Topic: Re: [ActiveMining] Lawsuit Discussion (Read 7991 times)

MSD hearing is next week. Might finally get a statement from Ken after that.

Unless they are stalling on purpose.

Legal process is slow a can be.

I emailed Wood Law with all my case details. They seem unresponsive. They do not pick up their phone or answer repeated emails. Has anyone had luck working with Wood Law on refunds?

Refunds aren't happening, I suggest you contact Wood Law or your own personal Lawyer.

I sent refund form on June 30th, as requested on VMC website. I am yet to hear back or get refund.

It looks like court is the only thing that will solve this some what.

Is anyone else closely watching kens wallet address?
https://blockchain.info/address/1DJpsvnM7xTnQbWEhLYyCyfxQyxwupEzCa
Is this addresses the only one known?

Update made to the front page:

Customer	Status	Order Reference
Magzy	2nd Refund check arrived - awaiting clearance at bank
metalchain	Still waiting	WNJRGEIAX
cryptoconomist	Still waiting
meccaflare0	Waiting since Jan 2014	SXWTSYTQH
greek_hephaestus	Unknown
lenart_o	Waiting since Mar 2014	VOAEWDKKJ
coindesk.com	Still waiting; two checks sent with misspellings; one unsigned
danielbrogren	Waiting since Feb 2014	JWXKFWTOW
btcricon	Still waiting
qukkM	Waiting since Jan 2014
jasonring	Waiting since Jan 2014
HardwareReviewer	Refunded
slavix	Waiting since March 2014	IHHOAKLGE

For the record I requested my refund Jan 2014 and the order reference is SXWTSYTQH

I sent them an email before and it took ~2 days for them to get back to me.

@slavix:  At least one guy, HardwareReviewer, did.  I don't think anyone else has reported getting one.  Sorry.

I tried calling Wood Law Info:888-237-0999, but no one picked up the phone.

Has anyone received refund using the form from
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.7474652

?

_____________________________________________________________________________

If you pre ordered and never received a product, fill out the following form and you may receive a refund:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.7474652

_____________________________________________________________________________

If you pre ordered and never received a product, filled out the above paper, and still haven't received anything or simply want to seek legal action against Ken/ActiveMining:

Wood Law Info:

http://www.woodlaw.com/cases/virtual-mining-corporation-and-active-mining-corporation
888-237-0999
1100 Main Street, Suite 1800, Kansas City, Missouri 64105
1736 E. Sunshine Street, Suite 209, Springfield, Missouri 65804

_____________________________________________________________________________

If you are an shareholder/investor and feel that you were conned/mislead by Ken Slaughter & ActiveMining:

MSD Info:

Shawn Hagerty
Investigator
Missouri Secretary of State, Securities Division
600 W. Main St., Box 1276
Jefferson City, MO  65102
573-526-3901
573-526-3124 (fax)
[email protected]

Scott Johnson
Investigator
Missouri Secretary of State, Securities Division
600 W. Main St., Box 1276
Jefferson City, MO  65102
573-751-4704
[email protected]

Missouri Securities Contact Information Page


_____________________________________________________________________________

If you do not want to give the government your information for whatever reason, sell your shares on Crypto-Trade:

https://crypto-trade.com/
(The price is extremely low)


_____________________________________________________________________________

VMC owes me $9,239.60. I am trying to get the promised refund since March! Can someone help me please.

2013-11-29   $9,239.60

Order Reference IHHOAKLGE -- placed on 2013-11-29



2014-03-27 15:48:43   Refund
2013-12-03 10:43:54   Payment accepted
2013-11-29 14:09:55   Awaiting bank wire payment
2013-11-29 14:09:54   Pre-Ordered

This.

Even if there is nothing recouped, it is worth it simply to bring Ken to justice. I have come to believe that we cannot just accept the mantra of, 'Oh, it is the Wild West of Bitcoin!'

There is a difference between a high-risk investment and someone deliberately deceiving investors and customers.

