Being stalked by a fraudster, what to do?
Author
I'm not sure this is the right place to post this, but after all, it is a Help Wanted topic.
Last year, a man emailed me, luring me into joining what he claimed was a company in the start-up phase. Inexperienced as I was, I didn't do much background checking before I did so; truth to be said, I didn't know of which steps to make in order to do a proper background check on his company nor his name, so I accepted.
I signed an NDA that claimed that his company was registered in Los Angeles California, United States and San Diego California. Later that year I found out that it had all been a fraud, and I, along with the rest of the team, left. We did a background check on the company, and the lawyer who checked it up for us couldn't find the company registered in any of the mentioned locations.
A community driven homepage posted an article on our story a while back, but was forced to take down the article when the fraudster contacted them. Now he is closing down my homepage by contacting my host.
Are there any steps I could make to get rid of this guy? Are there any steps I could make to prove to my host and article homepage that this guy stalking me and my team is basing all his threats on a company that doesn't exist? Or should I just burry everything and move on, let the bad guy win?
When working for this guy, the team finished a number of next-gen quality character models among other things.
To me it looks like I will have to spend a rather large amount of money to take the necessary steps to prove this guy wrong.
if he can take down YOUR own homepage, then during the course of your relationship, you must really have let slip a lot more information to him than you have told us about.
i can only imagine them (the third party homepage that had the article posted) taking down the article if the fraudster had some sort of legal papers / made threats against them. if that is the case, I would go to the police and seek their councel.
Quote:Original post by Trefall
A community driven homepage posted an article on our story a while back, but was forced to take down the article when the fraudster contacted them. Now he is closing down my homepage by contacting my host.
i can only imagine them (the third party homepage that had the article posted) taking down the article if the fraudster had some sort of legal papers / made threats against them. if that is the case, I would go to the police and seek their councel.
Author
The NDA I mentioned is the only contract he has with my name on it. But like I said, the company I'm contracted to isn't registered in the locations mentioned in the contract.
The fraudster faxed this NDA to my host. Me and the team that worked for him took the models we had made while working for the fraudster, to use it in our own game.
I can only assume it is the same thing he did with the third party homepage that was hosting the article.
The fraudster faxed this NDA to my host. Me and the team that worked for him took the models we had made while working for the fraudster, to use it in our own game.
I can only assume it is the same thing he did with the third party homepage that was hosting the article.
Hi,
I'd like to offer my knowledge in this matter as I am the president of a Limited Liability Company. First, it's unfortunate that there are people out there willing to build fraudulent businesses in hopes of bettering their life and putting others at risk.
Luckily he only suckered you into signing a fake Non-disclosure agreement which is not binding if in the agreement it mentions his fake business as the first party. However this guy can be very dangerous if he knows your personal information and should be reported to authorities as what he is doing is against the law and you can press charges against him for personal losses.
If his personal name is the first party in the Non-disclosure agreement then the agreement is binding and unfortunately there is nothing you can do accept allow the agreement to expire, there should be a date suggested in the agreement stating when the agreement needs to be renewed or becomes void.
If in the Non-disclosure agreement his fraudulent company is listed as the first party then if you still have the evidence you could contact your website host and request for them to sign a Non-disclosure agreement preventing them from revealing any of the critical information you exchange with one another. Your host of course can deny to sign any form of agreement with your party.
Lawyers are costly and in some cases can be avoided, but in others they are needed. Fortunately if your host is willing to compare your evidence to his evidence then you may be able to secure your websites availability again. If not, well think of the good in all of this - you have learned a valuable lesson.
Also, a Non-disclosure agreement is normally only an agreement between two or more parties stating that all information acquired during its time in the subject matter it references must remain confidential. It sounds like the NDA you have signed may have been a NDA and Consultant agreement wrapped into one and probably gives the liar full ownership to your work, but there is hope...
By law in order to own something, there must be an exchange whether it is a retroactive payment system (promising investments upon securing capital) or a contract per item or employment, there are also various other ways not mentioned here. The point is there needs to be some sort of exchange or the contract becomes void at its time of expiration. The only exception is Non-profit organizations.
I have to confess that I am no lawyer and I am only speaking on behalf of the knowledge I have gained during my times of running businesses. I hope this information proves helpful to you! Also, on another note - post some of your artwork and maybe I'll contact you.
At any rate, good luck!
I'd like to offer my knowledge in this matter as I am the president of a Limited Liability Company. First, it's unfortunate that there are people out there willing to build fraudulent businesses in hopes of bettering their life and putting others at risk.
Luckily he only suckered you into signing a fake Non-disclosure agreement which is not binding if in the agreement it mentions his fake business as the first party. However this guy can be very dangerous if he knows your personal information and should be reported to authorities as what he is doing is against the law and you can press charges against him for personal losses.
If his personal name is the first party in the Non-disclosure agreement then the agreement is binding and unfortunately there is nothing you can do accept allow the agreement to expire, there should be a date suggested in the agreement stating when the agreement needs to be renewed or becomes void.
