Fake Nations

Letter to OffshoreAlert titled 'FATCA Violation - Defamation & Attack on US Interest and Investors Interests - Complaint to OFAC' from Jean-Philippe Grange, who claims to be 'Treasury Minister Plenipotentiary & Ambassador USA, Te Taou Sovereignty and Kingdom of Maori' and is perpetrating a fraud involving the CWM Group.

The head of an offshore financial services group said he is selling his group and “retiring” from the business after being asked about his criminal record by OffshoreAlert.Timothy von Kaay, a 40 year old Canadian national and resident of Ontario,

Ambassadors of the Dominion of Melchizedek, namely George Harlley, Fortunato P. Aguas, Nikolai Bougaenko, Nathan Obasi, Dewey Painter, Rodny Daniel, Renzo Pampalon, Carlos Alberto Rosa Machado, Peter Feher, Charles W. Price, Sr., Melchizedek Maquiso, Berno Mendiola Atalig, Joalbert S. Kapalong, Charles Balas, Ron Roger Adams, Hans von Grunwald, George Carter, Ross Masao Harano, Louis Lesser, Edward Allen Artis, M.E. Evans, Tain Bodkin, Skip Wills, Larry Madrigal, James Gentry Laws, Jason Gentry Laws, and Joseph Anton Walter.

Less than a month after they were taken down as a result of an OffshoreAlert investigation, references to Grenada-registered Euro Caribbean Bank have been reinstated on the web-site of the 'Stock Exchange' of the sham country known as the Dominion of Melchizedek; Caribbean Media Corporation, which operated the Caribbean News Agency, popularly known as CANA, has suspended operations; Another web-site that has shut down, albeit for different reasons, is that of Prosperitas Internationale Credit Union at www.prosperitasinternationale.com; Vanuatu-domiciled International Seminars Ltd., which organizes offshore seminars at which get-rich-quick schemes are promoted, is operating under a new name - Global Wealth Education Ltd.; John Bourbon resigned as Managing Director of the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority, effective January 16, 2002 - 18 months after taking up the position, citing "personal reasons"; An ex-SEC officer is critical of his former employer in a book he has written about how the stock markets and the Internet are used to commit fraud against the unsuspecting public; Clyde Hood, the 67-year-old retired electrician from Mattoon, Illinois who persuaded thousands of people from all around the world to collectively send him more than $12 million by offering a return of 5,000 per cent in 275 days, has been sentenced to serve 14 years in prison; A web-site has been set up to raise funds to defend Kenneth R. Weare, of Belize-based J&K Global Marketing, against an SEC lawsuit filed on April 10, 2001, even though the case has ended without the defendants or their legal representatives ever putting in an appearance; The Isle of Man government has granted an online gaming license to Action Online Entertainment (IOM) Limited, which is the fifth firm to receive such a license; Imperial Consolidated is blaming its lawyers for its loss of a libel lawsuit in New Zealand, in which the judge determined they had fabricated documents submitted as evidence and questioned the legitimacy of their investment products; and Justice Hugh Small, sitting at the Bahamas Supreme Court, issued an order on December 20, 2001 that the voluntary liquidation of Americas International Bank Corporation Ltd. be continued but under the supervision of the court.

A principal of two offshore banks has told OffshoreAlert that he no longer has anything to do with the Dominion of Melchizedek, despite his name appearing on literature associated with the fake nation.Peter Drakoulakos, who heads Euro Credit Bank A.D., of Montenegro, and Euro Caribbean Bank Ltd., of Grenada, was once listed as the South American "Ambassador" for Melchizedek on its web-site.

The SEC has taken legal action in Hawaii against yet another 'founder' of a fake country who solicited investments over the Internet. Robert F. Moore, who lives in Honolulu, held himself out to be the 'Head of State' of The Kingdom of Enenkio and attempted to raise money in its name, according to an SEC complaint filed on October 5.

