Canada

Canadian national Dennis Sutton has been sentenced to six months in prison in the Bahamas after being convicted of 68 counts of fraud and forgery regarding the formation of international business corporations.Sutton, who operated International Investors Group Ltd., in Nassau,

Vancouver based attorney Martin G. Chambers, 63, is due to be sentenced on December 5, 2003 after being found guilty of five counts of money laundering.Chambers was convicted of all counts against him by a jury at the U. S.

A telemarketing fraudster has agreed to assist in an attempt to recover US$1.6 million that the United States Attorney in Los Angeles believes is being held by Bermuda-based e-commerce firm First Atlantic Commerce.Prosecutors believe the funds are the proceeds of Timothy Ryan Babuin's fraudulent activities, according to a plea agreement that he entered into at the U. S. District Court for the Central District of California on July 3, 2003.

Fund manager Brian Paul Kuhn pleads guilty at the Grand Court of the Cayman Islands to several counts of theft of client funds; Switzerland investigates theft of financial data by computer hackers; HedgeWorld Limited closes Bermuda office and relocates its staff to New York; "Marc Harris stole your funds", investment fraudster tells clients; Bermuda-based Bank of Butterfield and Bank of Bermuda expand overseas; and career conman David Tedder is sentenced to five years in prison, fined $1.06 million and ordered to forfeit $2.7 million at federal court in the USA.

A stock promoter claims he was paid CDN$10,000 not to testify at a money laundering trial that is currently being held in Miami in which the defendants are Canadian attorney Martin Chambers and Bahamas accountant Michael Hepburn.Kevan Garner, of Vancouver, told prosecutors the payment was made on behalf of Chambers through an intermediary, Barry Mann. There is no suggestion that Hepburn was involved.

Criminal Judgment in USA v. Jack Kronis at the U. S. District Court for the Western District of New York.

Proposed U. S. Legislation; Asset Recovery - Rita Laframboise, Queen of the Reloads!; and Rant.

Police in Bermuda have carried out raids on several offices on the island, including those of law firm Appleby Spurling and Kempe, looking for documents as part of a criminal investigation, reported The Royal Gazette newspaper on July 22, 2003; A Canadian Alliance MP wants Canada to investigate the possibility of annexing the idyllic Turks and Caicos Islands, reported the National Post, of Canada, on July 15, 2003; A court in Zurich, Switzerland, has sentenced Greek businessman Panagiotis A. Papadakis to 23 months and 16 days in prison for fraud, according to a newsletter published by the International Chamber of Commerce's Commercial Crimes Bureau; Former janitor John Wayne Zidar, 60, who orchestrated a Ponzi scheme that took in approximately $74 million from about 3,200 people in the United States and elsewhere, including Bermuda, was sentenced to 30 years in prison on July 28, 2003 at the U. S. District Court for the District of Western Washington; Mazars Neville Russell, the administrators of the Imperial Consolidated Group, have recovered relatively few assets for distribution to its clients and creditors, if a recent filing with Companies House for England & Wales is anything to go by; Just 15 months after they were formed, voluntary applications have been made to strike off two companies that were set up by former senior officers of the Imperial Consolidated Group to carry on in business as IC was collapsing after defrauding investors of $345 million; and A publicly-traded firm in the United States has written off its entire $1 million investment with Omnicorp Bank, which was closed down by regulators in St. Vincent last year but only after the bank's depositors were asked to convert their CDs to preferred shares in a highly dubious U. S.-registered, Canadian-based firm called Solara Ventures.

The Supreme Court of British Columbia has appointed a Receiver for US$20 million of assets belonging to two offshore banks, their clients and related parties - more than three years after freezing them.Following its appointment on June 16, 2003, KPMG Inc., in Vancouver, Canada, is seeking claimants for the funds, which were frozen in April/May, 2000 as part of an investigation into securities fraud.

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in Canada into Michael John Ongley for allegedly uttering death threats, burglary, assault with a weapon and unlawful confinement.

