8 Figure Dream Lifestyle defendants denied living expenses carveout
On July 2nd the 8 Figure Dream Lifestyle defendants sought relief from a court-ordered asset freeze.
The defendants argued that their use of the frozen assets to pay lawyers and personal expenses
outweigh(ed) any public interest in preserving frozen assets for deceived consumers.
Not surprisingly, the motion was denied.
In response to the 8 Figure Dream Lifestyle defendant’s relief motion, the FTC pointed out Alex Dee, Brian Kaplan, John Bain and Jerrold Maurer
have spent more than two years using false or unsubstantiated earnings claims to trick more than a thousand consumers into paying up to $22,000 for memberships in the 8FDL Program.
Defendants want this Court to allow them to resume lives of luxury, paying thousands per month for BMW and Audi car leases, a mortgage on a second home, paying down tens of thousands in credit card balances, and tens of thousands per month for their businesses, which the FTC has shown are vehicles for consumer fraud.
Defrauded consumers simply should not have to fund Defendants’ expenses.
The court agreed.
In a July 8th order denying the relief motion, the court observed the 8 Figure Dream Lifestyle defendants ‘to offer any countervailing evidence showing consumer harm here was minimal.‘
Also a deciding factor was the FTC’s allegation that ‘the potential monetary loss to consumers in this case far exceeds the amount of funds currently frozen‘.
All of that said, the court did throw Dee, Kaplan, Bain and Maurer a bone:
It’s possible that the asset freeze should be modified to allow for payment of reasonable attorney fees and basic living expenses.
This was more of a “lift the entire freeze so we can continue to squander the money” motion though.
The moving Defendants haven’t, for example, proposed a concrete amount of funds that should be unfrozen, or submitted documents detailing what these expenses might be.
Instead, the moving Defendants generally claim their unable to pay some unknown amount of expenses and ask that the asset freeze be modified for this reason.
Such a broad proposal can’t be feasibly implemented without further increasing the risk that assets might not be preserved for consumer redress.
As of yet no additional filings related to the asset-freeze have been made.
Even with leniency from the court, I imagine any request for a carve-out will be opposed by the FTC.
Looking forward, a preliminary injunction hearing remains scheduled for July 19th. Stay tuned…
I am one of the people who got scammed out of thousands of dollars.
What I thought was interesting is the part where you talk about the $100,000 to $110,000 frozen but there was a total of about $600,000 made. I curious to know where the rest of the money went?
The other thing that is eye opening is we were told the funds were requested to help some of the affiliates and even start a new company not help maintain the lifestyles of the people involved.
I’m not following? 8 Figure Dream Lifestyle ran into the tens of millions of dollars.
As to where the money went, same story in every MLM scam; to the owners and top recruiters.
Will we ever get any of our money back. I spent my retirement money on that scam.
To date there has been no Receiver appointed. Sorry for your loss.
I too was one of the duped into this scheme by one, Chuck M. who was pretty smooth.
After about 6 months and a lot of money down the drain, it became quite apparent that something was seriously wrong here. These people were and are very skilled thieves.
Of interesting note, that same Chuck M. has been in contact with me again now promoting an “almost” identical scheme, same big money in the mail paydays.
Interesting too, all of his former volume of YouTube videos and everything referencing him to 8FDL has been removed/bleached from the Net.
Would love to hear if a Court Appointed Receiver is named!
I joined in November of 2017 under Brian Kaplan. I borrowed $15,000 at Brian’s request through the Lending Club.
I worked it after training without any results until April 8, 2018, when I fell and broke my back shattering my spinal cord at the Thoracic 11 & 12, and the Lumbar 1 vertebrae.
It left me without the use of my legs and feet, as well as leaving me incontinent in both bowels and bladder.
After several months of rehab, I remain in the same condition today.
I called Brian in late 2018 to explain my situation to him and see if I could get my money back, and he said that he would just have someone or him to provide a sale for me.
That never happened. I trust that there will be a way for me to recoup my money.