uFun Club fraud in Samoa climbing to $1 million in losses
Some insight today into why prosecutors in Samoa requested an extra week to put their case together earlier this week.
Speaking at a media press-conference held yesterday, Ministry of Police spokesman, Superintendent Su’a Muliaga Tiumalu told reporters that
at least 8 local companies have lodged complaints against the two men and a woman now facing cyber-crime charges stemming from an alleged pyramid money making scam.
The suspects, Nicolas Giannos, Rosita Stanfield and an unidentified seventy-four year old local pastor, were apprehended earlier this month following an attempt to transfer $100,000 out of Samoa.
The trio had been heavily promoting uFun Club in Samoa throughout May, and turns out that $100,000 was just the tip of the iceberg.
In explaining the scope of the case against the three uFun Club investors thus far, Tiumalu revealed that
More than 8 companies have lodged complaints. More than $100,000 was paid by each of the companies to the proposed business.
Depending on exactly how much these companies invested in uFun Club, when combined with individual victims of the scheme, uFun Club losses in Samoa could very well top over a million dollars.
Tiumalu’s information provides some insight into why Prosecutors have now twice delayed filing charges against Giannos, Stanfield and the Pastor.
A second and final adjournment was granted this past Monday, with the case returning to court next week. At the scheduled Monday hearing, it is expected prosecutors will formally charge the three accused.
Separately police in Thailand are expected to submit a criminal case report on uFun Club to prosecutors later today. If prosecutors decide to take up the case, uFun Club executives will then face six criminal charges and some serious jail time.
In possible related news, Tiumalu also shared that ‘another local company is being investigated and its bank accounts frozen for similar cyber-crime activities.‘
Whether or not this other company has anything to do with uFun Club is as of yet unclear.
Stay tuned…
No word yet on whether the criminal case report was filed yesterday.
Did they or didn’t they!
99% Confirmed: Autotranslate on a post from Songmetta’s Facebook page suggests the report was indeed handed over to Thai public prosecutors yesterday
17 hrs ago (at the time of this comment) was about 3pm local Thai time.
My guess is we won’t hear anything further till next week. PPs might operate like US regulators seeing as criminal charges are on table, in that they won’t release any information about the case until charges are filed.
great!
the arrests began on april 11, 2015. today on june 27,2015 we have news the report has been filed. this is incredible speed.
at over 1.17 billion usd, and involving so many people and details, suwira songmetta and his team have performed a herculean task.
take it international thailand! call up interpol, send arrest notices for all the runaways and especially get behind malaysia’s ass.
well done mr suwira songmetta and team.
June 23rd, as victims continued to file in they had officers working late hours.
This is Ponzi investigation, Thai style.
Sleep? What sleep? Phone strapped to belt, I’ll make my goddamn bed here at the station – wake me up in 40 mins!
aw
am i allowed to say suwira songmetta is hotstuff? 🙂
Confirmed, case report was submitted Friday 26th June at around 3:30pm – https://behindmlm.com/companies/ufun-club/ufun-club-criminal-case-report-submitted-to-ags-office/
Another big lie being passed around here in Thailand (handed down from the UFUN higher ups to members/investors) is that the time to file a complaint with the police has passed.
Everyone is being told that if you file a complaint now it will be of no use. Fear, embarrassment and outright lies are keeping the victims in Thailand from coming forward to make their claims as victims.
Why haven’t the Thai police made a real effort to seize the computer data yet which would not only show who the victims are but would also expose a lot of the higher ups?
One of the web sites is supposedly operated in the US. Why hasn’t the FBI become more involved?