No RV for the Sterling Currency Group

Prosecutors Seek to Seize Assets of Iraqi Currency Dealers

Quote:

ATLANTA — Jun 11, 2015, 1:31 PM ET
By JEFF MARTIN Associated Press

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Federal authorities want to seize airplanes, homes, luxury cars and beach properties from a Georgia-based corporation dealing in Iraqi currency.

In a federal complaint, prosecutors say Atlanta-based Sterling Currency Group LLC is among the largest sellers of the Iraqi dinar in the U.S.
Prosecutors say the business is built on what they describe as a scam to defraud investors hoping to cash in on a "revaluation" of the currency.
The idea that the currency will be "revalued," resulting in a sharp rise in its worth, "has spread throughout the Internet and is promoted by a variety of Internet blogs and individuals who hold themselves out to be currency experts or 'dinar gurus,'" the complaint says.

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In the recently unsealed, 48-page complaint, prosecutors say company representatives spread false information in predicting the dinar would rise sharply in value.
"Sterling's business practices have included publishing information on its own website that its principals knew to be untrue and disseminating false information over the telephone," the complaint states.

Full Article at this link.

Sterling were the big boys, perhaps the biggest. This is going to send shockwaves through the dinarosphere because they weren't the only ones paying pumpers to,..you know, pump dinar sales. James "Adam Montana" Wolf ~~seems to be deleting any mention of the raid from his DinarVets forum,~~ guess he hasn't figured out how to spin this yet. And he isn't alone. When the BH Group went down, they were a drop in a bucket, Sterling, is one of the buckets.

My thanks to Deana for the link to the complaint. The list of defendants, properties, shell companies and trusts being made subject to foreclosure on is three pages long. Just a few highlights:

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I. Introduction

1.This Complaint seeks forfeiture of the
below-listed properties to the United
States as proceeds of specified unlawful
activities and properties involved in
money laundering offenses of Sterling
Currency Group, LLC (“Sterling”); Sterling
Online Processing Services, LLC (Sterling
Online); GID Partners, LLC (GID); Alex
Capital Holdings LLC (Alex); James Shaw
(J.Shaw); Carole Laurette Shaw
(C.Shaw); Tyson Rhame (Rhame); Frank Bell
(Bell), and other entities controlled by
these same businesses and individuals that
have used the facilities of interstate
commerce in a scheme to defraud investors
in the Iraqi dinar by publishing and
disseminating false information about the
viability of that currency as an
investment:

Quote:

B.Knowledge of the Scam

15. Sterling’s success is at least
partially attributable to its use of the facilities of
interstate commerce, including wire communications,
both directly and indirectly, to disseminate false
and misleading information about the possibility of a
revaluation of the dinar and to steer customers toward
choosing Sterling over its competitors.

16. The revaluation (or simply, “RV”) theory has
spread throughout the Internet and is promoted by
a variety of internet blogs and individuals who hold
themselves out to be currency experts or
“dinar gurus.” According to the RV theory, the dinar
will experience an abrupt , exponential rise in value
against the U.S. dollar and hence yield enormous profits
for dinar holders.

17. An individual who worked for Sterling from
approximately 2013 to 2015 confirmed that Bell
at one point told customer service center
representatives in a meeting that there would
never be an Iraqi dinar revaluation. Bell
instructed the representatives not to tell
callers that the revaluation will never occur
but to tell the callers to do their own research.

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i.Sterling’s Use of the RV Promoters’ Web Sites

23.Sterling has knowingly benefitted from
false representations made by web
sites and blogs, including “The GET Team.”

24.The GET Team, which is led by an in
dividual known as TerryK, runs an
internet chat room and weekly conferen
ce calls in which information about the
Iraqi dinar is discussed. During those
chats and conferences, TerryK spreads false
information suggesting that the reva
luation is about to occur.

25.In a September 13, 2010, email, TerryK
introduced himself to Rhame:
Ty, My name is TerryK, I own the wo
rlds [sic] largest Dinar web site
going....we have currently 7200 members
and currently we hold two calls a
week with about 1500 on the call and 100
’s if not 1,000’s on skype listening
in...what I would like to do is open a
discussion with you and maybe have
you on a call this coming wed night.
It starts at 9pm and thought maybe 10-
15 min on how you operate, how to ca
sh in with your firm and then a
question and answers session....let
me know via email [sic].
terryk.

26.Thereafter, beginning at least as ea
rly as 2011, Sterling began making
monthly payments in the amount of $4,000
to TerryK. In total, Sterling has paid
TerryK more than $150,000 since 2011.

By Jove, I think they've got it. The entire driving force of the dinar scam summed up. Dinar importers pretending to be legal money service businesses unrelated to the frothing from the mouth pumpers. Except the pumpers are paid by the dinar sellers. Who's a thunk it?

One small footnote to add, Terryk of the GET Team mentioned above had more than one sort of junior partners. One of them was Rodney "Gankans" Blackburn who's had four or five ponzi/pyramid schemes implode underneath him so far this year dispite his best efforts to promote them.

Late edit to add a link to the FBI's Dinar Investment Investigation response form:

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If you or a relative have been told that you will make enormous profits from the purchase of the Iraqi dinar, Vietnamese dong, Indonesian rupiah, or other foreign currency, the FBI encourages you to complete this victim questionnaire.