The organizer of the asset recovery section of OffshoreAlert's upcoming Symposium has won a $36 million judgment against a U.S. law firm.Interclaim Holdings Ltd. and Interclaim Recovery Ltd., which are based in Ireland and owned by a Bermuda holding company, secured the judgment in Chicago on July 3 following a trial that lasted two and a half weeks.

The University of Montreal Pension Plan invested US$67 million - representing more than eight per cent of its total assets - in the now-insolvent Lancer Offshore fund, according to a lawsuit.Another major investor was the AXA group, whose investment vehicles put in $15.25 million in June, 2002 - less than three months before the New York Post newspaper began raising questions about the Fund and six months before the Fund announced it was suspending cash redemptions.

Article based on an application to collect evidence for a criminal investigation into money laundering, narcotics trafficking and investment fraud - pursuant to a request for judicial assistance from Costa Rica - that was granted at federal court in the USA on May 27, 2003. Individuals and businesses mentioned in the request for assistance include Osvaldo Villalobos Camacho, Luis Enrique Villalobos Camacho, Freddy Villalobos Camacho, Victor Sandino Soto, Kenneth Alvarado Thomas, Bertrand Henri St-Onge, Sandra Kerwin St-Onge, Luc St-Onge, Richard Rivers, Norman Denault, Alejandro Alvarado Miranda, Javier Calderon Granados, Hermanos Villalobos Exchange House (OFINTER SA), Servicios de Soporte al Turismo SA, Casa de Libertad SA, Favillale, Carlos Badilla, Fonseca Vargas Omar, Mario Borges Soubirus, Michael Sterling, David Brown, Forbes & Stobart SA, Framagra SA, Palma de Mayorca SA, Inversiones Haas SA, Danir SA, Compania Mercantil El Desierto SA, Casa de Cambio Ofinter SA, Immobiliaria Internacional Platino SA, Barclays Bank, Whitney Bank, Amtrade International Bank, The International Bank of Miami, and LGT Bank.

First Amended Complaint in Protect Kids From Online Porn, Inc., of California, and One World Media LLC, of New Mexico v. Peter Zicherman, of Obtario, Canada; Fernando Pereira, of Barbados; Donville Inniss, of Barbados; Wired Solutions Inc., of Canada; Networks International Inc., of Canada; Rosedale Publishing Ltd., of Canada; Stormbreak Limited, of the Marshall Islands; Starruby Group Inc., of Canada; Giant Sun Group Inc., of Canada; Bizmedia Inc., of Barbados; Tempest Interactive Corp., of Barbados; Virtual Service Inc., of Canada; Internet Billing Company Ltd., of Florida; Internet Billing Company LLC, f.k.a. iBill Ltd., of Georgia; InterCept Inc., of Georgia; PSW Inc., of Rhode Islands, and Web Transaction Services Inc., of Texas, at the U. S. District Court for the Central District of California.

A mutual fund operator was taken into custody by police in the Cayman Islands on May 30 on suspicion of misappropriating approximately US$1.9 million of client funds.The arrest of Canadian national Brian Paul Kuhn follows an investigation into the activities

Notwithstanding the fact that he weighs approximately 500 pounds, janitor turned offshore promoter Peter Sabourin has achieved the difficult task of disappearing - leaving behind a mountain of debt.Sabourin, a 43 year old Canadian national, abandoned his weight loss business

A 'paper' company registered on the Caribbean island of Nevis has filed a lawsuit in Canada against an insolvent offshore 'shell' bank in an effort to recover $1.08 million that it claims to have deposited. Nevis-domiciled Kachina Inc., formerly Praxis Inc., is seeking a judgment for $1,088,588 against Sterling International Bank Inc., which, according to the complaint, was licensed in Nauru on November 28, 1994 and went into provisional liquidation on September 27, 2000.

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in Costa Rica into Osvaldo Villalobos Camacho, Luis Enrique Villalobos Camacho and Freddy Villalobos Camacho for allegedly laundering the proceeds of narcotics trafficking by Bertrand Henri St-Onge, Sandra Kerwin St-Onge, Luc St-Onge, Richard Rivers and Norman Denault.

USA's Motion for Downward Departure in USA v. Jack Kronis at the U. S. District Court for the Western District of New York.