Grenada has finished a close second to the fake jurisdiction of Melchizedek in an Internet poll to determine the worst offshore jurisdiction. In answer to the question 'Which of these offshore centers would you least trust with your money?', Melchizedek came top with 30 per cent of votes cast, while Grenada followed with 21 per cent.

Barbados-based attorney Yolande Bannister claims that her law and company management firms no longer represent two fraudulently-run banks. Offshore Alert has previously reported that Bannister's Alpha & Omega Law Chambers/YBG Management in Bridgetown, Barbados, served as the administrative office for the crooked Digital Commerce Bank.

The Caribbean Bank of Commerce, which had its banking license revoked in Antigua last year, has been up to its old tricks again. On March 29, 2000, the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency put out a warning about something calling itself Digital Commerce Bank Ltd., which is one of the names CBC now operates under.

BaTelCo throws spanner in the works of Bahamas International Stock Exchange private placement, Cayman Islands Stock Exchange tells New Utopia to take a hike, trial in Bermuda over European family's wealth costs $600,000 per week, First International Bank of Grenada has difficulty with its math, journalists arrested in Grenada, new sham investment game appears on the Internet, and the growth of the Bahamas is detailed in a prospectus for the new Bahamas International Securities Exchange.

Dominica-registered Overseas Development Bank & Trust has yet to satisfy three judgments totalling US$1.24 million that were entered against it in favor of creditors on January 29, 1999, sham New Utopia jurisdiction claims it is launching "the New Utopia Investment Fund of the Cayman Islands", Ralph Sherman's involvement in the First International Bank of Grenada, comparisons between Van Brink's First International Bank of Grenada and Michael Randy's Canadian Trade Bank, alleged investment fraudster Brent Wagman surfaces in Panama, '60 Minutes' television show goes soft on Alexandre Konanykhine.

After finally having its bank licence revoked by regulators in Antigua earlier this year, the Caribbean Bank of Commerce has simply changed its name and is continuing its criminal activity without interruption.The bank has not even bothered to change its Antiguan telephone and fax numbers or its two web addresses at www.caribbank.com and www.cbcltd.com.

The Russian criminals behind the Caribbean Bank of Commerce, which Antiguan regulators have been trying to close down for over a year, have put the bank up for sale. A representative of CBC this month sent out mass e-mails offering four different banks for sale, including the Caribbean Bank of Commerce.

A scheme to build a new offshore tax haven called New Utopia off the coast of the Cayman Islands has collapsed following legal action by the Securities & Exchange Commission. A federal judge in Tulsa, Oklahoma, this month granted the SEC's application to freeze all money raised by Lazarus Long (a.k.a. Howard Turney) for his New Utopia project through a fraudulent bond offering.

Cayman Islands Government award members huge salary increases, McKeeva Bush offers $200,000 to settle $1 million liability, according to First Cayman Bank liquidators; Antigua journalist Tim Hector continues to publish despite printing presses being destroyed in an arson attack, the dubious past of New Utopia conman Prince Lazarus Long, a.k.a. Howard Turney; First Nevisian Group forms Life Offshore Group of Companies, Barron's magazine rips into Agora's The Oxford Club.

Offshore Alert has uncovered evidence that a widely-publicised scheme to build a new offshore tax haven called New Utopia off the coast of the Cayman Islands to, inter alia, compete with Bermuda in offshore insurance appears to be an elaborate advance fee fraud. That allegation is supported by the fact that the public is currently being urged to order New Utopian currency by sending off funds to an Antiguan bank that we exposed as a fraud last month.

Offshore regulators apparently uninterested in scams exposed by OffshoreAlert; NimsTec's 3-D cameras offered for sale as "collector's items" over the Internet; Marc Harris has t-shirt with the slogan: "David Marchant is alive because killing him would be a crime"; As General Election looms, Progressive Labour Party tipped to win power in Bermuda for the first time; Dominion of Melchizedek offers a variety of fraudulent products and services; and Little Switzerland contemplates legal action after proposed purchase of Colombian Emeralds International falls through.