Attorney claims USI-Tech investigation extends internationally
A few days ago the website “USI-Tech Legal Claims” popped up.
The stated purpose of the site is to “address legal harms caused by USI-Tech in the U.S. & Canada”.
This site and the related services were created on the eve of USI-Techs sudden, total, and harmful withdrawal from the U.S. and Canada–by attorneys, a U.S. law firm, and cryptocurrency and block-chain professionals and experts, whose families and friends were heavily involved with and invested in USI-Tech.
We are INTIMATELY and PERSONALLY aware of the struggles, difficulties, and harms you are facing.
Visitors to the USI-Tech Legal Claims website are encouraged to provide personal information and financial disclosures related to their involvement in USI-Tech.
No information about who is behind the website is provided.
Further research reveals a YouTube channel bearing the same “USI-Tech Legal Claims” branding.
Videos on the channel are hosted by Joshua R. Kotter, a practicing Montana attorney with the firm Mountain State Attorneys.
As per the screenshot above, Kotter doesn’t appear to want Mountain State Attorneys directly connected to his USI-Tech website.
Instead he’s going with “Legal Crypto Law”, which claims it’s
a national / international law firm working in the areas of property and asset protection, blockchain technology, and other areas.
The firm claims to be “on its toes” dealing with the recent “shut down” of the USI-Tech, Laser Online and Hexabot Ponzi schemes.
In a video uploaded on January 10th titled “USI-Tech Not Clear & Ignoring, Says TX Securities Board-Attorneys Helping Affected Affiliates-No.3“, Kotter claims to have spoken directly with the Texas Securities Board.
After leaving three or four messages with the Texas Securities Board, Kotter claims he got in contact with the Securities Board’s “main enforcement attorney … that is handling the USI-Tech matter”.
[14:35] I was able to leave a voicemail message and send an email, and today, January 10th, I had a phone call with that individual for approximately forty-five minutes to an hour.
(It was) a very informative phone call.
[23:22] Higher authorities inside and outside the United States are communicating with that law enforcement agency, about everything that’s going on, everything that’s happened – and are looking at… uh, doing other things.
And that’s all that was said. But authorities higher than and outside the Texas State Securities Board and inside and/or outside the United States are looking at that.
Kotter also claims that USI-Tech have as of yet not responded to the Texas Securities Board cease and desist.
This includes failing to request an emergency hearing within ten days to challenge the cease and desist.
[21:31] USI-Tech has not requested such a hearing. USI-Tech has not responded to the cease and desist order.
[21:50] The Texas State Securities Board has had zero communication with anyone or anything related to USI-Tech.
When USI-Tech suspended affiliate withdrawals on Monday, the company told affiliates:
All further action in the US and Canada is now in the hands of our legal advisors. All subsequent steps will only be carried out on the basis of legally-compliant instructions from our advisors.
Whatever “further action” USI-Tech might have taken since receiving the Texas cease and desist notice, doesn’t appear to include cooperation with US authorities.
If USI-Tech fails to provide evidence to the Texas Securities Board that it’s not a Ponzi scheme by January 20th, the company will officially be an illegal securities offering in Texas.
With respect to “higher authorities” investigating USI-Tech, in the US that would be the SEC, who regulate securities fraud at a federal level.
As at the time of publication an SEC investigation into USI-Tech is presumed but not confirmed.
Outside of the US would likely be authorities in Dubai, Portugal, Brazil and/or Germany.
USI-Tech itself operates as a shell company purportedly incorporated in the Dubai.
Its principals, Joao Severino, Horst Jicha, Ralf Gold (co-founders) and Mike Kiefer (Master Distributor), are believed to be residing in Portugal, Germany, Brazil and Dubai and/or Switzerland respectively.
None of USI-Tech’s principals have made a public appearance since the Texas cease and desist was issued on December 20th, 2017.
US Master Distributors Dan and Patty Hunt were initially communicating with USI-Tech affiliates but appear to have since gone into hiding.
The last known communication from the Hunts was a January 8th Facebook video featuring Patty Hunt.
Footnote: Nothing in the above article or on BehindMLM should be taken as an endorsement of Joshua Kotter, USI-Tech Legal Claims, Legal Crypto Law or Mountain State Attorneys.
Personally if I was a victim of USI-Tech I’d be getting in contact with the SEC, as they are typically the regulatory body who dismantle MLM Ponzi schemes.
In the past we’ve typically seen litigation started by external lawyers representing Ponzi victims set aside in favor of a Receivership or Trustee claims process.
That said I’m neither a lawyer or accountant so the above should not be taken as legal or financial advice.
