Posted by Julius Levai on July 19, 2002 at 12:40:57:
Tony ! Thanks for the kind words, I might just do that. But the problems will not get better that way. We (you) need solutions. Last week there was a “peace” march in city-hall area about to many murders in town. That is also will not do the trick. Pointing fingers outside, and blaming others can not be (in the long run) do the work. It must come from within. Where is Jessie when you (we) need him?? Back to real estate. I suggested to Ron Starr to look into investing in the “flat lands” but he wasn`t interested. Chicken? maybe… Julius.
Not to beat a dead horse, but I think “old Billy boy” has probably repaid his debt to society. Twenty three years is a travesty.
It’s easy to poke fun at someone who was such a showboat and who ultimately crashed and burned, but at some point it would be nice to see the punishment fit the crime. Especially, in lieu of Enron and the like, his crimes pale in comparison. Do you really think those guys will see 23 years? Doubtful.
Posted by dbillionaire on July 18, 2002 at 24:16:15:
I belive he and his wife were sentenced mainly for not living up to what they promised. Their 800 help number was not manned properly. They found videos of the wife coaching the so called students testimonials. One tape showed her telling a student to be more sincere about what she was saying. I think at one point they were making 5 million a month. And finally, he had only made about $50,000 in real-estate deals. He knew what to do and how to do it, but didn’t supply the help that he promised. He fainted in the court room when they read his sentence. They showed that on the news.
Posted by Julius Levai on July 18, 2002 at 13:40:23:
Hello ! Compare him and his punishment to O.J. He is jail for long time, and O.J. killing “only” two people runnig around playing gulf, looking for the real killer…At this point you can not convince me that this is the best legal system out there. I grow up in a “Commie” system, even that was a better one than this. No wonder more then half of my friends are back in the “old” country… Julius.
The basis of their sentence was convictions for “money laundering.” Their sentence was based on some formula where each count is multiplied by a number of years, the end result being a total of 23, or something like that.
Here’s the insane part . . .
Had they transferred the funds in one transaction, their would have only been one count and their sentence something like three years. But since they transferred the funds by multiple transactions, even though the total dollar amount would be the same . . . 23 years.
Even crazier, they were convicted for transferring money from their own account into another account of their own. When you launder money (or so I’m told), you need someone in the middle of the thing to disguise it’s origin. They made no attempt to hide the fact that they were transferring their own money into another account.
Sure, they made plenty of dumb mistakes and took advantage of people’s greed and stupidity, but there’s no doubt in my mind that in the end, they were railroaded.
In the end the authorities recovered some Ten Million Dollars, a fraction of which was returned to the people who bought their materials and were due refunds. Kind of makes you wonder . . . if they knew where the money came from and knew it was rightfully someone else’s, why didn’t they just give it to them?
I don’t believe they’d ever have been prosecuted had there been no booty to recover.
Don’t quote my figures or facts . . . just what I remember reading years ago. I may be off (probably) here and there, but the overall message is the same.
Posted by Julius Levai on July 18, 2002 at 23:41:08:
Thanks for your generasity…Why would anybody be so…??? (fill in the blanks) Do you see, who is coming to your country; legal and illegal? Yesterday -the first time- EURO got front of the DOLLAR. Any comments? Can you face the muzek, that the legal system is broken, and if anybody points it out, then get red of the messenger? Top noch solution. Back to the who is coming to your country; I live in Oakland, Ca. We have this year alone 58-59 killings, for less then half mill. residents. The whole Continent of Europe has less then that… Just yesterday a Mexican guy with pregnant wife and two small children driving around in Oakland, and a black guy just shot him from another car for no apparent reason. In my book you dont get moore third world then this. I wish you have some solution for this kind of problems. I have options, I do not know about your options… Julius, and your name is ?