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Saturday, April 30, 2016

FULL DIAPER...FILLED WITH MONEY! The Complete Story Of Mark Noss, His Payments To Steven Ingersoll ($627,624.14 And Counting!), And The Distinct Possibility Of A New Federal Tax Evasion Investigation.

Government filing details a significant pattern of wire transfers to and from previously undisclosed bank accounts.

“In assessing the credibility of Habermehl as a witness and Noss as an affiant in this matter, the court must consider the relationships they have with Ingersoll and how their financial and personal relationships with Ingersoll have influenced the representations that Habermehl and Noss have made to the court. 

The evidence discussed above casts doubt on the credibility of Ingersoll, Noss and Habermehl.”
April 29, 2016
Government Memorandum
United States v. Steven J. Ingersoll

INTRODUCTION

I'm left to wonder how much sooner this colossal scam would have exposed if local and state media had only been more interested in this story, instead of discounting the stunning information I've consistently revealed on this blog.

It's been nearly two years since I received a call from a Novi Police officer on June 29, 2014 informing me that a threatening letter addressed to me was hand-delivered to a townhouse I'd once owned. 

I'd already been threatened with a defamation suit by a thin-skinned former Grand Traverse Academy board member, and would soon discover a Ripoff Report complaint under my name (well, with an incorrect spelling of my first name), "Antia" Senkowski.

And the worst? 

The vile tactic shown above, a Google blog created to mimic my site, but without my style and wit: "Glisteningquiveringidiot".

The prick who created this thought it was funny to link to my mother's obituary, and to provide my home address. 

Guess that dickhead didn't realize he was committing a crime!

Once I discovered the blog, I alerted Google and it quickly disappeared.

Kind of makes you wonder, huh?  

How much money was lost during that time, and will it ever be recovered? And could it have been prevented?

BACKGROUND

On March 29, 2016, the government filed a supplemental memorandum revealing newly-received evidence indicating that Steven Ingersoll had been receiving monthly payments of $12,500 from Full Spectrum Management (FSM), the management company that now operates the Grand Traverse Academy. FSM is owned by Ingersoll crony Mark Noss.

However, in its April 29 filing, the government has now substantiated that between April 8, 2014 and March 1, 2016, Steven Ingersoll received a total of $627,624.14 from Full Spectrum Management.

All of that money went into accounts owned by Steven Ingersoll and his solely-owned entities. 

Some of the transactions summarized by the government resulted in deposits being made into a Traverse City State Bank account ending in 0789, an account in the name of Smart Schools Management (SSM), an entity solely owned by Steven Ingersoll.

Many of the other transactions summarized by the government (at left) involve deposits made into a Chemical Bank account ending in 2058 in the name of Smart Schools Management of Bay City (SSB), an LLC owned by Steven Ingersoll and into a personal Chemical Bank account ending in 5867 owned by Steven Ingersoll and Deborah Ingersoll. 

The April 29, 2016 filing reveals even the government was unaware of Ingersoll’s Chemical Bank account ending in 2058 until revelations made in a March 15, 2016 email by a former FSM employee were investigated. (The government is still unable to determine whether Ingersoll disclosed the 2058 account in his required presentence financial disclosure.)

SUSPICIOUS TRANSACTION: ANOTHER GRAND TRAVERSE ACADEMY BANK ACCOUNT DISCOVERED

One especially shocking transaction among those listed in the government summary is a June 1, 2015 wire transfer of $54,358.41 from an account ending in 0151 for the Grand Traverse Academy at PNC Bank to Steven Ingersoll and Deborah Ingersoll’s personal bank account ending in 5867. 

That wire transfer was made by Steven Ingersoll more than two months after his March 10, 2015 conviction in this case.

Again, the government was unaware of the PNC account in the name of the Grand Traverse Academy until this wire transfer was uncovered, less than a month ago.

FINANCIAL FOOT-DRAGGING 101

According to the government, Steven Ingersoll initially refused to provide current income and cash flow information to the court and the court’s probation officer during the preparation of his presentence report. 

Consequently, Ingersoll was directed “to provide complete and accurate financial information to his probation officer, including but not limited to all assets, liabilities, income, and expenses resulting from transactions between Defendant and his agents, employees, partners, co-venturers, attorneys, family, friends and properties, entities and businesses that he owns or controls.” 

The court also directed Ingersoll “to provide copies of the complete and accurate financial information to the government and to this Court.” 

On October 15, 2015 the government received its copy of the financial report provided by Steven Ingersoll to the court’s probation officer in response to the court’s order. 

Ingersoll reported his income for January-December of 2014 included the following:
As you can see from the chart above taken directly from the government’s April 29, 2016 federal court filing, Ingersoll reported that his 2014 income from SSM and SSB combined was only $39,820. 

