SALT LAKE CITY — A Draper man who told investors he was a faithful member of the LDS Church has admitted to securities fraud in a plea deal with federal prosecutors.
A federal grand jury last December indicted Andrew D. Kelley, 41, on seven counts of securities fraud and four counts each of wire fraud and money laundering in connection with a $3 million investment scheme through his company, Blackbird Capital Partners.
In exchange for Kelley pleading guilty to one count of securities fraud, the U.S. Attorney's Office dropped the 14 other charges against him. Kelley faces up to 20 years in prison and a $5 million fine. Prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence on the low end of the federal sentencing guideline range. He is scheduled to be sentenced in September.
Kelley admitted that in an effort to get investments and lull investors into a false sense of security, he falsely represented high returns in Blackbird's day-trading business when in fact he lost millions of dollars and diverted money for personal gain, according to court documents.
Kelley told investors that he developed an algorithmic software program for Blackbird to invest its own funds to profit the company and investors. Kelley claimed he spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours developing the program that made up to 300 percent returns, court documents say.
Kelley also told investors he was a family man and a faithful member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, according to court documents.
Believing Mormons seem to be one of the most gullible groups around. Is that because Mormonism makes people gullible, or is Mormonism predominantly made up of gullible people?
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
SALT LAKE CITY — A Draper man who told investors he was a faithful member of the LDS Church has admitted to securities fraud in a plea deal with federal prosecutors. ...
Kelley also told investors he was a family man and a faithful member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, according to court documents.
...
Believing Mormons seem to be one of the most gullible groups around. Is that because Mormonism makes people gullible, or is Mormonism predominantly made up of gullible people?
Nope. Mormons are always conscious that they will need to answer to a higher power. They therefore always act morally. Atheists, however, pretend to be Mormons precisely because they know this will make people trust them.
Of course, the only way that you can tell whether someone who looks like a Mormon is a secret atheist is when they do something bad like this. Then it becomes clear that they are not True Mormons. (And not True Scotsmen either, for that matter ...)
Zadok: I did not have a faith crisis. I discovered that the Church was having a truth crisis. Maksutov: That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Religious gullibility plus prosperity gospel leads to ponzi victim potential.
"Religion is about providing human community in the guise of solving problems that don’t exist or failing to solve problems that do and seeking to reconcile these contradictions and conceal the failures in bogus explanations otherwise known as theology." - Kishkumen
Apologists might say that Mormons fall for this more often than others because since they are so good and honest, at times they can be naïve.
I think the real issue is different. Wisdom comes through a healthy degree of skepticism, questioning, reason, and logic. Faith is the exact opposite of skepticism and questioning.
When you are taught that the most important decisions in life should be made by interpreting your feelings and desires as promptings of the Holy Ghost, and you are taught that these "revelations" trump reason and logic--the tools of the devil--you are setting yourself up to make some bad decisions.
And Mormons falling victim to scams like this is way more common than you would think. In cold dollars and cents, what is probably worse than losing your entire life savings to a scam like this is losing 10% of your lifetime income.
It’s relatively easy to agree that only Homo sapiens can speak about things that don’t really exist, and believe six impossible things before breakfast. You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven.