CASPER, Wyo. — The Wyoming Attorney General’s Office Consumer Protection Unit said Thursday that the Wyoming AG has joined the Federal Trade Commission and 46 agencies from 38 states and the District of Columbia to stop “a massive telefunding operation that bombarded 67 million consumers with 1.3 billion unsolicited and deceptive charitable fundraising calls.”
“Together, the organizations and individuals involved collected more than $110 million using their deceptive solicitations, making more than 3.7 million deceptive calls to Wyoming residents alone,” a Thursday, March 4 press release from the Consumer Protection Unit said.
Over a three year span, defendants in the case are alleged to have made calls to 152,000 unique phone number in Wyoming
“Virtually all of defendants’ phone calls and direct mail advertisements purported to solicit donations for sympathetic causes,” the press release states. “For example, these causes included financial assistance for cancer patients, housing for homeless veterans, victims of house fires, and children with autism. Unfortunately, the charities purporting to represent these causes frequently spent little if any money on their advertised charitable purposes, lining their own pockets, as well as those of the individual defendants, instead.”
Corporate entities alleged to have participated in the operation include:
- Associated Community Services
- Central Processing Services
- Community Services Appeal
- Directele, Inc.
- The Dale Corporation.
“These entities were in turn formed and directed by a network of different individuals including Dick Cole, Bill Burland, Barbara Cole, Amy Burland, Nikole Gilstorf, Tony Lia, John Lucidi and Scott Stepek,” the release adds. “According to Plaintiffs, these defendants, currently and in the past, solicited donations for sham charity organizations via telephone and direct-mail. They used robo-calls and pre-recorded messages to make unsolicited calls to over 67 million phone numbers across the United States.”
The FTC and the mult-state coalition recently filed a complaint “alleging that these practices violate numerous provisions of federal and state law.”
“In order to address these unlawful and deceptive practices, the group has entered into several settlement agreements with the defendants,” the release adds. “Under these settlements, all existing corporate entities agreed to permanently dissolve their existence. In addition, all defendants agreed to bans on fundraising and telemarketing for goods and services, as well as certain bans on charitable fundraising.”
“Finally, they also agreed to bans on illegal robo-calls, abusive calling practices, and misrepresentations regarding the solicitation and use of charitable donations, among other relief.”
