Interstate Wire Fraud

[gestalt]

What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? OH

I have just received noticed from two separate third parties that a company that we commisioned in NJ to do direct mailing for us, has filed bankruptcy and turned into a ghost.

The company I work for knows that money is basically gone and retrieving it would only help a lawyer's pocket more so than ours.

My question is even though this company was incorporated, can the one owner [who has done work for us in the past & I dealt with consistently] be held accountable and prosecuted for Interstate Mail Fraud. Yes, red flags did go up when he started asking for wire transfers instead of a check, credit cards, etc.

We wired the money Monday [5.10.04].
In what direction, or who should I contact to start filing charges.

PS This person is also wanted by 7 other companies, with the largest sum totaling over $80,000.

 

[djohnson]

A corporation is owned by shareholders, not one person. However, one person may own all the shares. I am assuming this is the case. If it was really incorporated then the business and the shareholder is two separate intities. One not responsible for the others debts. That is why they incorporate. I don't understand in your post where the fraud took happened. Just doing a wire transfer is not illegal. Can you please explain where you think this happened and why?

 

[gestalt]

All of the phones have been shut off, no printing press proofs have been sent. The third parties have dealt w/ him more directly and have said that he has received over the $100,000 from nearly seven different companies and now he is nowhere to be found. The one person who I talked knows him personally and has told me that he can't be found anywhere.

Fraud because we paid him for a service that I am 99% sure that he will not deliver on. We always paid him upfront because he was to print, add indcia and mail 10,000 mailers. Does this not constitute as interstate wire fraud, seeing how he is NJ and we are in OH?

 

[djohnson]

Someone else here may jump in and disagree with me, but I don't see this makes any difference. You would just be a creditor. To prove fraud you would have to show it was his intent at the time he took the payment. That would be hard to do by just what you are saying here.

 

[gestalt]

So promising a service and then not delivering on it is not fraud?

I am confused, once a person receives money to complete a service and does not complete the task is not? We have to prove that his intent all along was to just take our money?

Well never mind, I just wanted to check a couple of things. It was handed over to our lawyers at the end of the day. Thanks for input.