Blessings In No Time gifting pyramid scheme sued by FTC
Blessings In No Time, aka “BINT”, was a matrix-based pyramid scheme.
On June 9th BINT and husband and wife operators, LaShonda and Marlon Moore, were sued by the Texas AG.
Today the FTC and Arkansas AG have followed up with a joint federal fraud lawsuit.
The Moores (right) were pitching a “credit repair” service through their company “The Mogul Behavior”.
Evidently that didn’t work out, prompting the couple to launch a multi-million dollar gifting scheme.
Blessings In No Time was officially launched in August 2020.
Bint operated via an app and disguised their illegal gifting scheme as “linkfunding”.
What are the advantages of linkfunding?
When funding from the government and nonprofits falls short, many people turn to linkfunding, meaning that they will rely on the kindness of their community.
Online fundraising removes the traditional barriers that typically exist when asking for support, making it simple to overcome financial obstacles quickly or raise money for a worthy cause.
“Causes” were of course BINT scammers’ hip pockets. BINT affiliates stole from those who joined after them in typical gifting pyramid fashion.
Under the “linkfunding” ruse, the Moores claimed BINT was “a safe, lucrative, and legal moneymaking membership program.”
In truth, BINT has been an illegal pyramid scheme. BINT has solicited money from consumers and promised them investment returns as high as 800 percent.
These promises are false.
The supposed investment returns Defendants have promised members they would receive have been, in reality, merely funds other members paid to participate in the scheme.
By the program’s design, most members have not earned returns but have instead lost the money they have paid to participate in BINT.
Therefore, BINT has not been a safe, lucrative, or legal moneymaking program.
You won’t find a BINT review here on BehindMLM because I’d never heard of the company.
Here’s why:
To help perpetuate their scheme, Defendants have prohibited members from posting anything concerning BINT online or on social media.
Members who have violated this rule risked forfeiting the money they have paid into the scheme.
This prohibition has prevented aggrieved consumers from alerting other consumers that BINT has not been a legitimate enterprise.
The FTC alleges that through BINT, LaShonda and Marlon Moore have scammed consumers out of tens of millions of dollars.
Despite these substantial losses, BINT was marketed on the cliche that nobody that had lost had come forward.
a guest speaker introduced by Defendants LaShonda Moore and Marlon Moore told the BINT community in a recorded live video, “the last time I checked, and you can correct me if I’m wrong, there is not a person out there that can say ‘I lost money with BINT.’”
BehindMLM regularly sees this defense trotted out in defense of scams.
The Moores represented the amount of money deposited into BINT, $29 million, was a proof of its legitimacy. They also claimed IRS, FBI and Pentagon officials were also participating.
Noting these prominent BINT members, LaShonda Moore concluded: “So anytime you all think we’re doing something wrong, know that we aren’t.”
What might have finally triggered regulatory action was LaShonda Moore claiming BINT had been cleared by the Arkansas Attorney-General’s Office.
BINT moves this way for a reason. BINT has been to the attorney general’s office and has come out scotch-free [sic] for a reason.
We have attorneys for a reason. We say ‘yes’ and ‘no’ to certain things for a reason. That’s because we are working legally.
And so I know a lot of times you guys send us ideas and you’re like ‘why can’t you do this?’ and you think that we don’t listen.
And that’s not the case; we listen. However, we’ve already been legally advised that that’s not in the best interest to the business of BINT.
Towards the end of BINT, the Moores trotted out a refund exit-scam.
Math being math, naturally there was no funds left by this stage to pay anyone.
Defendants … failed to provide requested refunds.
Moreover, LaShonda Moore recently admitted in a live video call that BINT no longer has the funds to provide the promised refunds and that the proposed defendants “do not have it financially to refund everybody in this community even if we wanted to.”
Throughout its operation, BINT collapsed three times. By February 2021 BINT victims had reported the scam to ‘the FTC, state attorneys general, and the Securities and Exchange Commission, among other authorities’.
The Moores have been accused of violations of the FTC Act and Arkansas DTPA. The FTC’s joint complaint alleges eight counts of fraud.
The complaint seeks to permanently enjoin BINT’s illegal operation and asks the court to award redress for injured consumers.
The complaint also seeks to impose civil penalties on the defendants under Arkansas state law.
Presumably due to the pandemic, BehindMLM has documented a number of gifting schemes similar to BINT over the past year.
Gifting schemes similar to BINT we’ve reviewed include
- Ben Quigley’s Kevlar Gifting Communities
- David Rosen’s Coop5050
- T.J. Rohleder’s Silver Partners
- Divine Prosperity Blossom
- Tommy Holt Jr.’s Alliance Economics
- The Underground Railroad
- Peter Wolfing’s Daily Digital Club and
- Eric Bechtold’s FollowFunding
Thus far, at least as far as I’m aware of, none of the scammers named above have been held accountable.
