ATM LEASEBACK SCHEMES-- any insight?

[Judge Roy Bean]

I... So, let's put this subject to rest. ...

Done and done already. You have been proven to be a fool and dishonest but you avoided the consequences by claiming you were going away.

Now your ignorance and dishonesty come back to haunt you.

[grimreaper]

I'm not going to stand by and have people EDIT things to fit their opinion , THAT'S DISHONESTY.
He took what was obviously NOT the case and morphed it into what suited his agenda.
If you think my response was indicative of my dishonesty, you're mistaken. It's a sign of my lack of CONTROL.

[wserra]

Others have followed this thread far more closely than have I. Therefore, a long-time litigator's perspective on a single point.

Depending on context, the difference between a "hearing" and a "trial" may indeed be semantics, and appears to be so here. They are both fact-finding proceedings, and my guess is that you won't find definitions of either in your jurisdiction's rules of civil procedure. For example, FRCP Rules 38-53 all concern the conduct of trials, but the term is never defined. A litigant's entire issue may be - and frequently is - decided by a "hearing".

I am in the middle of a fee dispute with another lawyer (I hate them, and always try to settle, but sometimes it is not possible). The judge held a half-day proceeding at which he took testimony and received exhibits. We submitted memoranda of law thereafter. His decision will determine, finally (subject of course to an appeal, if any), the rights of the parties to the dispute. Was the proceeding a "hearing" or a "trial"? In practice, it is uniformly referred to as a hearing, but the reality is that no one cares, because it doesn't matter. Call it a gzarnenplatz if you wish, the result will be the same. The results are what counts, not what you call the process.

[Lost Income]

Thanks for everyone's input. Apparently there are too many factors for anyone to determine how or when the NAS saga will end, especially given the crooks are still walking the streets living off somebody's money and the Receiver has yet to show potential for recovering anything significant. Sorry that my letters are so simplistic, in my working world a person either produces satisfactory results or gets fired.

[Gregg]

A hearing can determine that a net winner need not pay anything back, only a trial can result in anyone being deprived of life, liberty or PROPERTY....its in the Constitution, you can look it up.

[notorial dissent]

Right now it is a for real and interminable seeming waiting game, and it is up to the Receiver to make the next move in whatever direction that is going to be.

The bad part is that there are a lot of factors that we are not privy to or aware of that can have major effects here sooner or later.

I am still of the opinion that the Relief Defendants are going to be a major issue, but that is just my feeling on the subject.

[worried]

... It's a sign of my lack of CONTROL.

Actually most of your posts can be described this way...

I WOULD be tempted to think that you have some ulterior motive to influence outcomes somehow with your rantings. But, when you recently briefly revisited the subject of 'numbers of winners', you demonstrated once again how easily confused you are by the difference between numbers of PEOPLE vs. CONTRACTS that are winners and which one really matters... No, you're not diabolical, you just don't think things through before you develop an opinion and scream it for the benefit of your ego.

The 'argument' you keep making is ridiculous and irrelevant. You are simply arguing with yourself by trying to make two different facts CONFLICT with each other when they don't at all. Yes, Wishner and Gillis plead guilty, the scam has been deemed a Ponzi. Done deal. That does NOT prevent individual VICTIM'S (even those who are 'winners') from exercising their rights to zealously and creatively protect themselves and their 'gains' as much as possible (within the law). It doesn't matter AT ALL if this involves (gasp!!) "TRIALS"!!! This has been pointed out to you several times, yet you keep going back to your nonsense argument (hence the reason I compared you to SomeYuppie a few posts ago, go read some of his fallacy-laden diatribes).

I'm afraid that what I've just typed may not get through to you, so let me state it the same way you would:

NOBODY GIVES A CRAP!!

