source: Bitcoin News
2017. Mar. 29. 18:00
The infamous Gaw Miners company and investor Stuart Fraser may see the courthouse soon in a civil lawsuit against the defunct operation. A U.S. judge from the state of Connecticut denied Fraser’s request to a default judgment and hearing extensions.
Also read: SEC Officially Indicts GAW Miners CEO for ‘Hashlet’ Ponzi Scheme
Gaw Miners was an organization that allegedly ran a mining operation and a cloud-based Ponzi that failed miserably in mid-2015. Gaw’s founder Homero Joshua Garza and associates like Stuart Fraser were under great scrutiny from the bitcoin community due to shady mining operations, the Zen miner program, the “Hashlet” packages, and the notorious digital currency Paycoin. In December of 2015, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) indicted Gaw Miners and Garza for operating a Ponzi scheme.
The Gaw Miners “Hashlet” scam.Following this event, in the summer of 2016 customers of Gaw sued the company and investor Stuart Fraser for fraudulent activities. The civil suit which is taking place in the district court of Connecticut seeks damages from the company due to defendants selling “what they did not own and misrepresented the nature of what they were selling.”
“From approximately March 2014 through December 2014, defendants sold a progressive array of products and investment contracts to over 10,000 investors that defendants claimed would yield profits from mining or otherwise investments in virtual currency,” explains the civil suit against Gaw miners.
On March 21 the court received a motion from Fraser’s legal team Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP asking the judge for a default judgment call. Fraser has repeatedly denied allegations of his involvement with the mining operations. The court ruled against the motion and vacated the default judgment stating;
The Court addresses herein multiple pending motions. First, the Motion to Dismiss [ECF No. 41] is DENIED because it does not address the operative complaint. The Court will consider the Motion to Dismiss [ECF No. 61] the operative complaint in due course. Second, for the reasons set forth in Plaintiffs’ memorandum, [ECF No. 68-1], the order granting motion for default entry under Rule 55(a) as to GAW Miners, LLC and Zenminer, LLC [ECF No. 65], including the deadline to file a motion for default judgment by March 1, 2017, is VACATED.
The people behind the curtains of the Gaw Miner operations are accused of manipulating lots of investors and using “cryptocurrency jargon”, masquerading their true intentions. The company’s bitcoin cloud mining operations and the Paycoin scam reaped in millions in revenue but never paid off for investors. The company was widely accused of not even owning any legitimate mining operations at all while some speculated Garza and affiliates sold the mining rigs before the company went under.
With Judge Shea’s recent decision the civil suit against Gaw, Zen and Fraser looks like it will gain some traction in the near future.
What do you think about the court case against Gaw Miners, Zen Miners and Stuart Fraser? Let us know in the comments below.
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