If in the Non-disclosure agreement his fraudulent company is listed as the first party then if you still have the evidence you could contact your website host and request for them to sign a Non-disclosure agreement preventing them from revealing any of the critical information you exchange with one another. Your host of course can deny to sign any form of agreement with your party.
Lawyers are costly and in some cases can be avoided, but in others they are needed. Fortunately if your host is willing to compare your evidence to his evidence then you may be able to secure your websites availability again. If not, well think of the good in all of this - you have learned a valuable lesson.
Also, a Non-disclosure agreement is normally only an agreement between two or more parties stating that all information acquired during its time in the subject matter it references must remain confidential. It sounds like the NDA you have signed may have been a NDA and Consultant agreement wrapped into one and probably gives the liar full ownership to your work, but there is hope...
By law in order to own something, there must be an exchange whether it is a retroactive payment system (promising investments upon securing capital) or a contract per item or employment, there are also various other ways not mentioned here. The point is there needs to be some sort of exchange or the contract becomes void at its time of expiration. The only exception is Non-profit organizations.
I have to confess that I am no lawyer and I am only speaking on behalf of the knowledge I have gained during my times of running businesses. I hope this information proves helpful to you! Also, on another note - post some of your artwork and maybe I'll contact you.
At any rate, good luck!
I'm pretty sure this is related to the Realm of Valhallon: Age of Campaigns/Nations Half-Life 2 based MMORPG that posted here and everywhere else. ModDB did an excellent feature article on the subject that unlocked a lot of the information relating to that. I'm pretty sure the original poster had read it, and was even part of it.
I am under no NDA to anyone, so I can just state that I'm pretty sure the company is Pax Bellum, formally Ruccus Entertainment. I'd link to the article at ModDB with more information, but we were threatened legal action and had to take it down.
According to the evidence in that, however, these guys are real conviceted con artist, and could be quite dangerous. I recommend talking to the police, and try to get legal advice about the NDA.
I could have misread the entire thing and the original post could be about another scam altogther, but I don't think so.
I am under no NDA to anyone, so I can just state that I'm pretty sure the company is Pax Bellum, formally Ruccus Entertainment. I'd link to the article at ModDB with more information, but we were threatened legal action and had to take it down.
According to the evidence in that, however, these guys are real conviceted con artist, and could be quite dangerous. I recommend talking to the police, and try to get legal advice about the NDA.
I could have misread the entire thing and the original post could be about another scam altogther, but I don't think so.
Author
Thank you so much for those enlightening replies.
The first party of the NDA is the company. No name is mentioned in the contract at all, except for the signature of the Developer (me) and the Company representative. I do not have a version where both myself and the company has signed though. I actually emailed them a scanned version of my signed contract...
"This Agreement shall govern the conditions of disclosure and ownership between Developer and Company of certain confidential information relating to discussions related to a prospective or current business relationship between the parties and confidential information relating to both parties' professional and consumer entertainment technologies, art content, programs, business plans, equipment, systems, designs, formats, specification other intellectual properties and the like that is either oral or written or both, and may include, without limitation, any of the following: schematics; algorithm descriptions; engineering data; art content; components; component libraries; assets; materials; rendering techniques; know-how; marketing plans; trade secrets; research; development; and invention."
"Either party may terminate this Agreement upon ten(10) days notice to other party; provided, however, that the confidentiality and non-use obligations under the terms of this Agreement shall remain in effect for five (5) years from the date of disclosure"
My only concern is whether these guys have managed to somehow make it difficult to find out that their company is registered in the mentioned states. Would all states mentioned in the contract need to be valid in order for the NDA to be valid? Or would it be enough that it's only registered in one of the states mentioned in the contract? As the United States was mentioned, that leaves it open for quite a few States, which would cost a lot of money to do the proper search to find out if the company exist or not.
Fortunately money never exchanged hands. We were about to sign a new set of contracts including Employee I&S Agreement, Work For Hire Agreement and a new NDA when we discovered the truth of the project. Thankfully we never signed any of those, where money was supposed to change hands.
As for the fraudster, I really doubt that he gave us his real name. Who this company is, I really don't want to get into here. To prevent closure of this topic, I'd really prefer not to mention any names, but I can only speak for myself.
The first party of the NDA is the company. No name is mentioned in the contract at all, except for the signature of the Developer (me) and the Company representative. I do not have a version where both myself and the company has signed though. I actually emailed them a scanned version of my signed contract...
"This Agreement shall govern the conditions of disclosure and ownership between Developer and Company of certain confidential information relating to discussions related to a prospective or current business relationship between the parties and confidential information relating to both parties' professional and consumer entertainment technologies, art content, programs, business plans, equipment, systems, designs, formats, specification other intellectual properties and the like that is either oral or written or both, and may include, without limitation, any of the following: schematics; algorithm descriptions; engineering data; art content; components; component libraries; assets; materials; rendering techniques; know-how; marketing plans; trade secrets; research; development; and invention."