Shareholder Complaints change based on Ken's last update:

Shareholder complaints (last updated on May 29, 2014)

Action Needed	Status	Ken's last communication
Highlighting key products on website to drive sales	Incomplete	'We are working on something else more important.'
Additional hashpower to be added to Datacenter	Incomplete	'We are having some problems keeping our AC running, this is why we have not increased the hashrate. The project manager has now got the AC people working to correct the problem.'
Release of latest financial data	Incomplete	'Which do you want Sales or Report, working on getting us a CPA and getting the taxes done.  Can't keep Customer Service Reps due to all the threats and bad language.'
Plan for ActM's own chip	Incomplete	Ken has stated that 'We are working on getting our own chip,' but when asked for a timetable, Ken's response is 'Can't say at this point, lot of thing are happening.'
CT migration	Incomplete	'I will finish the shares transfers as soon as I can. I expect this to be in the next few days.'
Release dividends	Incomplete	'Dividends will not be paid until after this migration [May 21, 2014]'

'Order Reference' column added to Refunds table:

Refunds (last updated on May 29, 2014)

Customer	Status	Order Reference
Magzy	2nd Refund check arrived - awaiting clearance at bank
metalchain	Still waiting	WNJRGEIAX
cryptoconomist	Still waiting
meccaflare0	Still waiting
greek_hephaestus	Unknown
lenart_o	Waiting since Mar 2014	VOAEWDKKJ
coindesk.com	Still waiting; two checks sent with misspellings; one unsigned
danielbrogren	Waiting since Feb 2014	JWXKFWTOW
btcricon	Still waiting
qukkM	Waiting since Jan 2014
jasonring	Waiting since Jan 2014

Posted from Bitcointa.lk - #T6oX4fgmcgOLhJ4D

Here is my info :

Order Reference WNJRGEIAX -- placed on 2013-11-25

2013-11-25 00:33:19   Pre-Ordered
2013-11-25 00:33:19   Awaiting bank wire payment
2013-12-02 16:37:30   Payment accepted
2014-01-27 08:24:47   Refund

and now?  Nothing happened... Still waiting

Added 'CT migration'

Update to refunds list

Latest update; row added for 'Release accumulated dividends.'

As with most Bitcoin (in)securities, invest with caution.

always a mystery with ken.

lets hope he's at least getting a second, bigger data center online. that would be the least he could be doing that would qualify as "more important" than sales (considering he would need to fill DC with unsold boards)

but who knows?

more insane waiting for us, i suppose...

Still waiting to find out what is more important to a business than selling in-stock products that are devaluing by the day.

Maybe helping out kids at the local Cancer ward, but apart from that....?

bump

Update to front-page:

Quoting for posterity.

Don't worry guys, Ken is 100% working on the core business^tm

Ken doesn't even bother refunding hardware reviewers:  
( http://www.coindesk.com/46k-spent-mining-hardware-happened-next/ )
 

It's not a plan Ken it's actually happening. Your shareholders are taking you to court because of your ineptitude. In soliciting for monies and being negligent with the use of that money you have let your shareholders down and a judge will accept that.

Give me a reason as to why giving you more time is a better bet than this class action? It clearly isn't, you have drained away thousands of bitcoin in 10 months with very little to show for it. A few more months and it will all be gone. So I'll roll my dice with Wood Law.

You raise a good point.

My knowledge of law is limited, but it would seem like a class action could recoup some coin for victims. It also seems like lawyer fees, etc. could eat up most of what is gained.


That being said, I don't think class members would have to pay any fees, would they? So, in a worst-case scenario they would receive nothing (compared to a solo action suit they might have to pay more than they originally bought into ActM). Correct me if I'm wrong, as I'm just going off of what I've researched.

If that is the case, I feel like the primary motivation here would be the ethical argument, which is that Ken should be brought to justice.

@minerpart Sounds like a good plan, let see how it works out.

It's simply too late for your appeal. Ken has had so many chances to open the books and get the logistics sorted. HE IS INCAPABLE OF MAKING A SUCCESS OF THIS COMPANY. He just can't do it. So the only chance of getting any money back is this class action.

