By Frank Parlato
This is part three of FBI Informant, the story of James D. Clark, the man to whom the FBI gave a pass his crimes, so he could entrap Leo Grillo.
See part 1 James D. Clark FBI Informant: Pt 1: The Trade
See part 2 FBI Informant PT 2: The Clark Family Buz
The Swindled
They are not abstractions.
Claudine Falcone of Millstone Township, New Jersey sent James Clark $284,833. It is gone.
Isabel Lehman of Charleston, South Carolina sent $263,214. It is gone.
Barbara Marshall of Whitestown, Indiana — $226,492. Gone.
Anthony James Fox of Simi Valley, California — $213,409. Gone.
Macdonald Madden of Camano Island, Washington — $192,700. Gone.
Cindy Noblitt, also of Simi Valley — $187,000. Gone.
Ruth Ann Wall of Huntington, Indiana — $175,848. Gone.
Robert Lincoln of La Quinta, California — $144,753. Gone.
Pepito Azcarraga of Amarillo, Texas — $131,815. Gone.
Karen Celleri of West Orange, New Jersey — $124,399. Gone.
Steven Domansky of Loganville, Georgia — $121,700. Gone.
Maria Wright of Thousand Oaks, California — $110,119. Gone.
John Olson of Oxford, Florida — $105,409. Gone.
Carletta Vickers of Glenpool, Oklahoma — $101,544. Gone.
These people and many others like them heard an ad on conservative talk radio. Sebastian Gorka — the former Trump White House official turned Salem Radio Network host — told his audience of conservative retirees and veterans that gold was safe, that banks could fail, and that Midas Gold Group was the answer. Clark paid Salem Media for that endorsement. What Gorka’s listeners got was James Clark.
They called the number. A salesman working on commission told them to convert their retirement accounts to self-directed IRAs and buy physical gold through Midas Gold Group.
They did. They sent their retirement savings — in many cases, the savings of a lifetime — to James D. Clark. Clark was supposed to buy the gold, ship it to a certified depository, and hold it in their name.
He didn’t.
Waiting for Gold That Won’t Arrive
Some of them had been waiting since 2020. Four years. They thought they owned gold. They owned nothing. They had a claim against a bankrupt company with $181,773 left to distribute among $6 million in losses. Less than three cents on the dollar.
Barb Bolin filed her claim from South Korea. She is an American living abroad who trusted a pitch she heard and sent her retirement savings to Phoenix, Arizona, only to get nothing.
The US Trustee for the District of Arizona concluded these investors “may have lost most, if not all, their retirement savings.” Aggregate claims: $6,333,973.74.
Some of their money paid for Clark’s $2.8 million annual radio advertising budget. Some paid the $120,000 annual salaries of Clark and his two partners — Gabor Panczel and Kenneth Russo — each drawing the same amount from a company that owed its customers millions.
When the bankruptcy was filed, and the court stripped Clark of control, he proposed a reorganization plan. He promised to repay creditors $3.8 million over five years. His personal contribution — split three ways with his partners — was $50,000. From men who had collectively drawn $360,000 in compensation the prior year alone.
The court rejected the plan and converted the case to Chapter 7 liquidation. The trustee took over. The liquidation value for creditors: $181,773.
The retirees lost everything. Clark lost a failed business. Those are not the same thing. The liability sat with Midas Gold Group LLC — not with James Clark personally. The bankruptcy discharged the company’s debts. Clark walked away.
One thing stood between Clark and his next venture. The FBI fraud investigation.
Leo Grillo was Clark’s ticket to a fresh start.
Next: The refinery in Jalisco — and the question nobody has asked about $294 million in gold deliveries.
ARTVOICE ART
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