"Either party may terminate this Agreement upon ten(10) days notice to other party; provided, however, that the confidentiality and non-use obligations under the terms of this Agreement shall remain in effect for five (5) years from the date of disclosure"
My only concern is whether these guys have managed to somehow make it difficult to find out that their company is registered in the mentioned states. Would all states mentioned in the contract need to be valid in order for the NDA to be valid? Or would it be enough that it's only registered in one of the states mentioned in the contract? As the United States was mentioned, that leaves it open for quite a few States, which would cost a lot of money to do the proper search to find out if the company exist or not.
Fortunately money never exchanged hands. We were about to sign a new set of contracts including Employee I&S Agreement, Work For Hire Agreement and a new NDA when we discovered the truth of the project. Thankfully we never signed any of those, where money was supposed to change hands.
As for the fraudster, I really doubt that he gave us his real name. Who this company is, I really don't want to get into here. To prevent closure of this topic, I'd really prefer not to mention any names, but I can only speak for myself.
In california, business licenses are granted locally (i.e., the license to conduct business in that area) and I'm not suprised that it has been difficult to find. The company could be a real company but not conducting business in those areas, explaining the lack of business license, though that would be suspicious of course.
However, all corporations incorporated in california must register and pay fees to the Secretary of State office in Sacramento. I suggest you start looking at the SoS web site business lookup, http://kepler.ss.ca.gov/list.html though if you have already hired a lawyer it may not be productive.
You could see if you can find out if he is violating any Norwegian laws, and try and work through the norwegian legal system (though I don't know anything about it, perhaps it's awful), then perhaps you could get civil action against him in norway. Plus, if any of it is determined to be criminal actions, the norwegian authorities would know how to contact the FBI and arrange things.
It would be really sticky and expensive to pursue him though the US civil court system internationally.
However, all corporations incorporated in california must register and pay fees to the Secretary of State office in Sacramento. I suggest you start looking at the SoS web site business lookup, http://kepler.ss.ca.gov/list.html though if you have already hired a lawyer it may not be productive.
You could see if you can find out if he is violating any Norwegian laws, and try and work through the norwegian legal system (though I don't know anything about it, perhaps it's awful), then perhaps you could get civil action against him in norway. Plus, if any of it is determined to be criminal actions, the norwegian authorities would know how to contact the FBI and arrange things.
It would be really sticky and expensive to pursue him though the US civil court system internationally.
Author
Yes, I've already searched on that list you provided, and didn't find anything about the company. That site also provides a number that we called, and they couldn't find the company either. We did a similar search in Delaware, no results appeared.
The important thing for us is to know whether we have a case against him if he uses our content in any game he would release (the NDA would have to be void), or if he could sue us for using our content that we produced while under the NDA.
Since this guy is a fraudster, and since a name on one of our contracts has previously been charged for fraud, I can only assume that if there are any loop holes or ways to cloak the legal existence of this company, then they know about them. This makes it only more difficult to find out if we do have any legal rights to our content.
The NDA also states that the agreement shall be construed and enforced in accordance with the laws of the USA without regard to conflicts of laws provisions.
As for the police, I will have a talk with them, and encourage others on my team to do the same in their respective countries. Hopefully they can give us some idea of how much this would cost and if it would be worth going after this guy at all.
The important thing for us is to know whether we have a case against him if he uses our content in any game he would release (the NDA would have to be void), or if he could sue us for using our content that we produced while under the NDA.
Since this guy is a fraudster, and since a name on one of our contracts has previously been charged for fraud, I can only assume that if there are any loop holes or ways to cloak the legal existence of this company, then they know about them. This makes it only more difficult to find out if we do have any legal rights to our content.
The NDA also states that the agreement shall be construed and enforced in accordance with the laws of the USA without regard to conflicts of laws provisions.
As for the police, I will have a talk with them, and encourage others on my team to do the same in their respective countries. Hopefully they can give us some idea of how much this would cost and if it would be worth going after this guy at all.
Quote:Original post by Trefall
My only concern is whether these guys have managed to somehow make it difficult to find out that their company is registered in the mentioned states. Would all states mentioned in the contract need to be valid in order for the NDA to be valid? Or would it be enough that it's only registered in one of the states mentioned in the contract? As the United States was mentioned, that leaves it open for quite a few States, which would cost a lot of money to do the proper search to find out if the company exist or not.
If the company does business in several states, the laws of the state in which it has its headquarters take effect. A company can be incorporated in only one state at a time (though it may do business unrestricted in any state, by obtaining a business license from each state in which it wishes to conduct transactions). There is typically a term in the contract specifying which state's laws take precedence. If there is no such term here, it is likely the company doesn't exist at all.
If the agreement is between you and the company, as noted above, then he most certainly bring suit against you for breach of contract. You cannot enter into an agreement with an entity that does not exist, so any preexisting agreements with such entities would be deemed null and void.
Additionally, if he actually is a fraudster, it's even more unlikely that he'll be willing to actually go all the way to court, where he can easily be arrested. (In many states, entering into an agreement based on a lie -- in this case, the existence of a fictitious company -- is sufficient evidence for fraud.)
As for who owns the models, that is more of a tricky question. You may want to come to some kind of agreement with your fellow artists about who drew what and who gets the copyrights for what.
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