We desperately need to sell miners and increase the data centre - HE CAN'T DO IT. Fact. Two more months of this and we are dead. Court action and freezing company funds is the only chance for shareholders - leave it to Ken and we have total loss.

^Some people just don't like being scammed, and are willing to punish the scammer.  Those people are good for the community Bitcoin (the alternative being the scammer going unpunished, which breeds moar scam).

Consider not supporting scams/idiotic businesses, no matter how cheap the shares are.

these are the same as penny stocks. most fail, some don't, but they all cost only pennies a share, so one is able to invest small amounts to see what happens. at IPO there were mixed reports on Ken, but some trusted members had said they had worked with him in the past and saw a determined capable programmer and engineer, if somewhat unconventional and difficult to communicate with. My experience holding a small stake in actm has proven that these statements are mostly fair. However Ken's timing and management is terrible enough to tank this company, and he is often too stubborn to realize he his headed down a dead end. He is also one of the very worst communicators I have ever encountered, he over-promises and under-delivers consistently, and continually shifts blame for all failures to some vaguely identified "project managers" and "PR teams" which seem to be outright fabricated persons. As far as I can tell actm entire staff is ken and 2 teenagers (possibly family members) Regarding his fiscal trustworthiness... the jury is still out on that one... but the odds are not in his favor.

I threw some pennies at actm in the beginning and now it looks like those pennies were wasted, but...pennies. Unless you have solid insider information, you have very little to go on in terms of viability of any given offering. Due diligence will only get you so far when there is so little known about the principals involved, and only greedy fools throw large amounts at untried entities hoping they will win the lotto, they have no right to bitch, its their own damn fault they are losing their shirts. I really believe most of these supposed lawsuits that get discussed in this sub are empty threats made by butthurt gamblers hoping to light a fire under the operators' arses. Do any of them believe they will get even one satoshi after they get lawyers involved? If they have that large a stake in any of these "securities" then they are obviously not smart enough to know how things work.

All the same, I would love to see actm pull itself together and make my pennies shine...I'm saving up for a piece of dubble bubble ;-)

it's 2014 blind dart championship)

И на старуху бывает проруха
To their defence, Bitcoin securities being ~95% fail/scam, investing in one is pretty much guaranteed if you "invest" in bitcoin securities.

Why are there so many Full/Sr members who chose to invest in Activemining is what I'm intrigued about.

+1 agreed
this company could use a little improvement in public perception right now if you want the share price to rise at all.
I know Ken is MOSTLY 99.9999% responsible for this and doing a lousy job... but threads calling for lawsuits don't help either. you should probably delete. Its not like he is Kenilworth, who outright took money and disappeared... ActM is simply a poorly run show, sorry to say. Let it do what it does and hope for a little "uptick" It's better than zero.

I would agree. Since shareholders can now exit, it would not make sense to take legal action, from a financial standpoint.

As soon as my shares are listed, I'm out. I simply don't see this venture succeeding. He has made improvements, but the communication issues alone are too much. Customer service is a mess, and who knows where the financials are?

What is a bowel movement?

I'm a very large shareholder, and I would be strongly against any legal action at this moment.

We are finally seeing some movement by Ken, and I think it is best to give him time to keep the momentum going.

We now have our shares, mining is happening, there is improvement.

We still need to know more, and for more to happen, but now is the time to allow that to happen.

If it doesnt, then we can revisit thoughts of legal action.

Taking action now would be shooting ourselves in the foot, and a sure way of killing any hope of return of wealth.

It's this unreasonable censorship that has made me take a step back and ask what exactly is going on here. They are not conspirators just ignorant, morally superior die hards with a diminished sense of reality. They are also arrogant fascists unwilling to let others have their fair say.

This is so over, it never really had a chance with Ken solely  in charge. These brown shirts will have faith in their leader  till the end though.

