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The latest Caswell article!!! Briner Caught with his hands in the cookie jar again!


SEC suspends Briner-linked Irwin Resources


2007-04-17 18:15 ET - Street Wire

Also Street Wire (U-IWRS) Irwin Resources Inc


by Mike Caswell

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has suspended three spam stocks, and one has links to Vancouver lawyer John Briner, 29. The suspensions announced Friday are the newest part of an SEC crackdown on junk e-mails called Operation Spamalot.

The SEC names three companies, Irwin Resources Inc., Peopleline Telecom Inc. and Amerossi EC Inc. Irwin can be linked to Vancouver's Mr. Briner through his former company, Global Developments Inc.

Until recently Mr. Briner was the president of Global Developments, which invests in start-ups. Global's companies have some similarities -- most trade on the pink sheets, many are spam stocks and nearly all of them fall in value.

In the first round of Operation Spamalot, the SEC suspended one of Global's investments, Red Truck Entertainment Inc. Red Truck was the target of spam campaigns in 2005 and 2006, when it was known as Montana Oil & Gas Inc. and Mr. Briner worked as its lawyer.

In one spam campaign Montana Oil fell from 50 cents to 24 cents, and from $1.70 to 12 cents in another. It is not clear who owned the company's shares, but Mr. Briner was its lawyer and should have had access to that information.

Friday's SEC suspension lists another Global investment, Irwin Resources, as a spam stock.

Global disclosed ownership of a $685,000 convertible debenture in Irwin's predecessor last November. Junk e-mails began touting the stock Feb. 23, and the company fell from 90 cents to 29 cents by March 15.

It is not clear if Mr. Briner has any links to Irwin's former chairman, Dr. Erwin Liem, who is awaiting trial for unrelated fraud charges. Last July the RCMP charged Mr. Liem for fraudulently obtaining shares of Global Cogenix Industrial Corp., a former TSX Venture Exchange listing for which he served as a director. His trial comes up in March, 2008.

Mr. Liem was also a director of Goldmark Industries Inc., a Vancouver company suspended in the first round of Operation Spamalot.

Mr. Briner resigned as Global's president earlier this month, citing bad press and comments in Internet forums. "He felt that it was in the best interests of the Company and its shareholders for him to step down until he had an opportunity to deal with the false allegations and clear his name," Global said in a news release.

Mr. Briner did not return a request for comment, and nobody at Irwin Resources returned phone messages. The SEC has not accused Mr. Briner or Mr. Liem of any wrongdoing.

Another Vancouver spam stock

Irwin was not the only Vancouver company on the SEC's list Friday. The regulator also halted Peopleline Telecom Inc., which has an address in Los Angeles but a Vancouver phone number.

Peopleline was a spam favourite for two months in early 2006 and again in March, 2007. The company, which sells Internet phone service, denied having anything to do with the junk e-mails.

Peopleline's chief executive officer is Edward Gallagher, a Vancouver businessman also charged with fraud last July for Global Cogenix dealings. Mr. Gallagher has been with Peopleline since at least 2005, and remained with the company even after the Global Cogenix charges became public.

Mr. Gallagher did not return a message seeking comment for this story, and the SEC has not accused him of any wrongdoing.

The last stock suspended Friday was Amerossi EC Inc., a purported oil and gas company based in Thailand. Until last May it listed a Toronto address and called itself Microgenix Filtration Systems Inc.

The SEC has now suspended 38 stocks since Operation Spamalot began, including 17 with Vancouver links, but it has not charged a single person for spamming.