Posted on behalf of fizzywiglet, at her request, in response to Chaserious:
"Except that I checked the IRS's 501(c)3 list, and AAWA isn't on it. They may have applied for nonprofit status, but they haven't been approved yet...that generally takes between 2 and 12 months.
In any event, you are incorrect to think the attorney probably advised them on this. I used to work for an attorney, and I have filled out and submitted the incorporation paperwork on that attorney's behalf, as his paralegal. It was a perfectly routine process. The attorney doesn't do background checks or ask for proof of I.D. or anything; we asked the client for the basic info (names and addresses of board members, etc.), filled out the paperwork, mailed it in, billed our client a few hundred or $1,000 for it.
The attorney who submitted the paperwork on Richard Kelly's behalf would have no reason to suspect that a name/address was false unless Richard Kelly brought it up to him."