Yep miner, I was just censored for pointing out he had a free site already created for him and shot it down in favor of his with mtgox addon and to lose our money excuse.  I wonder if the hardcore actm thread people who manage that account can be considered part of actm or liable alongside Ken for the lies told to shareholders and misuse of company funds.  Probably not unfortunately

I posted this in the "official" thread https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.6267625

One of many points was to say that I was holding off on taking legal action.  When Ken was to release his financial reports I knew it wasn't going to happen.  Part of the problem is how his business is defined and the functions it performs.  In speaking with my lawyer, he even told me to be surprised if we ever see those reports.  He being a manufacturer and distributor of bitcoin machines, a miner, a security operator and how he incorporated two companies rather than just one make tax and financial implications not only complicated but massive.  The least of Kens worries will be his shareholders when the government decides to slam the book on his 75 year old head, and that is probably his mentality now even if the SEC, FinCEN or IRS have not begun to investigate.

Simply put, Ken jumped into an ocean 30 miles from land without a raft, life jacket or the ability to swim.  He really didn't think about the long term catastrophe he was setting in motion.  If he isn't looking at the world in a uniform and behind bars in 1-2 years time I would be incredibly surprised.

I am out of town this week, but I have emailed with my council, if I get any more important information regarding what we have here I will gladly pass them along.  Regardless of the short term prospect of a return, I don't see anything happening soon.  A return, any kind of return, would be nice, poetic justice would be the cell.

What is one thing Danny Brewster and Kenneth Slaughter do not have in common?  It is only one thing...

Danny knew to run and hide... Ken is slower mentally and physically, his exit will take much longer.

Good info lobbes. I guess they are talking about losses of a few k per claimant - so 30 x 2k is around 60k total losses. We will have a lot more than that he took what a million dollars? And obviously everyone is in the same boat so everyone has incurred a loss.

So the claim is a good one, i'll be contacting them via their form submission tomorrow. If they want to call me back international rates ill let them pay the call fee.

Great question, but I am certainly no lawyer. My main purpose of this thread is to get the ball rolling.   

This source says 'Although it sometimes helps if several people are named as plaintiffs in the suit, a single person is generally enough to file a lawsuit so long as the attorney for the class has a good faith belief that a number of other people were injured in a similar way. It generally takes at least 30-50 people with similar claims, and sometimes many more, to qualify as a class action.'

I would love it if someone who is a little more versed in the law could weigh-in.

Either way, if you are in, it wouldn't hurt to contact Wood Law Firm: http://www.woodlaw.com/cases/virtual-mining-corporation-and-active-mining-corporation

@bitlind - let us know any info you can once you speak with your lawyer.
 

I have my own lawyer but am going to be speaking with them regarding this class action suit and due course.  If it makes more sense from here, and joining together to bring some sort of balance to this inept individual, I will be all for it.

Comedy abound, the reality is probably this:

Ken is just so bumblingly inept, compounded by his Asperger's and social anxiety, he failed and failed time and time again in his dreams of hitting it big as an entrepreneur.  Bitcoin just gave him an avenue to affect even more people with his stupidity, he crowd funded it.  That should be a new trademark for him

Crowd Funding my ineptitude since 2013!

How many shareholders do we need for the class action lobbes? Count me in I know Ken won't be getting back on any of these points - if he even got a chance to read them before they were deleted by his really smart Mod team.

Agreed 100% and I can speak only for myself, I do not attack others in that thread.  The rallying cry "Ken needs to act now" has been beating for the better part of a year now.  He clearly doesn't give a shit about anyone of us, he even says he is 100% honest with us.  He bold face lies to everyone then comes on here to say he is honest with us, that right there is a slap in the face.  The man is an old, washed up, has been, who displays this image of being an engineer... people ate that up, I know I did early on.  Only until I talked to him several times over the course of 3-4 months did I start to feel odd, but so many behind him and an Advisory Board, I thought he couldn't screw it up with all the help he was thought to be receiving.  Then shares stop trading, board disappears, each supporter turns a 180 but is replaced by a new supporter.  FUD turns into certainty and we are left here.  The guy cant code, he can't even manage his own Exchange server, he can't even communicate verbally let alone communicate in a proper sentence structure on this site.  He can't remember lies told two weeks ago and has to lie more to cover it up currently.  The guy is a sad excuse for what is bitcoin and what has become of those inside of bitcoin who work with him.  He will just be a lesson learned for many years down the line, and I will look back at this and laugh at the legacy he leaves behind.  If my last name was Slaughter I would be looking to change it.  If I was married to this man, I would be signing with my maiden name.  If I were Micah, I would delete every single front facing social media account immediately and hide from the shame his father has put on his name.

