HONOLULU - Five members of a native Hawaiian sovereignty group on Maui are being accused of luring unsuspecting clients with bold talk and official looking documents.A twenty-five count indictment unsealed in U.S. District Court Thursday alleges the group committed various fraud and tax offenses through a debt assistance program that relied on falsified documents.
Those named in the indictment include Mahealani Ventura-Oliver, 42, John D. Oliver, 46, Pilialoha K. Teves, 49, Leatrice Lehua Hoy, 52, and Peter Hoy, 76. Each member of the group faces sixteen charges of mail fraud as well as conspiring to create, sell and use fictitious obligations.
U.S. Attorney Florence Nakakuni said the defendants lured people into the alleged scam through seminars on Maui and other locations where they conducted classes about Hawaiian history and real property rights. The defendants operated under the trade names Hawaiiloa Foundation, Ko Hawaii Pae Aina and The Registry.
During the seminars potential clients were offered private meetings where the defendants instructed them on a debt assistance program that could eliminate their mortgages, property taxes and credit card debts. Clients paid $1,500 to $10,000 for the closed door sessions where they were instructed on the use of special documents that could be cashed in with the state of Hawaii or the U.S. Treasury.
“The defendants claimed all individuals have 'a special reserve’ with the United States Treasury which could be used to zero out their private debts,” Nakakuni said in a press conference. “Various fictitious obligations such as promissory notes, bonds and money orders were falsely claimed to be backed by the United States Treasury and the state of Hawaii.”
According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Lawrence Tong, who will likely prosecute the case, Hawaiiloa Foundation received a total of $468,000 from clients duped by the alleged scam. Tong did not say how many people may have fallen victim.
NO ARRESTS
None of the defendants named in Thursday’s indictment have been arrested, instead they will be ordered to appear in federal court in Honolulu.
“We expect the summons will be issued in the next day or so,” said Tong.
Ventura-Oliver and Oliver are also charged with money laundering and conspiring to submit false tax returns. The indictment alleges they sought fictitious refunds totaling $1.5 million.
If convicted of the charges all five defendants face a maximum of five years in jail for the conspiracy charge and a maximum of twenty years in jail for each count of mail fraud.
Ventura-Oliver and Oliver face an additional term of five years in jail for the tax conspiracy charge and up to ten years in jail for money laundering.
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