On December 30th the TelexFree class-action plaintiffs filed their fifth amended complaint.

I didn’t cover it because the only change was a bunch of defendants were added – most of which are banks and payment processors. The complaint itself has blown out to two hundred and eighty-four pages.

As a result of this the TelexFree class-action docket has become quite busy. In order to keep track of developments I thought we’d revisit the class-action and see where it’s at.

For reference, this is the current list of defendants as per the fifth amended complaint:

 

TelexFree Staff

  1. James Merrill (co-founder, TelexFree)
  2. Carlos Wanzeler (co-founder, TelexFree)
  3. Katia Wanzeler (wife of Carlos Wanzeler)
  4. Carlos Costa (co-founder, TelexFree Brazil (Ympactus))
  5. Steven Labriola (International Marketing Director, TelexFree)
  6. Andreia Moreira (marketing management, sales and finance, TelexFree)
  7. Ana Paula Oliveira (marketing management, sales and finance, TelexFree)

 

TelexFree Legal

  1. Gerald Nehra (TelexFree attorney)
  2. Gerald P. Nehra, Attorney at Law PLLC (Nehra’s law firm)
  3. Law Offices of Nehra and Waak (second Nehra law firm)
  4. the Estate of Jeffrey A. Babener (TelexFree attorney)
  5. Garvey Schubert Barer P.C. (defunct professional corporation)
  6. Robert Weaver (TelexFree attorney)
  7. Samuel C. Kauffman (TelexFree attorney)
  8. Gary P. Tober (TelexFree attorney)
  9. Sarah P. Sandford (TelexFree attorney)
  10. The Sheffield Group (MLM specialist firm)
  11. PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (assisted TelexFree financial executive Joseph Craft)

 

TelexFree Financial

  1. TD Bank N.A (TelexFree bank)
  2. Kevin Staten (Bank of America Senior Vice President, actively involved with opening TelexFree accounts)
  3. Wells Fargo Bank N.A. (TelexFree bank)
  4. Wells Fargo Advisors LLC (associated Wells Fargo financial company)
  5. Mauricio Cardenas (Wells Fargo Advisors Financial Advisor, close friend of Carlos Wanzeler)
  6. PNC Bank N.A. (TelexFree bank)

 

TelexFree Payment Processors

  1. International Payout Systems
  2. Edwin Gonzales (President, International Payout Systems)
  3. Natalia Yenatska (Chief Financial Officer, International Payout Systems)
  4. ProPay Inc.
  5. Vantage Payments LLC
  6. Dustin Sparman (Managing Partners, Vantage Paymments)
  7. AlliedWallet
  8. Ahmad Khawaja (founder & CEO, AlliedWallet)
  9. Mohammad Diab (COO, AlliedWallet)
  10. Amy Rountree (VP of Operations, AlliedWallet)
  11. Bank Card Consultants Inc.
  12. John Yurick owner, Bank Card Consultants)
  13. Priority Payouts Corp.
  14. Thomas A. Wells (CEO, Priority Payouts)

 

Other TelexFree Defendants

  1. Telecom Logic LLC (“provided TelexFree with ever
    increasingly deceptive, slick and difficult to trace services it needed to collect victim funds long after it confronted TelexFree’s founders and bluntly told them they were running a scam”)
  2. Ryan James Mitchell (owner, Telecome Logic LLC)
  3. TelexElectric LLLP (receive $2 million from TelexFree)
  4. Telex Mobile Holdings Inc. (received $500,870 from TelexFree)

 

The fifth amended complaint also provides a list of settled defendants, which I’m including here to keep track of.

  1. Joseph H. Craft (Chief Financial Officer, TelexFree, settled for $100,000)
  2. Craft Financial Solutions (company owned by Joseph Craft)
  3. Fidelity Co-operative Bank
  4. John F. Merrill (COO, Fidelity Bank, brother of James Merrill)
  5. Synovus Bank (settled for $425,000)
  6. Base Commerce LLC (then known as Phoenix Payments, settled for $1.75 million)
  7. John Hughes (President, Base Commerce)
  8. Alexander Sidel (employee, Base Commerce)
  9. Jason Doolittle (employee, Base Commerce)
  10. John Kirchhefer (employee, Base Commerce)
  11. Brian Bonfiglio (employee, Base Commerce)

Note that employment details were current during TelexFree’s operation. These details may have since changed.

All up the fifth amended complaint lists forty-two defendants. This has flooded the case docket with filings and makes tracking difficult.

As of March 20th the case has hit 1325 docket entries. Here’s a bullet point summary of significant developments over the past month:

 

February 17th – Class-action plaintiffs moved for a new (updated) case scheduling order. Defendants have opposed this request labeling it premature.

 

February 28th – AlliedWallet defendants filed to stay the case against them pending the outcome of parallel criminal proceedings.

 

March 7th – Defendants Mauricio Cardenas, Bank of America N.A., Dustin Sparman, Vantage Payments, The Sheffield Group, PNC Bank N.A., TD Bank N.A., International Payout Systems, Wells Fargo Advisors LLC, Wells Fargo Bank N.A., Garvey Schubert Barer P.C., Samuel C Kauffman, Sara P Sandford, Gary P Tober, Robert Weaver, the Estate of Jeffrey A. Babener, Propay Inc. and PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP filed Motions to Dismiss.

Defendants Steven Labriola and The Nehra Defendants filed their answers to the fifth amended complaint.

Class-action plaintiffs filed a voluntary motion dismissing Kevin Staten, Edwin Gonzales, Natalia Yenatska, Thomas A. Wells and Priority Payout Corp as defendants.

Such to the extent any settlements were reached prior to dismissal, they were not disclosed.

 

March 10th – Class-action plaintiffs filed an opposition to AlliedWallets’ request for a stay.

 

Not to take anything away from the two hundred and eighty-four page fifth amended complaint, but the gist of the TelexFree class-action remains the same.

Class-action plaintiffs seek to hold anyone who had anything to do with TelexFree’s operations accountable.

Going forward I’ll continue to update this article with developments. If anything significant happens I’ll likely publish a separate article with a link.