Iowa joins national crackdown on fraudulent mailing operations
BUSINESS RECORD STAFF Sep 23, 2016 | 3:48 pm
2 min read time
420 wordsAll Latest News, Government Policy and LawFederal and state officials announced numerous consumer fraud lawsuits Thursday as part of a nationwide crackdown on predatory businesses that use deceptive mailings to defraud elderly Americans. The actions, detailed in a U.S. Department of Justice release, included criminal charges, economic sanctions, seizure of criminal proceeds, search warrants and civil injunction lawsuits.
As part of those actions, Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller announced consumer fraud lawsuits filed against two out-of-state mailing operations and the settlement of a third case involving a New Jersey list broker company that markets consumer lead lists to mass mailers.
In Iowa, Miller filed a consumer fraud lawsuit in Polk County District Court against Waverly Direct Inc. and company owner and President Gordon Shearer, both of Lynbrook, N.Y.
The lawsuit alleges that the company sends Iowans a congratulatory letter from the fictitious “Gerald St. John,” supposed director of the Numerological Resource Center, which, according to the lawsuit, is also a sham. The letter claims that the recipient has been specially selected to receive “life-changing” benefits, which would begin upon payment of a $20 “service/handling fee.”
The second lawsuit, also filed in Polk County District Court, names Nicholas Valenti and three of his companies — WB Co., TL Distribution and Southwest Publishing — all of Las Vegas. The lawsuit alleges the defendants send deceptive mailings to Iowans promising to reveal, for a price, methods for consistently winning large sums of money in lotteries and other forms of gambling. The lawsuit also alleges that Valenti sells the rights to use his deceptive mailers to other would-be scammers.
In a separate case, Miller on Thursday reached an agreement with Macromark Inc., of Danbury, Conn. over Miller’s concerns that the company engaged in consumer fraud through its role in providing consumer lists to other companies, or list brokering.
The settlement, called an assurance of voluntary compliance, requires Macromark to refrain from list brokering that exposes Iowans to fraud at the hands of scammers using psychic or sweepstakes schemes. The company agreed to pay $30,000 to support future efforts by the Iowa Attorney General’s Office to protect older Iowans from consumer fraud. The company denies wrongdoing as part of the agreement.
Miller contends that Macromark played a significant and ongoing role in facilitating deceptive marketing by providing lists of vulnerable consumers, often elderly, to offshore and U.S.-based mass mailing operations.
Iowa’s three consumer protection enforcement actions were coordinated with the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of the Treasury and other federal criminal and civil law enforcement agencies.
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