[webhick]

Thanks for everyone's input. Apparently there are too many factors for anyone to determine how or when the NAS saga will end, especially given the crooks are still walking the streets living off somebody's money and the Receiver has yet to show potential for recovering anything significant. Sorry that my letters are so simplistic, in my working world a person either produces satisfactory results or gets fired.

Unfortunately, NASI didn't keep records so without going through the process of rebuilding the finances, he simply doesn't know yet. It sucks, but it is what it is. I feel like he's plugging as hard as he can to wrap this up.

I think the sentencing is still on for July 20th. I feel like I read something about how they may not sentence until they realize the extent of the crime. My brain is kind of muddled lately, so maybe that's just a conclusion I drew. In any event, if that's the case, the Receiver's likely slamming through the books in an effort to get the NASI end of it wrapped up in time. Aren't minimum sentences for something like this based on the amount stolen?

[Tednewsom]

My guess re: sentencing: it probably doesn't matter whether the Receiver & forensic pals come up with a verifiable $3,000,000 scammed or $150,000,000. It's multiple counts of fraud, mail fraud, etc., any way it adds up. I can't imagine giving the crooks a break because they only ripped off three million bucks.

[Gregg]

...snip
I think the sentencing is still on for July 20th. I feel like I read something about how they may not sentence until they realize the extent of the crime. My brain is kind of muddled lately, so maybe that's just a conclusion I drew. ...snip

It sounds like you desperately need a vacation on an island somewhere tropical, with rum....I know I do....

[notorial dissent]

I think saying that NASI didn’t keep records is right on par with saying the Titanic had a bit of a hole in her!!!!

Rebuilding the books sounds like such a simple thing, and it is anything but, particularly when you have a business that wasn’t following any known or recognized business practices, even a shoebox would have done a better job than what they apparently were doing. I’m still amazed that it all hadn’t collapsed long before this, EXCEPT, of course, for the fact they had more coming in than going out for a very long time, and were unbelievably lucky. Going back over seven years of bank records, assuming they even stayed with the same banks all that time has to be a massive headache, and then there are the payouts, legitimate and otherwise that have to be found, tracked, and accounted for, even more fun.

I think webhick is probably right, in that they may well request a continuance on sentencing since they still don’t know the extent of the actual crime(s) yet. I don’t know what the limits are on this particular type of crime but I would suspect there is some considerably variance. The new Relief Relief Defendants just kind of popped out of the woodwork fairly recently and they certainly can’t have had time to even more than barely scratch the surface there to see the extent of the fraud, embezzlement, money laundering, crime, whatever you to call it, and I’m sure they’ll figure out some appropriate names by the time they’re done.

The fact, at least according to the last filing, that they hadn’t sent out tax statements leads me to believe they are still excavating, which means they are still looking to see what is what.

And yes, the dollar value of the crime is usually looked at for sentencing effect, so I should expect that to play in to it all, and where they are now could well be holding things up.

[webhick]

I was thinking that whatever happened with the money in Relief Defendants could be a whole 'nother slew of charges.

[notorial dissent]

You are probably right. I've never seen one like this where there were, apparently, a large number of (technically)non-affiliated affiliated entities. This is totally new territory from my perspective. I can see them having to go after them each individually, or perhaps, if they can prove that they are all just shells and/or alter ego's for the boys, then maybe they can get the court to just add them to the estate. This is the part I think will get tricky and really confusing, like the parent case isn't!!!! They may be able to get the court to do the piercing of the corporate veil thing to get to them, but in all honesty I've never seen one quite like this, at least from a securities receivership standpoint. Whatever happens, i don't expect it to be quick, easy, or inexpensive.

[webhick]

I just checked the criminal case against the Dickwad Duo to make sure that sentencing was still scheduled for Jul 20th. It is not.

The Duo requested on May 21st to continue sentencing until Dec 14th. A few of notes from the request: The loss will be a key issue at sentencing and it's still undetermined. Ed is 76 years old and is in poor health. He suffered a stroke in March of this year.