This guy (Joshua R. Kotter) just flat out feels wrong. He’s very long on and arguably not very good at diagnosing the problems of USI Tech but his videos offer no indication of what a US based attorney can, at the present time, do to provide a service worthy of earning any of his potential clients money.
Yet none the less he concludes his most current video by saying that he isn’t your attorney but maybe he should be.
At about the 35 minute mark in the second of what is currently three videos on his youtube channel Mr. Kotter alludes to the complications involved for someone in the US to continue being a “legal” affiliate in USI Tech.
His law firm can of course assist you in that regard but he makes it clear that those services are quite different that the services he is offering to USI victims.
And again, Joshua R. Kotter has not publicly disclosed what manner of services he purports to offer USI victims, even after three marketing videos.
If anyone here doubts his depth of experience or academic understanding of US securities law just dial into 30 minutes into his most recent (currently the third) video on his channel when he pretty much asks himself if the Howey “case” was the securities law precedence he had been talking about (pretty sure he promised to verify that).
For the love of God and all that is Holy if Joshua R. Kotter is not working on contingency but rather instead is charging any sort of up front fee, please, someone let us know.
For Canadian victims they should reach out to RCMP and see what their options are.
Joshua Rich Kotter, the guy who ran for state office in 2016? If he doesn’t want to get his law firm associated with this, he shouldn’t have done it.
I fully agree with GlimDropper. This does not smell right. I find myself sorely tempted to report his USI claims site to the hosting provider, Hostgator.
Did he promise to treat any info he receive as protected by attorney-client privilege? Probably not, as that’d imply pro bono work.
Fraud recovery fraud is serious business. This is when you ring up someone who has lost $XX,000 in a scam and tell them that they can recover their investment if they pay you $Y,000. Obviously they never see the money ever again.
Gullible / greedy person who has a history of falling for the “give me some money now and you’ll get lots of money later” con + promise that if they give you some money they’ll get lots of money later + the gambler’s compulsion to chase losses = ker-ching.
Quite often the person ringing up the investors is either the original scam artist, or they have bought the original scam artist’s suckers list.
Now, it may well be that Kotter is totally legit. For avoidance of doubt, I have no reason to believe that Kotter is operating a fraud recovery fraud.
For that matter, Kotter could take your money to represent you, fail to recover your losses, and it would still be totally legit. Representing someone in a hopeless case is not fraud.
All I am saying is that USI Tech investors should proceed with extreme caution, especially if they are cold-called or otherwise approached. Ideally they should engage a lawyer of their own choice, someone who who has been personally recommended to them or they can otherwise trust.
Here is a site with a list of all the appropriate Canadian authorities by province. It also includes info on how to go after the scumbags who are recruiting.
I personally today and filing a report about a local whos still bragging about the $80,000 hes has made in USI.
http://www.securities-administrators.ca/aboutcsa.aspx?id=99
Guys this attorney your talking about isn’t real, a figment of your imagination. The website created was done weeks ago by a troll with no authority or experience.
Please do your research as mindless drones share this information which is complete nonsense.
The USI-Tech page was only created recently because USI-Tech pulled out of the US recently.
The Mountain State Attorney website domain registration is a bit odd, as it shows a 21st January 2018 creation date (future?).
The Mountain State Attorney Facebook page has posts dating back to 2016 though – facebook.com/pg/Mountain-State-Attorneys-225927510802996/posts/?ref=page_internal
The corporate address is a bit suspect though, apparently there’s a ton of lawfirms using it.
If he isn’t real, he also fooled the local paper with an elaborate scheme:
billingsgazette.com/business/40under40/under-forty-joshua-r-kotter-managing-attorney-avantgarde-law/article_6fe56d9c-ba8f-5300-aa4c-2d4c357b992d.html
Feb, 2016? Well gee, whoever’s behind Kotter has been waiting for USI-Tech to collapse for a while lol. *cue Xfiles theme*
And dude needs to work on his smile. That grin makes him look like a right royal punce.
But an attorney of that name does exist. If you go to Montana Bar association and do a search, he does exist. Except his file is not public.
NOLINK://www.montanabar.org/search/newsearch.asp
LinkedIn Profile matches the stuff above. Looks like a real guy to me. Even photo is the same guy (but not same photo). He’s even in newspapers like BillingsGazette.
You’re doubting a bit too far, it seems.
And where ever Dan and Patti Hunt are hiding they have a solid internet connection, quickly deleting any posted comment on their USI-USA page telling people to contact the SEC and any other negative comment towards them, while dropping their names as admins from the Facebook page.