The Bank of Montreal has been summoned to attend a hearing before the British Columbia Securities Commission on May 21 to answer an allegation that it breached an asset freeze order. The allegation concerns accounts controlled by Exchange Bank and Trust,

Exchange Bank & Trust, which was licensed as an offshore bank in Nauru and operated in Nevis, is being sued for $3 million by a client in British Columbia.The civil lawsuit was filed at the Supreme Court of British Columbia on April 24, 2003 by Umbrella LLC, which is registered in Nevis and based in Vancouver.

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in Ukraine into Pavlo Ivanovych Lazarenko, Mykola Ivanovych Agafonov, Petro Mykolayovych Kyrychenko and Igor Oleksandrovych Polozhentsev for alleged embezzlement.

Superseding Indictment in USA vs. Serdar Kalaycioglu, Mario Turcotte, Richard Carson, and Sheldon Mickelson at the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

A United States law firm accused of lining its own pockets by cutting an illegal deal with a telemarketing fraudster to the detriment of one of its clients - an asset recovery firm - has been ordered by a court to produce all of its financial statements and tax returns from 2000 to the present; Three men who were accused of kidnapping an offshore investment fraudster in Kingston, Ontario, Canada in 2001 have pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of common assault; David Ballantyne, who became one of the most despised people in the Cayman Islands, finally agreed to resign as Attorney General, effective March 15, 2003, in the aftermath of the collapse of the Euro Bank money laundering trial; A letter to the editor that was published in the Caymanian Compass on February 26, 2003 spoke volumes for the level of animosity among locals towards the people widely believed to be primarily responsible for the Euro Bank fiasco, which is likely to cost Cayman's taxpayers many millions of dollars in legal fees, costs and damages; Bermuda company director Paul Lemmon has been sentenced to 21 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United States; A dispute involving two offshore entities and two Canadian firms has arisen over the rights to the domain name 'poker.com'; Thirteen days after OffshoreAlert's article last month about a lawsuit filed at federal court in Miami by Florida-registered Growth Fund Partnership Inc. against Nevis-registered Condor Insurance Ltd., both of whose operations raise red flags, the action was dismissed with prejudice; Three firms have been ordered to pay tens of millions of dollars of restitution for their part in a massive investment fraud; Florida-based crook Rommy Kriplani, who specializes in ripping off residents of Third World countries by taking their money on the promise of jobs in the United States that never materialize, is at it again, once more in partnership with his favorite law firm of Spiegel & Utrera, of Coral Gables, Florida; and James Michael Dwyer, who until last year owned the White Sands Hotel in Bermuda, was criminally indicted for bank fraud on March 4, 2003 in his native New Jersey.

A fugitive investment fraudster was arrested and deported to Costa Rica after being tracked down in Panama by two of his victims on March 8, 2003, according to a report in The Tico Times newspaper. Ian Calvert Bleasdale, 62, a British-born, naturalized Canadian, will now stand trial on five counts of fraud, reported the newspaper on March 14.

Dozens of people in the United States and six other countries have been targeted in a massive police clampdown on alleged perpetrators of high yield investment frauds. Some of the people targeted in the clampdown were: Charles Ellis Halvorsen, Christopher Michael Taylor, William Joseph "Bill" Herisko, Leonard Kalish, Seymour "Sy" Taub, Mario Piccolino, Elson Quon Lui, Nicholas Roblee, a. k.a. Nicholas Richmond, Linda June Eaton, Joseph Lawrence Finney, Raj Mallick, Ronald Gaopalelwe Mokwena, Jack Louis Schrold, William Bruce Harper, John Cocoman, Gregory Smith, Larry Taylor, Rebecca Taylor, James "Doc" McCall, Victor Carl Vaccaro, Robert Downing II, Thomas Patterson, Antonius Maria Heijnen, Rudolfo Nieto, Henry Young, Charles Judson "Judd" Strader, Marion "Bowden" Atherton, James Joseph Honse, Harry Livingston, Alexander Moorehead Sr., Mark Scott Petkovich, Kenneth Samuel Harrison, Rosemary O'Connor, Garrett Oldhouse, Pamela Weeks Clark, Kitten Otto, William Patrick Bailey, Peter Johnson, Harmondev "Hardev" Bal, George Rieg, Alok Basudev, Kevin McKee, Sendjer Shefket, Yen Lung Chen, Tom Hauser, Karl Kortmeyer, and Marius Vermaak.

