{"id":10095,"date":"2015-03-17T12:27:13","date_gmt":"2015-03-17T19:27:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=10095"},"modified":"2015-03-17T12:27:13","modified_gmt":"2015-03-17T19:27:13","slug":"fbi-wizard-of-oz-in-3d-movie-sounded-too-good-to-be-true-unfortunately-it-was-for-730-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=10095","title":{"rendered":"FBI: Wizard of Oz in 3D Movie Sounded Too Good to Be True; Unfortunately, It was for 730 Victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"FBI<\/a>FBI BLOG<\/strong>: \u00a0 The owners of Gigapix Studios<\/strong>\u00a0in Hollywood told investors they had a sure thing: They were going to make an animated version of the Wizard of Oz called OZ3D, and those who got in on the ground floor\u2014and the company\u2019s imminent public offering\u2014could make a killing.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the film was a bigger fairy tale than investors bargained for, and approximately 730 people lost millions of dollars. For some, the investment represented their life savings.<\/p>\n

\u201cPotential investors were told, \u2018You\u2019re going to make so much money that your kids and grandkids won\u2019t want for anything,\u2019\u201d said Special Agent Eric Potocek,<\/strong> who investigated the case out of our Los Angeles Division. \u201cIn the end, the movie was never made, and it is unlikely investors will ever get anything back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Between the film and the impending public offering, the two principal fraudsters behind Los Angeles-based Gigapix raised some $21 million over a seven-year period beginning in 2006. Of the $8 million raised for the movie, only 5 percent of that amount went toward actually producing a film. The rest was used to pay big salaries, commissions, overhead for a fancy office, and other expenses.<\/p>\n

Christopher Blauvelt, 59, and David Pritchard, 67, were convicted in 2014 on a series of federal charges including mail fraud, wire fraud, and offering unregistered securities for sale. Last month, Blauvelt was sentenced to eight years in prison, and Pritchard received a five-year term.<\/p>\n

Some of the victims were \u201csavvy investors,\u201d Potocek noted, and perhaps could afford to lose what they risked. But many victims\u2014referred by friends or other investors and who lived far away from Hollywood\u2014were susceptible to the sales pitch and the lure of being part of the film business.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMany of the victims were not wealthy people,\u201d Potocek said. \u201cThey were teachers and secretaries and folks who worked 30 or 40 years to save for retirement.\u201d He added that Gigapix \u201ctook money from older people and from others who clearly could not afford to lose it. People lost their homes and had their dreams of retiring evaporate.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Blauvelt founded Gigapix in 2002 and brought Pritchard on as a partner four years later. The two hired telemarketers to solicit potential investors, who were told that Gigapix was a blockbuster animation company waiting to happen\u2014similar to Pixar Animation Studios\u2014and that Gigapix was developing projects expected to generate huge profits when the company went public.<\/span><\/p>\n

The telemarketers\u2014known as \u201cfronters\u201d\u2014used marketing lists to cold call potential investors and worked from scripts touting the supposed merits of Gigapix. When victims expressed an interest in investing, they were turned over to \u201cclosers\u201d who collected their money. Two of the company\u2019s closers were also convicted in the fraud.<\/span><\/p>\n

While soliciting money for Gigapix and OZ3D<\/em>, the defendants told lies and half-truths, suggesting that the company was financially successful and investors would receive high returns on their investments in less than 18 months. They claimed that investments carried little or no risk.<\/span><\/p>\n

There have been other recent cases in Los Angeles involving movie fraud, where telemarketers lure victims into investing in films that never get made.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese criminals were selling entertainment,\u201d Potocek said, \u201cbut it could just as easily have been stocks or precious metals. When someone promises a high rate of return in a very short time, and with little or no risk, any investor should beware. Those are very large red flags.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

FBI BLOG: \u00a0 The owners of Gigapix Studios\u00a0in Hollywood told investors they had a sure thing: They were going to make an animated version of the Wizard of Oz called OZ3D, and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10101,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[648],"tags":[1246],"class_list":["post-10095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other-voices","tag-wizard-of-oz"],"yoast_head":"\nWizard of Oz in 3D Movie Too Good to Be True<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Wizard of Oz in 3D Movie by Gigapix proved to be a financial scam\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=10095\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Wizard of Oz in 3D Movie Too Good to Be True\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Wizard of Oz in 3D Movie by Gigapix proved to be a financial scam\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=10095\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"American Justice Notebook\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AmericanJusticeNotebook\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-03-17T19:27:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Wizard-of-Oz.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"360\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Raul\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Raul\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/cjnotebook.com\\\/?p=10095#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/cjnotebook.com\\\/?p=10095\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Raul\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/cjnotebook.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/f5521baddca77b521f012298775186c0\"},\"headline\":\"FBI: Wizard of Oz in 3D Movie Sounded Too Good to Be True; 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