I’ve added the FTC’s case against BINT and the Moores to BehindMLM’s case calendar.
Stay tuned for updates as we continue to track the case.
Update 18th January 2022 – A bench trial has been scheduled “for sometime during the week of 10/17/2022”.
Update 7th April 2022 – A motion to dismiss from the BINT defendants has been denied.
Update 13th July 2023 – LaShonda and Marlon Moore have reached a settlement with the FTC.
The settlement has been presented to the FTC Comissioners for approval, after which it will be filed with the court.
Update 10th November 2023 – Marlon and LaShonda Moore have been indicted on BINT related fraud charges.
“Find me one person in BINT that lost money guys!
Also if anyone who lost money tells anyone we’re terminating your account.”
Sounds like Cheri Mark’s Marketing 101.
First rule of BINT Club: You do not talk about BINT Club.
Second rule of BINT Club: YOU DO NOT TALK ABOUT BINT CLUB!
Third rule: If we stop answering emails, or get tapped out, BINT Club is OVER.
Fourth rule: No cops, no Feds.
Etc…
I can’t think of an American equivalent although I’m sure there is one but bint in British English is a pretty insulting word for a woman.
There are several in America: The 5 letter B-word (rhymes with witch), the 4 letter C-word (rhymes with hunt), the 5 letter W-word (which rhymes with bore), the 5 letter S-word (that rhymes with tank).
slut, cow, ho, woofer; you get the picture.
I think the closest American English equivalent would be “chica”.
“Bint” meaning “woman” comes from a colonialist adaptation of the Pashtun “bint” meaning “daughter of”.
See also “bin” as in “Osama son of Laden”.
We Americans aren’t above stealing British slang. In particular British slang that appears in a wildly popular film like “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”….
As it says on the Urban Dictionary site:
“He’s buggered off” and “…being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it” are two of my favorite quotes.
Oh, and “One, two, FIVE! (Three, Sir) THREE!”
Now, what is the airspeed of an unladen swallow?
Bint is derogatory but it doesn’t mean “whore”, just “woman”. Urban Dictionary is incorrect, dictionary.com has a better definition.
It’s the kind of word a man of a certain age, probably working class or lower middle, might use to describe his wife, in the same vein as “‘er indoors” or “ball and chain”.
It’s one of those words you can use on a TV soap opera before the watershed in place of what the character would actually have said.
A better American English equivalent would be “squaw”. (Indigenous word for woman adopted by colonialists, carries derogatory sense when used by colonialists to refer to either native or colonist women, inherited from the lesser status of natives vs colonisers.)
Well, this took an unexpected educational turn. <3
What is disheartening to me is these people, who mean well, don’t get it that cash gifting is illegal no matter how you try to structure it. If they bothered to do any real due diligence they would have known that.
Instead they are trying to placate the members into believing this can be rescued and work. They are doing nothing more than re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Heck they even hinted this might not be salvageable. I can save them the time and all that work they are doing….stop it won’t work!
CASH GIFTING IS ILLEGAL no matter how you try to disguise it, call it, or structure it.
Here’s a hint people: One of your admins is working out of their walk-in closet for God’s sake. Does that look like success to you?
bUt DiD yOu KnOw ThE iRs LeTs YoU rEcEiVe uP tO $15,000 iN gIfTs EaCh YeAr?
@Malthusian:
A dictionary is a lexicon. It is a record of how words are used by the public. Urban Dictionary is just a crowd-sourced record of how people are using the word.
Who’s to say they’re wrong? Words change meanings over time, and the same word can mean entirely different things on each side of The Pond. One man’s bonnet, torch, and boot are another’s hood, flashlight, and trunk.
But speaking as a US lifer of over 6 decades, who has encountered plenty of bigots, I have never, ever heard the word “squaw” used in a derogatory fashion. No one even says that word unless they’re reading aloud about Hiawatha or the first Thanksgiving.
Maybe “squaw” was a put-down in Colonial times, but sakes and forsooth, that wast hundreds of years ago, gentle friend.
Probably the most common US term for a woman whom the speaker wishes to objectify is “broad.” As in:
“Did youse guyz check out da rack on dat broad over dere? Her boobs arrive ten minutes before SHE does! What keeps her from fallin’ over? Et cetera!”
Article updated with scheduled bench trial.
The elements used remind me of: CAPTAIN PLANET Cartoon Show! Another PYRAMID SCHEME goes bust and to pot! YAY!