However, between April 8 and December 16, 2014, a time span of roughly nine months, Mark Noss/Full Spectrum Management made deposits totaling $363,681.73 into Ingersoll’s SSB and SSM accounts. 

Yeah, let that sink in.

$363,681.73!

In his March 16, 2016 email response to a former employee's allegations, Mark Noss initially told the Grand Traverse Academy’s board that the transfers made from his Full Spectrum Management to Ingersoll were for the use of Ingersoll’s “intellectual property and consulting services”. 

Noss admitted making the payments, while clinging to the ridiculous fiction that he had “no formal business relationship with Dr. Steven Ingersoll”. 

In 2014, Ingersoll received $363,681.73 into his SSM and SSB accounts for the use of his intellectual property, yet Ingersoll only reported to the court Schedule C income of $39,820 from SSM and SSB for the whole year. 

Fancy that!

Although Ingersoll listed W-2 wages in his presentence financial report to the court for 2014 and 2015, he apparently did not identify Form 1099 income from FSM or other users of his intellectual property and his consulting services. 

Rather, Ingersoll listed his intellectual property as an “other asset” attributable to SSI and, in a very inaccurate and misleading fashion, described it as “3 yr net, License fee of 150k minus taxes@35% Plus L/R.” (sic). 

On the same page of Ingersoll’s financial report, he falsely characterized SSM and SSB as “inactive with remaining debt.”

More recently, Ingersoll has falsely claimed that the actual payments that Ingersoll received from Mark Noss were disclosed on the Income Statement as Schedule C income from SSB and SSI.

Ignoring the fact that none of the deposits listed on the government summary actually went to an account for SSI, the total Schedule C income that Ingersoll reported from SSI and SSB combined was only $256,070, which is $107,611.73 less than Ingersoll’s known income from FSM alone, for 2014. 

As the table below reveals, the Schedule C income from SSI and SSB reported by Ingersoll for 2015 totaled only $94,405.29, well below the $238,942.41 actually deposited into Ingersoll’s accounts by FSM in that year.



The transactions listed on the government summary, covering all of 2015, total $238,942.41. 

That total is $40,176.31 more than the total Schedule C income reported to the court by Ingersoll for 2015. 

In addition, the 2015 transactions on the government summary include Ingersoll’s receipt of a $54,358.41 wire transfer of funds from the Grand Traverse Academy into Ingersoll’s personal account on June 1, 2015, plus Ingersoll’s receipt of ten transfers totaling $80,500 into his personal account from FSM over the course of the year. 

Yet, Ingersoll did not reveal to the court that he had personally received any income from Mark Noss/Full Spectrum Management or the Grand Traverse Academy in 2015!

In the two-year time span between April of 2014 and March of 2016, Steven Ingersoll received a total of $627,624.14 through deposits from Noss’s Full Spectrum Management and the Grand Traverse Academy into his accounts. 

That figure is more than twice the annual $150,000 licensing fee referenced on Ingersoll’s financial report balance sheet as “3 yr net, License fee of 150k minus taxes@35% Plus L/R.”   

COOKING THE BOOKS...EVEN IF YOU'RE NOT AL CAPONE!

This whole thing got started in mid-March when the government received evidence revealing that Mark Noss had been paying Ingersoll $12,500 per month since his FSM took over the role of educational services provider for the Grand Traverse Academy in April of 2014. 

The former FSM accountant initially disclosed this information to Brad Habermehl and other members of the GTA board on March 15, 2016 via an email. 

Mark Noss responded to the accountant’s email on March 16, 2016, acknowledging that he had “for years and continue[s] to pay a proprietary fee for IVL’s Intellectual Properties that has allowed me to use it in my solely owned clinics, as well as more recently apply it in the GTA setting.” 

In his response to the accountant’s email, Noss acknowledged that since April of 2014 his FSM has made monthly payments of $12,500 to Ingersoll. 

However, as demonstrated by the transactions listed the government's summary (left), Noss’s FSM has provided much larger sums to Ingersoll’s accounts. 

In addition, Noss’s FSM did not make any payments for the Ingersoll’s IVL to SSI.

Instead, Noss/FSM made most of the payments to accounts for Smart Schools Bay City and one of Ingersoll’s personal accounts. 

Noss also made a payment to Ingersoll’s Old Y, LLC. (The Bay City Academy's Old Y campus, located at 111 N. Madison Avenue, abruptly closed in late 2014 without explanation.)

In its April 29, 2016 filing, the government questioned why there would be any legitimate reason for the Grand Traverse Academy's management company (FSM), would make payments to any of Ingersoll’s entities other than SSI, particularly Ingersoll’s Smart Schools Bay City, the Old Y, LLC, and Ingersoll’s personal account. 

Funny, I have the same question! 

