Complaint in Lanchester International Corp., of the Turks and Caicos Islands, v. Wells Fargo Bank, NA at the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Philip Baker, who headed a fraudulent hedge fund group that comprised offshore funds and other entities in Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison - the maximum that he faced.
Philip Baker's Plea Agreement in a criminal action styled as 'USA v. Philip J. Baker' at the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
Complaint filed by Timothy L. Blixseth and Emerald Cay Ltd. against Gary Di Silvestri, Worldwide Commercial Properties Ltd., Angelica Morrone, Southaven Ltd., and Ital Swiss Investments Ltd. at the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Registration at the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Florida of a Judgment obtained in the Turks and Caicos Islands by Trinidad and Tobago Unit Trust Corporation against Cem Kinay and Oguz Serim.
Former Turks and Caicos Islands Premier Michael Misick, who was forced out of office in 2009 amid a corruption investigation, is being sued by a U. S. law firm that alleges it is owed $326,217 in legal fees.The fees were
Four shell companies that are licensed as reinsurers domiciled in the Turks and Caicos Islands are being sued for alleged fraud in the United States by a participant in one of their reinsurance programs.In a civil complaint filed at the
Complaint in Security Life Insurance Company of America v. Southwest Reinsure, Inc., Libre Insurance Company, Ltd., Sierra Family Life Reinsurance Company, Ltd., Ideal Insurance Company, Ltd., Family Heritage Reinsurance Company, Ltd., James B. Smith, and INA Trust FSB at the U. S. District Court for the District of Minnesota.
Complaint filed by Llewellyn Connolly, Dodgar Partners Ltd., Edward Razek, Ocean Villa 4 (D.C.) Ltd., Thomas Walker III, Beach Villa V. D.C. Ltd., Andrey Ivanov-Galitsyn, Villa 7 Dellis Cay Ltd., Estefano Isaias, Salinas on the Beach Ltd., Stephane Pictet, Sandrine Pictet, Thomas Singh, Upwey Ltd., Michael Topr, Ocean Villa 2 (D.C.) Ltd., Mikal Watts, Tammy Watts, and 313TW Caribbean Investment Ltd. against defendants Cem Kinay, Oguz Serim, O Property Collection USA, Inc., O Property Collection GmbH, ), O Property Collection TCI Ltd., Turks Development L.P., Turks General Partners Ltd., Turks (B.V.I.) Holdings Ltd., Turks Ltd., Dellis Construction Ltd., William Tacon as Receiver of Turks Development L.P. and Turks Ltd., Stephen Katz as Provisional Liquidator of Dellis Construction Ltd., Marjorie Kinay, Cenk Kinay, The SUU Hotels, Trinidad and Tobago Unit Trust Corporation, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group International Ltd., Mandarin Oriental Management (BVI) Ltd., Mer Insaat, Halis Sumer and Avatar Real Estate Services, LLC at the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Complaint filed by Trinidad and Tobago United Trust Corporation against CB Richard Ellis, Inc. and Kent Kerr at the U. S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
Litigation that has been taking place in Florida over the last 22 months on behalf of victims of various get rich quick investment schemes that substantially targeted Jamaican nationals or their descendants in the Caribbean and the United States is
A Cayman Islands corporation is suing the United States Government for the return of assets totaling $20 million that were taken from its account at Morgan Stanley in California to help satisfy $33 million in alleged tax liabilities of convicted
Chapter 15 Petition for Recognition of a Foreign Main Proceeding in the Bahamas by Juan Lopez, a.k.a. John Lopez, as the Foreign Representative of British American Insurance Company Limited, at the U. S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida.
A High Court judge in St. Lucia has quashed a dubious decision by the Government of St. Lucia to protect a Government Minister, Keith Mondesir, after he was apparently caught trying to avoid customs duty on household items that he
An offshore company controlled by disgraced former Turks and Caicos Islands Premier Michael Misick is embroiled in a legal battle with two business partners - one a rapper, the other a music journalist - for control of the publisher of
A religious leader in the Turks and Caicos Islands was the nominal head of at least seven offshore shell companies that a U. S. tax protester and his clients used to evade taxes totaling $630,000 from 1998 to 2002, OffshoreAlert
A Turks and Caicos Islands based Ponzi scheme that promised returns of up to 15% per month took in US$220 million from approximately 6,000 investors in a 27 month period from April, 2006 until it ceased operations in July, 2008.Of
Two magazine publishers have filed separate civil complaints in the United States against the Turks and Caicos Islands Tourist Board for allegedly failing to pay for advertising.The first case was brought by New York based Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc., d.b.a.
