|
|
What Have We Done? Towards the end of 2006, we gained a bit of momentum by getting the ear of Karen Patterson of the Department of Corporations in California. She is quite adamant about getting more reports from everyone that has invested with Studio Partners / Makelo. An accountant from the Department of Corporations has contacted me and other investors about any bank information that we might have in regards to where the money actually went. If you haven't filled out a report, please do so now. You can find the link to the form on the What Can We Do? page. I have contacted 11 investors out of a possible 14 that have made an initial contact with me. Most of these investors have been found as a direct result of the existence of this site. These investors are located all over the country, from Hawaii to the East Coast and have lost any where from $5,000 to $50,000. Surely, there are other investors out there and some of them have quite possibly lost much more. I understand that a number of investors placed their money with Delaware Trust (now under a different company name). I attempted to leave my personal contact information there to act as a central coordinating figure for those investors that lost their money while having their account with them. However, their legal department advised against helping us. Over the past couple of years, I have contacted many people/companies, including David Belle & Associates, Dan Lauria (the writer/director), LAPD, SEC, multiple lawyers, Colorado Attorney General's office, Douglas County Sheriff, and many others. However, attempting to hunt down Keith and Matt just to talk to them would likely be moot as they have expressed no desire to try to contact us. Both of them apparently have made themselves extinct. We have a very tough battle ahead of us. Unfortunately, Keith and Matt did all the "right" things by changing office locations, disconnecting all phones, disconnecting ties with all agents, and just plain disappearing. The police really need a "smoking gun" in order for the DA to prosecute. One detective was quite frank with me when he told me that he smells fraud all over this case, but it's not prosecutable without some damning proof of a crime. Can you help come up with such proof? I've heard no more information from the SEC. They basically operate in secret and will only make themselves known if they need to contact one of us or an action has occurred. The SEC is mostly interested in the sale of securities under false pretenses. If you believe your were sold your shares under false pretenses, it's a good idea to file a report with the SEC. Are you not an accredited investor...this can me material! The first real action to take place against the company was done by the Department of Corporations (California) by issuing a Cease and Desist Order against Studio Partners (signed on January 29, 2007) to prevent the sales of any more securities. The document basically states that the securities appear not to be "qualified". Hopefully, this adds more incentive for the SEC to investigate and prosecute. Matt - Keith: If you're reading this, I sincerely don't understand how you can sleep at night knowing that many good people entrusted large sums of money to you, that you basically ran off with. It's despicable that human beings can do this to one another. |
|
|