A recent person to post said he saw the back office of the Hunts after the Dallas meeting and they were taking out 3-4 bitcoins a day from referrals.
A response to one post saying they are waiting for payment was responded “me too”(we didn’t take any of your money, we lost all ours too!) by the page. I wonder where the Hunts are hiding?
“No information about who is behind the website is provided.” – must mean it’s a scam.
How are the Hunt’s hiding? Last video was three days ago. This site is laughable at best.
Deleting evidence of your participation in a Ponzi scheme = hiding.
@Dave
You are probably not smart enough to figure this out based on your USI comments, but this site stands on it’s own.
The information is put out there for you to do with it as you will. If you look at the history it’s been dead on.
I laugh at all the guys that comment on here such as yourself.. after these companies fold up and go away, they never come back and go sh*t you were right. Maybe you could be the first!
Yet, here you are.
I think you should triple or quadruple your investment.
Sell the farm, cash in your parents’ retirement fund. Do whatever it takes to prove Oz wrong.
Just a note….. I followed a marketing guru, Mike Klingler, into USI after he showed me his back office with 1000’s of affiliates and earning close to 2 BTC per day in his first 90 days.
I had worked with Mike in the past and he had a good reputation… in the past.
I got in and tested the system. Fortunately for me I started with only 25 packages ($1500) before the lockout.
Within 48 hours of the lockout Mike announced he was moving to Davorcoin.
I reviewed Davorcoin and asked Mike how he could refer people to Davorcoin… especially with what was going on with USI and 1000’s of his people who were in the process of losing all their money in USI.
He honestly said his plan was to have several hundred of his downline flood YouTube with video advertisements for the DavorCoin MLM Program, make as much money as he possibly could, as quickly as possible, not “reinvest” any of his ‘profits’ like everyone else is encouraged to do, and transfer his profits out regularly.
I was shocked…. this is not the person I knew.
I declined his offer to move on with him to the next venture. Lesson learned…..and it only cost me $1500.
You can look forward to the YouTube ad onslaught to start very shortly…… hope this helps someone.
Fraser McDonald. Guy in Thailand was promoter of USi. Now saying that he knew those programs aren’t for long time.
It seems as though the Hunt’s and Bethany College Professor David Frost have been politely and consistently removing people from their money for years as a team (or maybe that LLC name is a coincidence).
Below is the LinkenIn “work” experience posted under Patti Hunt’s profile, you can find on a google search.
I wonder how “limited” their exposure is to people trying to recoup their money?
On a side note, if you do check out the profile…. sound out her name as it’s spelled in the web address.
This website is full of nothing but BS. YES, USITech did shutdown their Affiliates in the U.S. and Canada. WHY? Because (USI-Tech violated securities law by offering unregistered securities. Strawman arguments removed.)
I see no wrong that USITech has done and i see no reason to doubt the integrity of USITech. Anyone can scream SCAM about any business, but the screaming is only justified by established proof.
When Affiliate abuse was brought to the attention of USITech by legal authorities, they immediately acted to stop sales in the U.S. and canada.
Some abusers were warned but apparently took no heed of the warning and chose to continue gorging their wallets.
UsiTech is currently auditing all the members accounts to determine who the rotten apples are. UsiTech has not knowingly allowed anyone to abuse the company or any customer.
I believe the only ones who will lose any money because of doing business with USITech are the ones who gained their money illegally. They certainly deserve that loss.
^^ There is nothing to speculate about the Texas cease and desist, it clearly states USI-Tech is illegally offering unregistered securities. Ditto the Canadian warnings.
Instead of watching Facebook and YouTube videos, go and read the actual notice yourself to confirm.
Naive first time Ponzi investor confirmed.
Correct. That’d be everyone from the company owners down to every last affiliate who profited.
There’s no legal way to gain money in a Ponzi scheme.
and yet here you are trying to defend your scam instead of letting it stand on it’s own merits if it was indeed legal. you scabs give it away every. single. time.
Making a separate website is marketing concept. It does not in any way make it a fact he doesn’t want to tie his law firm to the project.
I find this assumption based on either ignorance or a sign this article is complete bias and I didn’t even finish reading. UGH.
I am married to a lawyer , not in that state, and I know the laws and common practice of lawyers and internet marketing is my profession. Grrrrr.
Yeah no. In the wake of a Ponzi collapse if a law firm is going to offer assistance to victims they damn well better offer full disclosure.
By all means set up a “marketing website” but full disclosure of who is running it and what law firm they are working should be provided somewhere on the website. Anything less is misleading at best or just flat out dishonesty.
Sorry, you were saying about bias?