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Invested life-savings with an ex-con, now I fear it's a ponzi!

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MJ DeMarco

I followed the science; all I found was money.
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I want to believe this story is fake.

I just can't believe people can be this stupid.

Even the commenters are questioning its truthfulness.

Are people really this stupid with their money?

You invest your life savings with an ex-con convicted of financial fraud and now you're worried about losing everything?

As someone said, you're either exceedingly greedy, or criminally stupid.

We plundered our 401(k) to invest in a friend’s business — now we fear it’s a Ponzi scheme

We are in a sticky situation and need some advice on how we should proceed.

We had a friend who has had some success (and failure) in business. He was sent to federal prison for two years for signing off on falsified financial documents as an executive of a company. He claims he somewhat knew but was also sort of tricked into it, or at least was backed into a corner. Whatever...

But after his release he got himself back on his feet fairly swiftly. And when I say friend, this isn’t a casual acquaintance: My wife, 55, has been best friends with his wife since they were toddlers. My wife met him in high school and actually introduced them to one another, so that is definitely a complicating factor.

After two years in prison, he presented an ‘investment opportunity’
In August 2015, he approached us with an investment opportunity. Since his conviction he is no longer allowed to helm a publicly traded company, but he was running his own private company, a social media site for tweens. We even attended some high-level events like anti-bullying campaigns.
 
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socaldude

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I think it's probably true.

It's pretty common for someone to get ripped-off in some overpromised business deal. But I think most are not public because of embarrassment.

If they would have just done due-diligence like a lot of professional investors they would have realized it was a scam.

I mean even just asking some questions. Kind of like being interrogated by the FBI or crossed examined by an attorney would have exposed some BS.

Lies, even elaborate ones from clever con artists usually don't stand hold up to a lot of hard questions.
 
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MJ DeMarco

I followed the science; all I found was money.
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Read Rat-Race Escape!
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Utah
If they would have just done due-diligence like a lot of professional investors they would have realized it was a scam.

What gets me is NOT that they were scammed or lost money ... we're all guilty of that.

What gets me is they invested their life savings on a crap roll.

It's OK to gamble on investments and businesses -- its NOT OK to gamble your entire life savings on it -- the only exception I see is when you fully control and understand the business -- but even that is a bit too much...
 
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BrooklynHustle

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I want to believe this story is fake.

I just can't believe people can be this stupid.

Even the commenters are questioning its truthfulness.

Are people really this stupid with their money?

You invest your life savings with an ex-con convicted of financial fraud and now you're worried about losing everything?

As someone said, you're either exceedingly greedy, or criminally stupid.

We plundered our 401(k) to invest in a friend’s business — now we fear it’s a Ponzi scheme
Well that was a dumb move, to say the least.

Hope they are able to salvage the situation somehow, and learn from it.
 

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