The futility of the British legal system's obsession with secrecy in the age of the Internet was brutally exposed on the weekend with the publication of a long awaited final report by the United Kingdom Government into alleged corruption and
Two complaints alleging indebtedness against the Turks and Caicos Islands Government have been filed at courts in the United States over the last six weeks. The first complaint was filed at the Circuit Court for the 11th Judicial Circuit, for
A fourth civil complaint in 11 months has been filed at federal court in Orlando by an investor claiming to have been defrauded in a Forex scheme operated by a Jamaican national using a Cayman Islands corporation.The latest action was
Former Turks and Caicos Islands Premier Michael Misick is being sued in Fort Lauderdale by a physician who claims he was defrauded in a TCI based get rich quick scheme. Plaintiff Christopher Walker, a resident of Orlando, Florida, is seeking
In the very first edition of OffshoreAlert in February, 1997, we referred to TCI as the "Totally Corrupt Islands" and commented that there was a presumption among knowledgeable businesspeople that TCI domiciled companies were "crooked until proven otherwise", prompting a
Bermuda based finite risk reinsurer Inter Ocean Reinsurance Company Ltd., which has been in run off since 2005, is being sued for $20 million by four subsidiaries of U. S. Fortune 500 company Assurant, Inc. The complaint against Inter Ocean
Canadian national George Georgiou has been criminally indicted in the United States for allegedly defrauding two Bahamas based broker dealers of at least $29 million in a securities scam. Georgiou, 39, masterminded a scheme that caused losses of "approximately $25
On January 12, 2009, Bermuda and the USA signed a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty, pursuant to which each country can formally apply to the other to obtain information for criminal investigations. The Bermuda Government lauded the agreement as "yet another
US Senator John Kerry intends to look into offshore tax evasion; First Curacao International Bank to "start repatriating" frozen assets; UK Government commissions review of offshore financial centers' Condor Insurance sued in California; and US criminally indicts Raoul Weil, Chairman and CEO of UBS Global Wealth Management and Business Banking and a member of the Swiss bank's Group Executive Board.
A Texas based physician has filed a second civil complaint in Florida in an attempt to recover damages of US$1.95 million that he claims to have suffered in an alleged property scam in the Turks and Caicos Islands perpetrated by
The current global economic crisis has prompted the United Kingdom Government to commission an "independent review" of all British Crown Dependencies and Overseas Territories that serve as offshore financial centers.Details of the review, which is due to be completed by
An epidemic of investment fraud is causing financial misery to victims who appear to be predominantly Caribbean residents and Caribbean expatriates living in the United States.Tens of thousands of investors are believed to have invested between US$650 million and US$1 billion over the last five years in more than two dozen unlicensed schemes, many of which promised returns of between 6% and 25% per month.
Miami-based businessman Charles Intriago, who sold his anti-money laundering-focused company Alert Global Media, Inc. to New York-based supplier of AML technology Fortent in December, 2006 and continued to manage it before abruptly departing in late March, 2008, is preparing to launch a new business venture that will concentrate on asset forfeiture; Canadian national Wayne Wile, who has been accused of committing securities fraud along with the Cayman, Bahamas and Bermuda operations of investment group Lines Overseas Management, obtained a Cayman Islands Driver's License in a false name, according to the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission; OffshoreAlert has obtained more information about companies and individuals involved with the Grand Island Commodity Trading Fund group of companies, which went into liquidation on June 17, 2008 - one month before its trading manager, R. Christopher Girvan, was arrested in Cayman on suspicion of theft, false accounting and fraud; Investment fraudster Keem Kalfon is at it again. His latest venture operates as 'The People's Money Center' from a web-site at www.peoplemc.com, which was established in June, 2007; and Despite all that has happened over the last 10 years in terms of legal gateways being implemented to allow foreign parties to obtain information about individuals and businesses operating in offshore financial centers, there is still a misconception among some residents of major countries that the secrecy and anonymity of their offshore transactions is enshrined in law.
