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Tuesday, May 28, 2013

OH, THAT’S SOOO THONG: A JUGGER-NAUGHT IN SEATTLE

Wearing a bikini while playing a friendly game of football with your friends is exciting and challenging. But tackle your best friend wearing a thong, and watch everyone go wild!

Or maybe not. 

One man's story of his experience with bikinis, football and David Lee Hunter.














[NOTE: At his request, the real name of the man we’re calling “Steve” and other identifying details, including his hometown, are being kept confidential.]







When David Hunter offered to transfer his ownership of a new World Bikini League Football team, the Montana Rush, to "Steve", he concealed one significant detail. 

He didn’t own the team.

But that didn’t stop Hunter from reaping thousands of dollars from Steve, including a Seattle waterfront hotel stay and airline tickets to Hawaii.

Steve spoke exclusively to Miss Fortune and agreed to share his experience with the Charlevoix native, who’s on the run from a Traverse City fraud charge.

BACKGROUND: The World Bikini Football League

The World Bikini Football League was established on November 24, 2008 in Snohomish, Washington. Founded by a Snohomish native, the TWBFL featured women playing football in bikinis. From November 2008 through August 2009, the founders offered and sold investments in the form of membership units in TWBFL to approximately fifteen investors, raising approximately $228,500. At the time of their investment, all investors were Washington residents.

Those initial investors had the opportunity to purchase either a “league” ownership, which required an investment of $25,000, or a “team” ownership, which required an investment of $10,000. Although the TWBFL’s business model was based mainly on revenue generated by online subscriptions to view the games (filmed, then rebroadcast on the company’s website), additional potential revenue sources, per the founders, included “spinoff opportunities” such as endorsements, clothing, and novelty items.

On Friday March 13, 2009, the league held games and a photo shoot at the Starfire Sports & Entertainment Complex in Tukwila, Washington. A large video production company was brought in to capture every play and document everything from hair and makeup to gridiron action.

The teams include; Seattle Emeralds, Portland Tsunami, Cheyenne Tetons, Calgary Glaciers, Montana Rush, Vancouver Yellow Jackets, Spokane Dragonfly, Denver Snowbirds, Boise Wildfire and the Las Vegas Temptation.

THE SCAM

Steve’s friend, who’d been Hunter’s neighbor in Kapaa, Hawaii, introduced him to Hunter. Steve told Miss Fortune that he’d spoken with Hunter a few times by phone before finally meeting him in Tukwila the night of the TWBFL video shoot in March 2009.

Steve tells Miss Fortune that David Lee Hunter “offered to transfer his ownership of one of his ‘teams’ in exchange for me taking care of some of his operating expenses. The paperwork I signed seemed legitimate and I even reviewed the TWBFL's partner contract.”

 


Left: David Lee Hunter, slippery in Seattle
Steve maintained that as part of their ownership transfer agreement, Hunter had him “buy team uniforms, for which I paid Victoria's Secret directly and had them shipped to an address in Seattle, Washington.” Hunter and Steve attended the first "shoot" of TWBFL in Tukwila, WA -- a half a dozen or more games were played and videotaped, an overnight shoot that stretched from Friday night into the early hours of the Saturday morning.

Although Steve had planned to head back home after the shoot, Hunter invited him to “hang out at his pad in Seattle and spend a night on the town with himself, his former wife, and her friend.”

On the drive from Tukwila to Seattle, Steve stated that Hunter claimed that “he'd left the keys to the [Seattle] condo in Hawaii and was having trouble getting a hold of the superintendent of the building.”

Steve told Miss Fortune that he parked his car near Seattle’s Pike Place Fish Market and the group spent Saturday afternoon touring the waterfront on foot. Steve explained that at dusk Hunter said “he'd still not heard from the super and suggested getting a room at the Waterfront Marriott.” 


Steve said that Hunter claimed that although “the room wouldn’t cost anything because he had all kinds of ‘frequent flyer’ credits that he'd use to pay the hotel bill, he convinced me to ‘hold’ the room on my debit card. We partied in Seattle and had a good time on Saturday night.”

After lunch on Sunday, Steve said that Hunter told him “he'd incurred some additional expenses and asked if I would sign an amendment to our agreement to compensate him for these ‘out-of-pocket’ expenses.”


“As with the apparel [uniforms] from Victoria Secret, Hunter conned me into paying for three one-way plane tickets for himself, his former wife, and her friend to return to Hawaii. It raised a red flag, but I was betting on a nice payout from my team ownership so I went ahead with the ticket purchase. The tickets were for the following Monday. When I left Seattle that Sunday evening, I failed to close the hotel bill because I trusted that Hunter would pay with his ‘frequent flyer’ credits. Hunter gave me the impression that he'd reached the Seattle condo’s superintendent so they'd be staying at the condo after one night at the Marriott Waterfront.”