A dentist and his accomplice who defrauded $1.2 million from clients of their Grenada-licensed offshore shell bank that was capitalized with just $300 have entered into plea agreements in the United States. Dr. Noel E. H. Tait and Douglas E. Castle each pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud at the U. S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on March 14 and March 27, 2003, respectively.

OffshoreAlert has obtained details of yet another unregistered securities offering being carried out by former officers of the Imperial Consolidated Group, including ex-British policeman Gary Alexander Lyons. Anglo Canadian Securities Inc., which is based in Canada and the UK, is raising funds for a personal injury litigation product that is virtually identical to one previously offered by Imperial.

In all of the hullabaloo surrounding the collapse of the Euro Bank trial in Cayman after the judge determined that the island's senior anti-money laundering officer, Brian Gibbs, had lied and destroyed evidence, it was easy to overlook a snippet in Gibbs' November 26, 2002 witness statement about Johnny Johnson; An order for the extradition of offshore banker William Cooper from Antigua to face a money laundering indictment in the United States was thrown out by a judge in Antigua on January 13, 2003 because the application was made before an extradition treaty between the two countries was ratified and before money laundering was criminalized on the Caribbean island; Edouardos Stamatiou, whose Argentina-based firm Tucuman Land Holdings Ltd. received £151 million ($237 million) of the $345 million defrauded from clients of the Imperial Consolidated Group and won't give it back, is a former principal of The Cayman Financial Brokerage House, which … surprise, surprise … was forcibly closed down in October, 1999; Another post-Imperial Consolidated scam, known as Property International, is in financial trouble after not very long in business; And, to conclude our segment on Imperial Consolidated, we have been passed the name of yet another company which allegedly brokered client funds into the fraudulently-operated group - Lighthouse Strategies; Canadian national David Voth has been fined CDN$12,000 in Canada for failing to file tax returns; Bahamas-based Suisse Security Bank & Trust, which is in provisional liquidation, has asked a U. S. judge to order two parties who unsuccessfully sued the bank in New York to place $1.3 million into court to cover its legal fees and damages; Trading on the over-the-counter market of shares in a company that Bermuda-based Lines Overseas Management was helping to do a reverse take-over of has been temporarily suspended pending an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission in the United States; and Famed U. S. attorney Johnnie Cochrane may be helping to broker a settlement in the long-running battle for control of the assets of Eurofed Bank in Antigua.

Belize-based offshore provider Grupo CAT appears to have gone out of business following the disappearance of its principal, Steve Saemmler Klein. Over the last month, the group's telephone lines have been disconnected and several of its web-sites are no longer accessible.

Trading on the over-the-counter market of shares in a company that Bermuda-based Lines Overseas Management was helping to do a reverse take-over of has been temporarily suspended pending an investigation by the Securities & Exchange Commission in the United States.

Canada-based Suncor Energy is to become a member of Bermuda-registered sEnergy Insurance Ltd., effective January 1, 2003.sEnergy was established in Bermuda in May, 2002 to provide large limits of coverage for business interruption and excess physical damage insurance.

Jawad Mahmoud Hashim has a doctorate in Economics from the London School of Economics and, by all accounts, he is a smooth and very sophisticated individual who has kept his head while many around him lost theirs.

UK-based Capital City Finance Limited, which was formed on August 20, 2001 as a spin-off from the Imperial Consolidated Group, is three and a half months overdue with the filing of its annual return with Companies House for England and Wales; If clients of St. Vincent-licensed Omnicorp Bank needed further evidence that they are being taken to the cleaners by the bank's management, there has been plenty of it recently; Investment fraudster Tracy Calvin Dunlap, Jr. was sentenced to 27 years in federal prison on December 19, 2002 at the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina.; Steve Saemmler Klein, who operates a dubious Belize-based offshore group known as Grupo CAT, has apparently gone missing; and Alyn Richard Waage, 56, of Canada, and James Michael Webb, 40, of California, were extradited on December 19, 2002 from Costa Rica to Sacramento, California to face numerous federal charges relating to the Tri-West Investment Club, an Internet-based investment fraud scheme that allegedly netted more that $60 million.

