Ten months after the initial Black Friday indictment, there has been yet another online payment processor officially revealed. However, the source of the discovery was the Federal Trade Commission and not the US Department of Justice. In a report recently filed in Utah federal court, Jeremy Johnson has been charged with concealing $51.4 Million in online poker payments through 65 shell companies.
Jeremy Johnson is the Utah businessman who was sued by the FTC in 2010 after he scammed over $289 Million from customers. Johnson was selling a variety of get rich quick schemes and once a customer purchased one of them, he would charge them for other services that they never signed up for.
Once the lawsuit was filed, a receiver was appointed to preserve Johnson’s assets. Robb Evans & Associates was the receiver assigned to preserve those assets and during their investigation of Johnson’s holdings and companies, an additional 65 shell companies were revealed and an additional $51.4 Million in funds were discovered as well. Those funds were obtained as a result of online payment processing for online poker companies Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars.
A majority of the $51.4 Million in funds has been moved either into stocks or into overseas bank accounts. Nearly $25 Million was moved over to Ameritrade and the money was used to purchase stocks. An additional $5.5 Million was transferred to bank accounts in Cypress and Andorra.
This isn’t the first time that Johnson has been accused of being involved in online poker processing. Chad Elie submitted testimony in federal court last year that he and Johnson were partners in online processing and that Johnson had caches of cash, gold, silver, and coins that he was hiding from the government.
At present, Johnson is only facing one charge of fraud in Utah, but that may change soon. According to Brent Ward, prosecutor for the case, a new indictment may be filed against Johnson in May and will include new charges. At this time, Johnson does not face any charges from the US Department of Justice regarding Black Friday.