Like I have said in the past, it is with great surprise that someone hasn't shown up on his doorstep and taken matters into their own hands.  

I guess you should see some sense then. You are not getting moderated by "Zum".

Sorry about off topic Lobbes, continue on.

If it wasn't him who banned me and is doing all the deleting I could see the sense in that, as it is I think he just wants us to back Ken till the bitter end.

Personal drama aside, the damage to this company lies squarely on Ken's shoulders.

We can fight all we want about the censorship issue, or trolling, or FUD, but that is just a red herring. Always has been. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if Crumbs was actually Ken at this point.

Zum has a point that we shouldn't be wasting our time attacking each other, however I would say we need to be rallying against the true cause of this (Mr. Slaughter)

If we weren't living in a vacuum of information, Trolls wouldn't have too much to troll about.

EDIT:


+1

My point, exactly

Ken has him beat, but I side with you miner... no reason to be giving you, one of the biggest supporters of all time the boot simply because you question things now.  The hypocrisy of those who control Actm Thread is the staggering part... someone should delete his worthless post here since it doesn't add anything to the lawsuit discussion.

Way to troll lobbes' thread Actm, hypocrite

lobbes - agree 100% with everything you say there. Ken has lost my confidence, I don't trust him anymore and his actions or lack of actions are not that of what you would expect of a CEO in his position.

If we leave him to it over the next few months I'm sure we will log in one day to see he has said 'sorry its over we ran out of funds'. Well that's no surprise when the website is a joke, customer services are literally disgusting and our reputation has been shattered by the delays and amateurish behaviour of all parts of ACtM.

If we go down the Woods Law class-action route we could at least get 10% of our money back. That will be a lot better than 0% which is what we are facing right now as Ken continues to slowly run this company into the ground.

Simon aka zumzero you have removed my Mod abilities and banned me from the thread because I called you a dickhead and a cock in pm.

That is NOT a justifiable reason to ban me from the thread and remove my Mod rights. 

Yesterday you were calling notlambchop all sorts of obscenities on the thread over multiple posts and got into a debate with him. THAT is the sort of behaviour that SHOULD get someone a warning - yet it was carried out by YOU.

None of the mods have agreed to banning someone and deleting all their posts for sending some pms. You have taken it upon yourself to ban someone because the power has simply gone to your head.

The damage you are doing to this company right now is staggering.

Minepart was put on probation in that thread. (Read Banned until further notice)

All of his posts will be removed regardless of what is written in them.
Any posts quoting those posts will be removed regardless of what is written in them.

This is a very simple system, one that we have used since the thread opened.


Some posts are well written and are completely against Ken and Activemining which we have no issue with but include an attack or "troll" on another user for a small portion of the post and the entire post has to then be deleted.
If you would like to post something please do so without quoting banned users, attacking other users, or trolling in general and your post will not be deleted.

The censor queens are out in full affect.  I have probably posted seven times in that thread, all but two have been deleted, and not one was trolling, all pertained to the many issues at hand.


The Advisory Board, minerpart, and many others like him... notice how they all eventually abandoned ship (enough is enough) or were forcefully removed from the discussion (censored, banned)?  That would and should speak volumes.  Everyone backs Ken up until they don't or can't anymore, by either choice or force.  Its kind of sad to see all the supporters and faithful members be pushed around, cut out, and treated like they are nothing.

Old Man River will certainly rue the day