The United Kingdom Government has been asked to provide details of any and all steps it has taken to ensure that corruption and fraud in Bermuda is "properly investigated".The request was made in a new report on British Overseas Territories by the Foreign Affairs Committee, which is appointed by the House of Commons to examine the administration, expenditure and policy of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and its associated agencies.
A new report on British Overseas Territories by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the United Kingdom Government has highlighted evidence of corruption in the Turks and Caicos Islands, Bermuda and Anguilla. By comparison, the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands emerged relatively unscathed. The Committee has recommended that the UK Government sets up a Commission of Inquiry to investigate corruption in the TCI, encourages the Anguillan government to establish an "independent inquiry" to look into corruption, and details the steps it has taken to ensure that allegations of corruption in Bermuda are "properly investigated".
Two former officers of a U. S.-based investment adviser have been accused of perpetrating a "massive fraud" against clients, who include an offshore bank and several offshore hedge funds.The conduct of Eric A. Bloom, 42, a resident of Northbrook, Illinois, and Charles K. Mosley, 43, a resident of Vernon Hills, Illinois, caused the loss of "several hundred million dollars" of approximately $1.4 billion of assets under management that their Chicago-based firm, Sentinel Management Group Inc., had at the time it filed for bankruptcy last year, according to the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Former Canada-based offshore services provider Peter Sabourin and related parties, including companies he controlled in the British Virgin Islands and the Bahamas, have been ordered to pay $1.77 million in compensatory and punitive damages, plus costs and fees, to the victim of an investment scam they perpetrated; Creditors of St. Vincent and the Grenadines-licensed Horizon Bank International Limited (in liquidation) took a massive hit at Bermuda Supreme Court on March 31, 2008 when Justice Ian Kawaley awarded damages of $20 million against the bank for conspiracy to defraud and breach of fiduciary duty in a civil complaint filed by Canadians Allen Walsh and Hans Taal; and Alleging fraud, segregation and false reporting violations involving $562 million in client funds, the U. S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed a complaint against Sentinel Management Group Inc. (in bankruptcy) and two of its former officers, Eric Bloom and Charles Mosley, at federal court in the USA on April 28, 2008.
A U. S.-based tax adviser who used Turks and Caicos Islands-domiciled entities to commit tax evasion was convicted by a jury on all 17 counts of an indictment at the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas on April 4, 2008. Lanas Evans Troxler, a licensed investment advisor and estate planner formerly of Dallas and now a resident of Lubbock, Texas, was found guilty of one count of corruptly endeavoring to obstruct and impede the due administration of the Internal Revenue laws, four counts of attempting to evade and defeat tax, and 12 counts of assisting in the preparation and presentation of false and fraudulent tax returns. The tax loss from Troxler's activities was more than $630,000.
Eight companies domiciled in the British Virgin Islands, four in the Turks and Caicos Islands, and one each in the United States and the United Kingdom have been added as parties in litigation brought by the U. S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission against the Lake Shore group of hedge funds.
A management agreement between a Bermuda corporate services provider and a hedge fund group accused of committing a $100 million-plus fraud against investors was back-dated by two weeks in an attempt to circumvent a restraining order issued by a U. S. federal court, a regulator has claimed. The contract pursuant to which Bermuda-based Mercury Group Limited agreed to provide "office and related facilities and services" to the Lake Shore group was, in reality, entered into on June 29, 2007 - the same day that 38 boxes of Lake Shore records were transferred from Roth Mosey & Partners LP accounting and consulting firm in Canada to MGL in Bermuda, according to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in a filing on January 9, 2008 at the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, where it is suing Lake Shore and its principal, Philip Baker, for fraud.
Plaintiff's Opposition to Defendant Lake Shore Asset Management Ltd.'s response to court order of January 4th, 2008 in U. S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission v. Lake Shore Asset Management Limited, Lake Shore Group of Companies Inc. Ltd., and Philip J. Baker at the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.