Consumer Fraud How to "convert" civil suit in criminal issue?

[rkim777]

There is a person from California who has been convincing people all over the country to pay her, via wire, check, and credit card, $30,000 and more to "teach" people how to invest in commercial real estate and then supposedly to put them into commercial real estate deals. She has convinced well over a hundred people to give her money by falsifying her credentials as a commercial real estate "expert". In reality, she has little to no experience in commercial real estate but knows how to talk a good game. Although she now lives in California, she is soon relocating to Florida.

A problem is that many people wired money to her company and wrote checks to her company before checking her out thoroughly. Her lies about her "expertise" have just recently come to the surface. But now she is refusing to refund money to people and has been unresponsive to those who email and call her "office" which is really a UPS store address.

Some people have contracts with her but she has not lived up to her contract but others were convinced by her to send her money without even a contract.

She can be found but at this point it is a civil issue. Is there a way this can be turned into a criminal issue such as wire fraud or securities violations since she has no securities license and her contract states she is to find commercial investments for the people who paid her $30,000? Would her complete fabrication of her "expertise" in commercial real estate be grounds to pursue fraud on a criminal basis? Is there a statute to cite showing that she violated criminal law somehow? Civil law is not enough to pin her down but criminal law may do the job.

 

[CdwJava]

To get this to be a criminal matter the first step would be to report it to the local police. Now, since this might be outside the realm of experience and ability for the local police to address, you might also consider contacting your state's Attorney General and maybe even the FBI. If she is taking $30,000 a pop from people and clearly doing so with fraudulent intent, then they just might get interested. However, if she simply makes a good sales pitch and people jump into bed without doing their homework and she has her bases covered, then it may remain solely a civil matter.

 

[rkim777]

Thank you for your reply. The matter has been reported to the local police but, as you say, I don't think they know or want to handle it. I was hoping that her selling of real estate instruction as well as saying that she will try to put her "students" (more like pigeons) into deals might raise the interest of the Securities Exchange Commission since her sales pitch to the thousands of people she has spoken in front of has included her offer to partner with them on deals as well as provide funding for them. I would think that this could be taken as the general solicitation of unregistered securities. Some of her victims have submitted complaints to the SEC but it would be great if she might be violating other criminal laws such as wire fraud.

If anyone else has ideas, please post them. This person should be stopped from fleecing others.