Infinity2Global Ponzi scammers Richard Maike and Doyce Barnes have been denied appeals on their respective convictions.

In a fourteen page published opinion by the Sixth Circuit, the US Court of Appeals found;

At trial, the government presented abundant proof that the defendants knowingly participated in (and in Maike’s case devised) a fraudulent scheme.

The government presented overwhelming evidence that the defendants employed that plan to deprive others—namely,
lower-level distributors—of money by means of lies and fraudulent representations.

For example, Barnes’s projections of the company’s revenue were based 100% on payments from distributors, with zero projected income from outside sources.

Maike lied to prospective recruits about the casino’s monthly profits; and after monthly payouts to Emperors dropped to circa $17 per month and stayed there, the reality (a jury could easily infer) was that these defendants knew that Emperors would not recoup their investments from casino revenues.

Maike also lied about the company having been offered $100 million for the Touch software alone.

[I2G] yielded more than $34 million in revenue for the company, nearly all of it extracted from the participants themselves; 96% of participants lost money; and the defendants themselves reaped millions.

The evidence therefore allowed the jury to infer not only that these defendants knowingly and voluntarily agreed to participate in a fraudulent scheme—namely a pyramid scheme—but that they actually did so, thereby obtaining millions of dollars in profits for themselves. The government presented sufficient evidence for the jury to convict these defendants of conspiracy to commit mail fraud.

On whether or not the Emperor Packages I2G offered were securities, and therefore Maike (right) and Barnes committed securities fraud;

The jury had ample grounds to find that the Emperor packages were securities and thus that the defendants were guilty of conspiracy to commit securities fraud.

Consequently, the Sixth Circuit concluded

the criminal judgments of Maike and Barnes are affirmed.

Richard Maike (right), as owner of the Infinity2Global Ponzi scheme, was sentenced to ten years in prison in December 2022.

Doyce Barnes, as I2G’s Vice President of Sales, was sentenced to four years in prison in December 2022.

Ordered restitution between Maike and Barnes topped $10.4 million in June 2023.