the cafe to get coffee and hot chocolate) - and the locksmith got there JUST IN TIME to open the door and get my credit card info before the ferry left.
Kinda like when you run across a novel, truly outrageous pennystock promotion ploy or rig method - those are the memorable ones.
I think the fake business address put out by SKTO in a PR and then "updated" to a new fake address may be one of the more memorable bumbles of 2013.
At every yearend, this board should do a rundown of the top 10 most outrageous or novel penny stock bumbles/scams of the year.
Integral,
I stayed at the Villa Serbelloni (the estate at the top of the hill in Bellagio). My room was in a villa on Lake Como with the window looking straight down into the lake.
The Villa is owned by the Rockefeller Foundation and you get to stay there by invitation only. I was an invited member for a WHO conference being held there and funded by the Rockefeller Foundation and WHO/UN.
I stayed there for 5 days - all paid. Meals and the conference (about 20 of us total) were held at the main villa at the top of the hill. Every morning the white van would come down to our lodgings and pick us up for breakfast and drive us up the hill to the Villa. It was all part of the estate - with olive trees and grape vines all the way up the hill.
NOTE: This is NOT the Grande Hotel Serbelloni! It is a separate private estate owned by Rockefeller.
http://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/bellagio-center
The Bellagio Center, also known as "Villa Serbelloni", is situated above the small town of Bellagio, Italy on 50 hilly acres of park and garden. Bellagio is located on Lake Como approximately 75 km (47 miles) north of Milan.
The food was outstanding - they have a top chef running the shop there.
And it (and the trip) was entirely free to me, thanks to the Rockefeller Foundation.
Those UN schmucks do live quite the lifestyle of the rich and famous, I must say.
It was a blast!