Posted on 09/07/2023 2:15:26 PM PDT by Morgana
A 120-year-old Illinois church could be forced to shutter and sell off its assets if its members fail to raise $300,000 in the next month to pay off a $487,000 federal court judgment against them to recover “long gone” donations a businessman convicted of running a Ponzi scheme poured into their coffers over 10 years.
The church, Messiah Lutheran Church in Joliet, said they had no idea they were benefiting from the ill-gotten gains of convicted fraudster, Illinois resident Kenneth D. Courtright III.
The Securities and Exchange Commission said Courtright and his company, Todays Growth Consultant Inc., raised at least $75 million from more than 500 investors throughout the United States and abroad in a Ponzi-like scheme from at least 2017 through at least October 2019.
Courtright and his company reportedly defrauded these investors through false promises on returns while using the proceeds from his Ponzi scheme to pay his personal expenses, including his mortgage and private school tuitions for his family.
Now, the court is seeking to recover the funds Courtright spent, including the donations he made to charities.
Messiah Lutheran Church explained on a website they established for a fundraising campaign at www.savemessiah.org that they received a total of $780,000 in donations from the businessman over the 10 years his benevolence lasted, but they already spent every dime of the money.
“Of course, we don't have that money,” Beth Hohisel, leader of Messiah’s litigation committee, said in a video appeal posted on YouTube. “We have used that money in our ministry, we've paid our staff, we've sent our youth to youth camp, we kept the lights on in our building. That money is long gone.”
She added: “When we tell someone what's happening to our church, the first response generally is, how can that be? That doesn't even seem fair at all.”
Attorney James Murphy from Mahoney, Silverman & Cross said in a statement that there was no wrongdoing on the church’s part.
“Unfortunately, Illinois law, under which the SEC Receiver’s lawsuit is brought, allows for the claw back of donations to charities based on the misdeeds of the donor. This type of lawsuit can be brought against any non-profit organization in Illinois,” Murphy said.
The church explained that the SEC was “unrelenting in demanding a large payback from Messiah Lutheran,” and the $487,000 is due by Nov. 15.
To honor the demand, the church said on its website that it emptied its Building Fund in order to make a $187,000 payment on the judgment on Aug. 28, and now they are out of options to pay the remainder of the money.
The church says if they are unable to pay the remainder of the judgment by Nov. 15, the amount they owe will increase to $587,000 by the court. The church’s assets can then be frozen, and a forced sale of their property executed.
“The SEC Receiver has made it clear that she does not care if Messiah losses its home and She does not care if Messiah’s congregation is left without a place to worship,” Brian Wielbik, president of Messiah’s Church Council, said in a statement. “It’s a true David versus Goliath story.”
Still if they did not know the business man was doing a ponzi scheme how are they responsible?
That is a very good question. I’ll check back here to see if anyone has an answer.
Maybe get the $$$ from this Courtwright guy.
Ask yourself this.
If this guy bought thousands of stuff from Wal Mart to they go to Wal Mart and demand that money back?
I know in Canada, you can be convicted of a crime, such as buying a $5000 television for $800. You should know something is wrong there.
Maybe thats the reasoning being used here?
Also was fraud this guys only source of income? Maybe the church can claim that the money came from his legitimate job.
Because it’s a donation, not a purchase. I bet the private schools didn’t have to return the money, because they provided the services paid for.
But donations work differently. Since the Church didn’t earn it, and the source is fraudulent funds, they must return it.
Otherwise, every crook in the world would just have their buddy set up a church, donate all their dirty money to it, and then they can freely keep the money when they are caught.
The people who are defrauded of their money in the scheme deserve to have their money returned.
This makes sense.
Obviously the court agrees, but that’s nonsense. What you’re describing is just money laundering through a charity, and if they could make that case they should charge the church with a crime. That’s obviously not what happened here, the church was not accessory to the fraud and is not responsible for it.
The defrauded party deserves their money back, but from the person actually convicted of the crime and not the church. That money is gone, and trying to draw a distinction between donations and purchases to extort it just doesn’t fly.
“Forget it Jake, it’s Illinois.”
I agree with your assessment. How in the world is this their fault?
And yet with all of his money laundering, Brandon is President of the Free World?
*SPIT*
that has me thinking that the same security law can be used to go after the democrat party and bankrupt them... A bg part of the FTX scandal is the money given to democrat party and to politicians...hear that judicial watch or some other group of lawyers. I don’t know how much was donated by FTX but I am sure it can even be proven in a court of Law that at some point the democrat party was taking donations and knew it was a Ponzi scheme.
It is not a donation. It is shared responsibility for the costs of the ministry by a supporting member.
“recover the funds Courtright spent”
Did he buy any food during this time? Pay utility bills? Buy gasoline?
Is the SEC going to hit up the local grocery stores, et al, too?
It seems to me, gains made by the investors are up for grabs. Not this stuff.
If the donations were used on tax returns it is more like a purchase.
I bought some fake Chinese 5oz silver “coins” from my local coin dealer for like $5 a piece.
he told me that some guy had donated them to his church. they still had the post it notes on each coin claiming the valuation was between $4750 and $5400.
he had to tell them that they were fake and worth nothing.
I am sure the guy probably wrote 40k off of his taxes for a charitable contribution
Corrupt government doesn't like non-profits, especially churches, because they want to stand our country on its ear and become the only source of charity. Although anything coming from government is not charity government wants that definition changed as well.
I can almost guarantee you this type of claw-back law will be used against Christian churches and organizations with a few liberal ones thrown in as collateral damage.
The church is 120 years old... so there is no way his buddher could set up the church for fraudulent purposes before any of them were born.
And it is a Lutheran church, which requires a pastor with a copious amount of education, years of scholarly work, not a fly-by-night make believe diploma from a 6 week “preaching for dummies” crash course.
I didn’t say the church was a fraud, I said if you allow this loop hole many fraudsters will be establishing fake church’s to hide dirty money.
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