LogCon: Blondie asked ' ...why did they trust her?'
All she had to do was convince one Witness. Then is spreads like the ebola virus.
And that one person was Paul Cooper. A JW elder.
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2011/sep/25/alleged-ponzi-scheme-leaves-lives-shattered/#/0
...he met Paul Cooper in 2006, a religious teacher and elder with a reputation as a financial rainmaker.
The word among the small network of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Mexico was that Cooper owned a spectacular home in Acapulco, funded charitable works and, if you were chosen, would share his gift.
“There was all this positive talk about him,” Titmas recalled.
So he was thrilled one day when Cooper approached him.
“I was given the chance to make a dream investment,” Titmas recalled. “He called me a special person … and said I had only a brief window of opportunity to invest.”
Cooper offered a chance to invest in a “successful” payday loan business in Spokane. Titmas took a few days to make some calls to trusted friends and religious peers.
“To the person, everyone that I spoke with had positive things to say about (Cooper),” Titmas said. “They were already invested and had good experiences.”
Titmas wanted the financial security, and saw the investment as an opportunity to offer financial assistance to his faith and enhance its missionary work.
There have been several "clawback" cases in which Bruce Kreigman has successfully received judgement against some of the investors who did make money on the scheme. The "net winners" had to pay back their fraudulent profits to offset the Little Loan Shoppe's bankruptcy.
I was able to find judgments for varying amounts against the following people/companies:
Geoff Toews, Rory and Cathy Bjarnason, and CLB Holdings
Gudrun Foerstner, Tyler Foerstner, Heidi Schulze (deseased), and the numbered entity 685937 BC Ltd.
Connie Konsulis, Shanna Bowolin, and Matthew BowolinHorst and Claudine Romani, H & C Investments, Ltd. and the Estate of Rene and Armande Baudez
Beverly Gyenizse, and David Perry Lazy M LLC, Pacifica Ventures Inc., Shelly Armstrong, David Armstrong, Daljit Haer, Ronald Ponton, and Tomika Ponton.
Keith Alexander ("Mr. Alexander") and 1127477 Alberta, Ltd.
The judge in these cases included this statement, or one similar, in the rulings:
"Defendants knew or should have known that Debtor was perpetrating a fraud"
They were greedy. And willing to take advantage of other JWs in order to increase their fraudulent profit.
It appears like 93 defendants had their cases withdrawn. https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/granule/USCOURTS-waed-2_11-cv-00365/USCOURTS-waed-2_11-cv-00365-17At the bottom of the page at the link, there are more judgments and court actions listed.
Lorenz Reibling is listed as #6 in the list of creditors holding the largest 20 unsecured claims:
http://bankrupt.com/misc/nvb09-23021.pdf
Lorenz invested 1.5 million dollars. And lost it all.