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One law-enforcement official involved in the probe said "a significant number of people" likely lost millions of dollars in the aggregate. The site recently claimed it had 300,000 members from around the world, some putting in $6,000 at a time. The Web site of 12dailyPro still was operating as of yesterday.
Based in Charlotte, N.C., 12dailyPro is run by a woman named Charis Johnson, who managed the site through a North Carolina-registered company she also operated called LifeClicks LLC.
In a statement issued yesterday through her attorney, Ms. Johnson blamed a commercial dispute with StormPay for the unavailability of funds owed to 12dailyPro members. Ms. Johnson said StormPay demanded it be the exclusive provider of payment services for 12dailyPro, then soon after froze the accounts and funds after "falsely accusing us of misrepresenting our business model."
She said 12dailyPro had never missed a payment to members until the problems with StormPay arose. LifeClick's lawyers are "evaluating our legal options," she said, adding that the company is "cooperating fully with all investigations."
StormPay officials said they cut off payments after being alerted to possible fraud at 12dailyPro. In a recent interview, StormPay Chief Executive Steve Girsky said, "We have done nothing wrong." Asked if he believed 12dailyPro was a legitimate operation, he said his company initially had no reason to question it, but "upon further investigation we had a hard time making these returns work."
Today the FBI officially announced its investigation.
A story which we will watch with interest. To follow this story, please click here
