Gilmond’s Zeek Rewards trial scheduled for September 2017
As late as February 1st, 2016, Trudy Gilmond was still adopting a “if I ignore it, it’ll go away” approach to her upcoming Zeek Rewards trial.
Gilmond was sued by the SEC late last year for her role as a top investor in the Zeek Rewards Ponzi scheme.
An attorney conference had been scheduled for February 1st, with SEC attorneys unable to reach Gilmond on the day.
A follow-up attempt to contact Gilmond (right) was made on February 3rd, with SEC attorney John Bowers claiming ‘Gilmond was unable or unwilling to respond regarding the issues presented‘.
As such, the SEC alone filed a proposed trial schedule on February 10th.
Judge Mullen signed off on the schedule on February 17th, ordering a five-day trial to kick off on September 11th, 2017.
Perhaps in anticipation of Gilmond’s continued non-cooperation, Mullen stressed in his order that
the deadline indicated on the published trial calendar may not be extended for any reason.
Failure to comply with this deadline WILL result in sanctions.
The second sentence was bolded in the order itself, suggesting Mullen won’t be taking any crap from Gilmond if she tries to delay the trial.
Separately on February 16th, Gilmond filed an amended answer to the SEC’s complaint.
The amended response is properly formatted this time around, as opposed to the one-paragraph response Gilmond filed in January.
The response itself is filled with your typical denials and “I didn’t knows” we’ve seen time and time again from Ponzi insiders.
Of particular note is Gilmond’s response of ignorance regarding Zeek Rewards being a Ponzi scheme:
I would have no knowledge of anything regarding investments or regulators due to the fat that I have never dealt with sales of investments.
I do not have knowledge of what securities are and would not have the knowledge of how to sell them.
Despite claiming she has no “knowledge of what securities are”, Gilmond goes on to claim “I do not agree that I offered securities or sales of securities”.
I’m sure that’ll go down well in court.
Stay tuned…
Footnote: Our thanks to Don@ASDUpdates for providing a copy of the SEC’s Attorney Conference report (February 10th), Gilmond’s Amended Response (February 16th) and Judge Mullen’s Pretrial Order and Case Management Plan (February 17th).
Update September 12th, 2017 – Rather than face trial Trudy Gilmond decided to obstruct the SEC’s case against her from going forward.
This resulted in a Final Judgment of $1,752,673.47 in disgorgement, $169.084 in prejudgement interest and a $150,000 civil penalty issued against her in June, 2017.
She claims that she has no knowledge of what securities are, after having actively helped launder money in Cow Frinzi Club, been a member of more cash gifting schemes than I can name, and more other Ponzis than most other people this side of Faith Sloan?
If Trudy is trying for perjury charges, she’s on the right track there.
I have said it before and I will say it again, people like this will continue to get away with it for the most part.
By the time it gets to a trial it will have been 4 years since Zeek shut down. Why she may be playing stupid and maybe she is stupid, but I doubt there will be any assets left that anyone will be able to secure.
She has either spent the assets or hidden them away. I doubt she will spend any time in jail either.
It is very frustrating how slow this is all taking. What about the list of 9000 that made money. No legal action has happened on any of them.
I know a few personally and they have not heard a thing and do not intend to do anything until they are contacted.
The process of taking legal action against these people is just taking too long.
@Steiny The expert witness for the class-representative defendants filed a claim for their expenses not too long ago. The case is progressing, albeit painfully slowly.
One thing is for sure. If she fails to show for the trial, I am sure the judge will have her arrested and tossed in jail to ensure she will show up for her hearing. At least she won’t have to worry about getting lost on the way to the courthouse.
While the wheels of justice do turn and work slowly, they do turn and work. This is not TV where everything is solved within an hour.
It makes no difference how long it takes, as long as she is held accountable in the end.
I know you folks here are not the law and so don’t think I am jumping on anyone here because I am frustrated with how slow this is going.
And my frustration is not because I lost in Zeek because quite honestly I did lose but I am quite pleased that 60% of my money has been returned, and there will probably be a little bit more sometime down the road. Hats off to the receiver for doing what they have done so far.
I think my frustration is this. When I was younger, my Grandmother said many times, if you are going to steal it is better to steal with a pen than with a gun.
I always hated that saying but now as I watch this Zeek stuff slowly take place, it appears my Grandmother was right.
Think about it. Most of these small number of people so far who made a ton in Zeek have all pretty much stalled or ignored any legal action. I have even looked up a few of them on Facebook and they seem to be parading about life with not a care in the world.
Even recently Darryle Douglas had an arrest warrant issued against him. Let’s be real, there is no man hunt out for this guy. Sure, if he gets stopped for a traffic violation there is a chance he could get picked up. But it is pretty unlikely that is going to happen.
What I am seeing is the mode of operation amongst these scammers is ignore everything and take your chances. The chances seem pretty good that they will get away with it.
Sure, maybe someone here and there will get caught and be made an example of. But the chances seem to be very slim that will happen.
And let me bring up the so called 9000 who made money and are supposed to be sued. I know 3 or 4 people on that list and have spoken briefly with all of them about this.
All of them have claimed to know nothing about what is happening legal wise. I believe that as they are probably not paying attention to what is happening. They all have sort of said in one way or another that they will deal with it if and when it comes.
I am not saying to say that all of these people need to be arrested and thrown in jail. I also don’t want to see these people sort of reduced to living in a shack financially. But I do think that they should all have to pay back all or most of what they got in Zeek. If that hurts them a bit financially that is ok.
Anyway, I am just complaining a bit. I do enjoy watching how this all unfolds even if it is too slow.
Here is the good thing. Zeek was the first scam that I got into. And hopefully the last. I learned a lot that is for sure.
Now if I am ever presented with anything that looks even remotely like a scam, I am like steer clear.
Keep doing what you are all doing here. It is a very informative website.
I was doing some research and came across this article.
Was wondering why we hadn’t heard anything about Gilmond’s September trial and realized the trial date was 2017.
Updated the article to better reflect that.