As the U.S. economy tumbles and the world economy trembles, businesses will begin laying off workers. In October, AOL announced that it would be laying off 2000 employees. Yahoo is planning on laying off hundreds of employees. Airbus is set to cut 10,000 jobs.
Scamsters follow the news. Perhaps the best State Securities Commissioner in the country, Joe Borg of Alabama, has recently issued a warning to investors that they can expect scamsters to pitch scams that supposedly provide protection against recession.
William Horton of the Birmingham News reports:
Daniel William Heath, his father John William Heath, and Denis Timothy O’Brien will soon be sampling the cuisine at the California State Prison in Los Angeles, after the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office obtained convictions against them on charges of securities fraud, elder abuse, grand theft, and other charges. Each of the men faces more [...]
When the SEC began investigating Bryan Behrens of Omaha they found a bus painted in Nebraska Cornhusker red and a Cadillac Escalade parked in his driveway. They think that he may have used money swindled from elderly investors to buy those rides.
KETV in Omaha reports that the SEC believes Behrens raised $6.5 million in a securities fraud he [...]
In August, Michael Schneider pleaded no contest to 173 felony counts of burglary, embezzlement, elder financial abuse, grand theft and forgery. Operating through a company called the California Plan, Schneider told his elderly investors that he used their investments to fund mortgages on real estate throughout the San Francisco Bay area. What he didn’t tell them was [...]
USA Today reporter Kathy Chu has written the best story yet on the crisis threatening retiring baby boomers. Every baby boomer should read that story and the companion story on protecting your nest egg.
I sometimes feel like the amateur astronomer who knows an asteroid is on a collision course with earth, but cannot get the [...]
Glenn Frey had a hit in the 80’s called “Smuggler’s Blues.” The song includes the lyric “it’s the lure of easy money, it’s got a very strong appeal.” That line speaks as much to financial criminals as it does to drug smugglers.
Robert E. Kessler of Newsday reports:
Seniors Lose Nest Eggs in Alleged Mining Scam
He promised low-risk, high return investments. Who isn’t going to listen to a deal like that? At least seventeen investors, many of them seniors, did listen to Rick J. Boros, a/k/a Vincent Kwiatkowski (“Boros”) . . . and lost more than $1.2 million. On September 3, 2008, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) stopped Boros before he [...]