Steve admits it “was my mistake for not closing out my credit card bill when I left Seattle. I trusted him [Hunter] to take care of the hotel bill with his ‘credits’. I found out a couple weeks later when the bill came that he'd stayed in the room an additional three nights and charged the entire stay to my credit card. He claimed it was a clerical error on the Marriott’s part, and that he'd reimburse me for the $888.68 ASAP. He never did.”

Steve admits that he was disarmed by Hunter’s flattery and promises of easy profits and dismissed the signs he now sees clearly in the rear-view mirror of experience.

After returning to Hawaii, Hunter strung Steve along for several months, even visiting his hometown to “assure me that everything was on-track with the TWBFL payments.”

Finally, Steve realized that Hunter had “scammed” him, and he started “a long chain for angry emails to him and got a lot of ‘I'm sorry’ email replies from him but was never reimbursed.”

Steve finally contacted a TWBFL founder at the Snohomish headquarters, who told him that he was aware Hunter had scammed others with a similar ploy.

In an email, the founder told Steve, "Sorry to hear about your dealings with Dave.  You are not the first to have surfaced on this issue.  It seems Dave was selling interests in our league without our knowledge and without any actual ownership or authorization for a while.  Let us know if we can help out."

In October 2009 as a last resort, Steve hired an attorney who sent David Hunter a demand letter and rescission of their "agreement". Although Hunter signed for the certified letter, he never responded to the demand for repayment.

Steve says David Hunter still owes him thousands of dollars.

In addition, the friend who’d introduced Steve to Hunter also paid him money for the Bikini League “investment”. Although his loss was not as significant as his own, Steve estimates that he and his friend collectively lost about $5,000 to David Hunter.

HEY, CAN I USE YOUR NAME AS A REFERENCE?


By October 2009, Steve had decided to chalk up his loss as a learning experience and moved on until he heard from a Vancouver, Washington man in March 2013.

David Lee Hunter, the man who Steve claims cheated him out of thousands of dollars, sold him a bikini-clad version of the Brooklyn Bridge, and conned him into paying for three tickets to paradise, was now using him as a business reference with a new "potential partner".

You read that right.

In order to establish credibility with the Vancouver man, Hunter claimed that Steve was an active business partner who’d invested with him. In addition, Hunter claimed that Steve’s friend came from established “family money”, and implied he invested money from his “trust” fund.

The Vancouver man wisely opted not to invest with David Lee Hunter.

CODA: THE END OF THE WORLD BIKINI LEAGUE

On October 13, 2011, in an ironic twist to the story, the State of Washington's Securities Division entered into a Consent Order with the founders of The World Bikini Football League, LLC. 

The Securities Division had previously alleged that the founders had offered and sold investments, in the form of membership units in TWBSL, to approximately fifteen Washington investors, raising approximately $228,500. The state further alleged that the founders offered unregistered securities, acted as unregistered broker-dealers or securities salespersons, and violated the anti-fraud provisions of the Securities Act of Washington. Both men neither admitted nor denied the allegations, but agreed to cease and desist from violating the Securities Act and agreed to pay a fine of $1,500 and investigative costs of $1,500. 

The $25,000 in penalties is a fraction of what the real investors lost when they invested in the sports league to feature women playing various sports in provocative bikinis.

The League's co-founders projected that their league would generate at least $3 million a month by December 2009, according to the Washington Department of Financial Institutions Securities Division.

The league's plan was to make money by placing online videos of the women and charging subscribers a fee to watch them. In 2009, the league reported 16 games with 88 flag-footballers in bikinis. But according to the Washington Department of Financial Institutions, the league was never registered to sell securities in the state of Washington.

The co-founders raised $225,000 from investors by selling ownership units in the league and teams for as much as $30,000 per stake, the state said. Additionally, the league did not disclose to investors that one of its founders filed for bankruptcy protection in 2001 and 2005.



It looks like David Lee Hunter may have had the last laugh...but looks aren't the only things that can deceive, right Dave?

 

9 comments:

  1. Wow.. Another crazy Tale! But the funny part is he always uses the same line with losing credit cards or keys. Pretty Pathetic!!

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  2. So has this ass hat stopped begging Miss Fortune to cease and desist... errrm, I mean stopped threatening her with fabricated lawsuits? Haven't heard from the little invertebrate lately...

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    Replies
    1. Not a peep in over a week....not that I missed hearing from our Sir Ass of Hat!

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    2. Well, to be frank, I myself am a little disappointed. Just when I was getting attached to Davey boy, I now will have to resort to picking on other soulless pirates on the lam. Maybe Miss Fortune can ferret out another chew toy for us in blogville.

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    3. Just think of the fun you'll have reading Miss Fortune's daily posts from the trial after Davey boy is caught and shipped back to Traverse City for his trial. Hey, I bet it will be a short trial.

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  3. what's next? It'd be great to get the GQU blog on Reddit or Imgur :)

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    Replies
    1. What, and have the whole world find Miss Fortune?

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    2. why not? you're already #1 "David Lee Hunter" on Google Web and Image search results.

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  4. why not? your blog is already the top result for "David Lee Hunter" on Google Web and Image Search.

    ReplyDelete