Offshore businessman Paul D. Lemmon, who was arrested in the widely-publicized 'Bermuda Short' operation, has entered into a plea bargain agreement with Federal prosecutors in Florida.Lemmon, a 40-year-old Canadian national, has agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud in a case in which he is a co-defendant with Mark Valentine.

Offshore promoter Jerome Schneider and his alleged business partner, Eric J. Witmeyer, are expected to be arraigned next week after they were criminally indicted in the United States.Although they were indicted on December 19, 2002, neither was required to put in a court appearance by year-end, which prosecutors said was due to the difficulties of the Holiday season.

The British Columbia Securities Commission has scheduled a hearing for December 10 11, 2002 to consider applications to vary asset freeze orders relating to accounts at the Bank of Montreal in Vancouver that were frozen in 2000 as part of

A raid on an alleged boiler room in Vancouver is further evidence that the Bank of Bermuda may have been conned out of $14.3 million when it invested in First Ecom.com Inc.

Canadian securities regulators and armed police have raided a Vancouver boiler room operation closely linked with Brek Energy, whose offshore investors, including the Bank of Bermuda and clients of Lines Overseas Management, have lost tens of millions of dollars in

A bail ruling at Federal Court in Miami indicates that prosecutors believe a Canadian businessman may have been behind an alleged death threat against one of his co-defendants, Bahamas accountant Michael Hepburn.In a decision dated October 16, 2002, District Court Judge Ursula Ungaro-Benages allowed an appeal by the U. S. Government against an earlier order granting bail to 62-year-old Martin G. Chambers.

Businessman Richard Hape has been convicted of two counts of money laundering involving offshore companies he established in the Turks & Caicos Islands, where he worked and lived.The 54-year-old Canadian national faces up to ten years in prison and is currently out on bail pending sentencing.

A well-publicized IRS investigation into the activities of U. S. citizen Jerome Schneider has done little to dampen his enthusiasm for aggressively promoting dubious offshore products.In October, OffshoreAlert was a recipient of a mass mailed, 24-page, color, glossy promotional brochure from Schneider titled "New Wealth Perspectives".

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in Canada into Hercules Perez Abenojar, Rodolfo GonzalesGarcia, Ignacio Mateo Cruz, Alfonso Tui Go and Victor Eugenio Mateo.

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in the United Kingdom into suspected investment fraud by William Booth Cook and Donald Nutter.

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner to collect evidence for a criminal investigation in France into Jean-Paul Roca, Bernard Mathieu and others for alleged fraud and forgery.

Bahamas accountant Michael M. Hepburn, who has been arrested and charged with money laundering in Miami, has a history of involvement with crooked companies, OffshoreAlert can reveal. Hepburn, 54, has provided fake audits for several offshore insurers that have collapsed amid heavy losses and allegations of impropriety, including Paramount Reinsurance Ltd., formerly First Reinsurance Ltd., of Barbados; and Alpine Assurance Ltd. and Savoy Reinsurance Co. Ltd., both of the Turks & Caicos Islands.

Canadian authorities who took part in Operation 'Bermuda Short' which led to 58 indictments, including two directors of a Bermuda-based firm, have praised offshore regulators for their level of co-operation."It's a fallacy that offshore centers do not co-operate with such investigations," said Garry W. G. Clement, Superintendent with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, told OffshoreAlert. 

New evidence obtained by OffshoreAlert shows that THREE convicted drug dealers are beneficial owners of the British Virgin Islands-registered parent of The Harris Organization financial services group. The traffickers all own preferred shares, which purport to pay annual interest of 10% in the case of Wallace Stull and James Somerville, and 7% for Lawrence Boulanger.

Selected Clients of The Harris Organization - August 31, 2002

Application for the appointment of a Commissioner for a criminal investigation in the United Kingdom into alleged fraud by James Cadwell, Richard Pope and David Curley.