WHO ELSE COULD BE PAYING INGERSOLL...AND HOW MUCH? BAY CITY ACADEMY UNDER SCRUTINY?

Where else could Ingersoll be getting regular (and potentially undisclosed) income?

Ingersoll has testified that SSI was ultimately the repository for his income from his intellectual property. 

Ingersoll has also testified at length that he markets his Integrated Visual Learning intellectual property and provides consulting services to a wide assortment of entities, in addition to FSM.

According to the government, Ingersoll’s own testimony gives reason to suspect that Noss/FSM was not the only source of his income via SSI in 2015. 

While it's apparent that Ingersoll underreported his income for 2014 and 2015 by not disclosing his income from Noss/FSM and GTA, the full extent of Ingersoll’s under-reporting of his income still is unknown. 

And since incarceration will not stop third parties such as FSM from using and paying for the use of Ingersoll’s intellectual property, it is easily foreseeable that other users of Ingersoll’s intellectual property are making deposits into other undisclosed accounts controlled by Ingersoll and will continue to do so after Ingersoll is sentenced. 

The newly-discovered evidence of unreported income flowing from Noss/FSM and GTA to Ingersoll’s solely owned entities and personal bank account lead to multiple conclusions that are relevant to Ingersoll’s sentencing, especially as the court is about to make findings based on the evidentiary hearings conducted, and yet to be concluded, regarding Steven Ingersoll. 

The new evidence reveals that Ingersoll has not been candid with the court, the court’s probation officer, nor the government regarding his income stream. 

Simply put, Ingersoll has been hiding his assets from the court and the government. Ingersoll has undisclosed accounts and uses those accounts to receive undisclosed income. 

According to the government, the transactions listed in its summary are far too frequent and far too large to be innocently overlooked by Ingersoll in making his financial report to the court.

The government asserts it is nothing short of astounding that Ingersoll has retained the ability to make a wire transfer of more than $54,000 from a previously unknown Grand Traverse Academy account to his personal account more than a year after his connection to GTA supposedly was terminated and months after he was convicted at trial. 


"I AND STEVE ARE TWO OF THE FIVE": WHO ARE HIS OTHER PARTNERS?

The information long withheld by Ingersoll, but disclosed very recently by third parties and the government, reveal much about the relationships between Steven Ingersoll, Mark Noss and Brad Habermehl. 





Brad Habermehl became president of the Grand Traverse Academy board when Mark Noss resigned March 19, 2014 to form Full Spectrum Management and become the educational services provider for the Grand Traverse Academy. 

Habermehl, who testified during the sentencing hearing on behalf of Ingersoll, received both the email from the accountant to the Grand Traverse Academy board and Noss’s response. 

In assessing the credibility of Habermehl as a witness and Noss as an affiant in this matter, the government is requesting the court consider the relationships they have with Ingersoll and how their financial and personal relationships with Ingersoll have influenced the representations Habermehl and Noss have made to the court. 

The evidence revealed to date by the government in its April 29, 2016 filing casts doubt on the credibility of Ingersoll, Noss and Habermehl.  

INGERSOLL'S NEWLY-REVEALED OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE: AN ADDITIONAL TWO-POINT SENTENCING ENHANCEMENT

The government asserts, in its motion to add another two-point sentencing enhancement to Ingersoll's eventual federal prison term, that the newly discovered evidence is particularly useful to the court in assessing the credibility of Steven Ingersoll. 

Ingersoll deliberately concealed the fact that he has been receiving and continues to receive substantial payments from Noss/FSM. 

Moreover, since Ingersoll has been deceitful regarding his recent finances, there is no reason to accept his testimony regarding his convoluted finances during 2009, 2010 and 2011. 

Rather, Ingersoll’s always self-serving and often false testimony should be considered with great skepticism by the court. 

Indeed, the government asks the court to construe Ingersoll’s false testimony and inaccurate financial information adversely to when computing Ingersoll’s offense score under the federal sentencing guidelines. 

Finally, the government asks the court to instruct Ingersoll to provide a new financial report to the writer of Ingersoll’s presentence report and the government by a date certain in the near future. 

In addition, the court should direct that Ingersoll submit the financial report to the court subject to the penalties for perjury.

Ingersoll should be required to provide a list of all financial accounts of any kind for which Ingersoll or his wife have or have had signatory authority since 2008, regardless of the name(s) on the account or the nature of the account. 

This should not be a difficult undertaking since Ingersoll has provided his financial information to his attorney and the forensic accountant he employed in connection with this case both for trial and sentencing purpose. 

In addition, the court should require Ingersoll to provide, likewise subject to the penalties of perjury, a coherent list of all other assets, foreign and domestic, in which he and/or his wife have a direct or derivative interest. 

The government asserts it cannot conceive of any other way for the court to obtain complete and accurate financial information from Ingersoll.