Government opposed it partially, basically stating that a six month extension was too long. So, sentencing is now set for September 21st.

I'll put it up on the blog within the next couple of days.

[Tednewsom]

Ed is 76 years old and is in poor health. He suffered a stroke in March of this year.

Tsk tsk. All that stress, I bet. Awww. Poor guy.

[notorial dissent]

Well, at least we now know two things we didn't before, the accounting isn't done, and Ed really did have a stroke earlier in the year.

[The Observer]

Ed is 76 years old and is in poor health. He suffered a stroke in March of this year.

So 19 years of running a scam into your golden years, meaning that Ed started this around his mid-50's. Nothing worse than grabbing a tiger by the tail when you really should be looking to get into the slow lane and enjoy your last years peacefully. Now he has wrecked his health, left his family in very dire straits (regardless of whether they have squirreled money away), and will leave behind a reputation that will be forever besmirched.

And I am not sure if the accounting will ever be completed, let alone by a September 21st deadline date.

[webhick]

Minor update: Joel's lawyer withdrew on 7/28.

Also, victims keep sending letters to the judge, which he keeps forwarding to all the lawyers and the probation officer. And stupid me keeps downloading those documents from PACER because I keep seeing docket entries for in-chamber minutes (or some such thing) and getting excited. It's like being nickle and dimed for doses of disappointment. Seriously, it costs $0.10 each time I download them. At this rate, I won't be able to get those juicy fruity things out of the vending machine at work any more. They're oh so deliciously expired.

Because I am too thick to stop downloading these filings and because I have a set budget for downloading from PACER, I humbly request that victims stop sending letters to the judge unless otherwise directed to do so by some legal authority. Send them to the government lawyers, Dickwad Duo's lawyers or their probation officer. That's where they're ending up anyway. As the minutes say:

Because only counsel may submit filings for consideration, the Court forwards said letter to counsel for the government and defendant and to the U.S. Probation Officer for determination of its filing.

[webhick]

I'm providing more of a narrative on this because my brain is a little fried. Documents have been uploaded to the blog's library, but I'm not publishing anything today. I'm tired my eyes are going wonky.

It looks like Joel's lawyer is trying to get sentencing pushed to mid-December, citing a need to gather facts and review the mountains of information or something. Specifically, to review the complete list of investors. They seem a little obsessed with determining the net winners. They also whined about the Probation Officer's pre-sentencing report. It seems he quoted some victim impact statements verbatim and used the government's loss records, but only summarized the nineteen character letters provided to him by Joel's camp and discarded any of Joel's opposition to the government's loss records. I guess Joel also believes that the government should lump related corporate losses into the individual losses. Basically that if John Doe controls FlushItAll, Inc. and John's net losses are $1000 and the FlushItAll, Inc. net winnings are $1000 then it all washes out to $0. I don't think that's how it should work.

The government opposed it, basically saying that they gave the defendants the list of investors back in January and the defendants have had enough time to get their shit together.

Then the court shot down the rescheduling request.

Then Joel's lawyer tried again, this time saying that government is full of shit because the day of the government's opposition, they dropped of an additional 8,000 pages of discovery to the defense and that it's continuing to provide documents to the defense.

Then the government called them bold faced liars and did an epic eye-roll. Apparently they did drop off everything in January and the "additional" 8,000 pages of discovery are just copies of what was already sent. But, the government did not fully oppose a continuance. I suspect because Joel's lawyer is just going to keep banging his head against this wall. The government is now cool with a four-week continuance, which would place the new date mid-late October.

[webhick]

A new status report was filed while I was on vacation. I'm not doing it tonight, but it will be up this week.

ETA:

I'm skimming the document and holy crap. Few things, by no means complete:

They only got $500 for the office crap. They had previously said it was worth less than $10k. While not technically wrong, it was a gross overestimation.

They've gotten over $800k paid back by investors. Big thanks to those guys for helping to make the victims whole.