Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Tracking the scam: Who said TVI Express hired Grimes and Reese?

Back in September, there was a rumor spread from IncreaseMyMonthlyIncome (i.e. Kaspi and Jackson's TVI Express website) that TVI Express has hired Grimes and Reese to make themselves compliant in the US. This report was soon copied by various TVI Express member websites.

This report was allegedly filed by Don Traurig, who allegedly talked to one of the lawyers there personally. However, if you read the actual message, you will realize that there is absolutely NOTHING to confirm this alleged call had taken place. There had been NO announcement from TVI Express itself, nor any sort of confirmation from Grimes and Reese or any third-party source that can be used to confirm this claim. Furthermore, there was even a message allegedly from Tarun Trikha and relayed through Don Traurig that NOBODY should call the lawyers to even verify the claim.

This is early September 2010.

A few days later, a TVI Express "team" in Georgia was served with cease and desist, and nobody bothered defending TVI Express. Which should prove that the hiring of Grimes and Reese was merely a rumor.

But who started it?

Search through Google shows that the first listing is likely Troy Dooley, on 23-JUL-2010

http://thatmlmbeat.com/mlm-weekly-news-report-find-out-about-waiora-tvi-express-mpbtoday-global-verge-and-amway/

However, he did not name a source for this information. Thus, one wonders who leaked him the information. Troy Dooley had previously highlighted TVI Express as a scammy operation multiple times on his website MLMHelpdesk.com so it is surprising this information did not appear on mlmhelpdesk.com at all.

Furthermore, MLMHelpdesk.com was hit with a WOT "bad reputation" tag, yet I found no problem with the information it had been providing on scams and legitimate MLMs. Thus, I suspect it had been maligned by its detractors.

I had posted several questions to Troy but he had no responded.

Here is one that seem to predate Troy's Announcement dated 06-JUL-2010, but that's a link to Youtube video dated June 26, 2010. In the about:
" tviteaminfo.com TVI Express | TVI North America - New office coming to the USA! TVI Express is your MLM choice for earning life changing income and transforming lives. TVI Express has engaged the well known law firm of Grimes and Reese, as specialists in MLM and direct selling law to launch offices in the US..."
The website it links to is now promoting Revolving Relay, not TVI Express. It was issued by TVINorthAmerica, based out of Atlanta Georgia, the same folks who got issued the cease and desist. If you look at the video, you can even see "Grimes and Reese" as one of the tabs on the browser. If you scroll to the 9 minute mark, you'll hear the narrator (unknown) that claims Grimes and Reese had been hired.

So they are most likely the ones who leaked the news to Troy Dooly, without confirmation.

So where did they get the information from? The only one that makes any sense would be Tarun Trikha. Though it would be up to Mr. Pat Dejour to reveal that.

So the message in September in which Don Traurig, supposedly relaying message from Tarun Trikha asking members to NOT call the attorneys to verify is very self-serving.

No comments: