A Peek Behind the Curtain
We constantly stress that scam artists are better prepared than you think, willing to go to any lengths to create the illusion of legitimacy. They cover their bases and are prepared to meet the challenges of even the most skeptical investors. The details of Mark Dreier’s $700 million promissory note scam show us how fraudsters plant people to “confirm” their misrepresentations to investors who bother to do their own pre-investment investigation. Read more about Dreier’s scam here.Former SEC enforcement attorney Robert Miller has admitted being a plant for Drier. In connection with his guilty plea, Miller admitted to accepting $100,000 to impersonate a representative of a Canadian pension plan and a representative of an Icelandic hedge fund. Drier gave Miller a cell phone with a Canadian dialing code so that skeptical investors would have to dial a Canadian number to reach him, lending credibility to Miller’s performance. Drier provided Miller with detailed scripts for handling inquiries, whether people were trying to reach the Canadian or the Icelander.
Does this surprise you? Does it seem to you an extraordinary level of preparedness? If you believe nothing else, please believe that his level of planning and preparation is routine for scam artists. You simply cannot do an investigation on your own that will give you an protection. Only someone who has spent his career tracking down and investigating scam artists has seen enough of their tricks to anticipate and expose them. If you care about what you have worked so hard to save, do what banks do when they move cash: hire private protection.
