TAUNTING MISCREANTS SINCE 2012! AN INDEPENDENT, AD-FREE NEWS SITE--SHINING A LIGHT ON THE DARK UNDERBELLY OF FRAUD, CONS AND SCAMS FROM NORTHERN MICHIGAN TO LAS VEGAS, NEWPORT BEACH HAS ENDED ITS RUN. PUBLISHED CONTENT WILL REMAIN ONLINE, BUT MISS FORTUNE HAS SIGNED OFF! Due to lack of technical support by Google, I'm unable to respond to your comments.
Robert
Buckhannon, who appears to be the “brains” behind SuperBio LLC, a South
Carolina limited liability company formed on May 18, 2017 by his
brother, Ronald, and Sebastian Runza, will be warming himself this Christmas holiday in front of a blazing yule after sidling up to the wassail bowl.
Buckhannon's sentencing, scheduled for December 18, 2017 at 10:00 a.m. in United States District Court in Las Vegas, Nevada, has been delayed a third time.
According to a “Stipulation to Continue Sentencing” filed this afternoon, the Acting Assistant United States Attorney and Assistant United States Attorney, along with Buckhannon's defense team, request the scheduled December 18 sentencing “be vacated and continued for a date and time no sooner than 30 days”.
Buckhannon is not in custody and, according to the court filing, “does not object to the continuation of the sentencing”.
Robert L. Buckhannon has launched a fertilizer business (and is seeking investors/distributors) with at least two men, including his brother, Ronald Buckhannon.
Buckhannon's activity began in early 2017, and while Ronald Buckhannon’s name is on official South Carolina records, Robert Buckhannon’s fingerprints are all over this scheme.
Robert Buckhannon appears to be the “brains” behind SuperBio LLC, the South Carolina limited liability company formed on May 18, 2017 by his brother, Ronald, and Sebastian Runza.
But it appears that neither Ronald Buckhannon nor Sebastian Runza appear to have sufficient legitimate capital necessary to back and launch this business.
In August 2008, the two men were involved (along with a third man, former Florida resident William E. Marvin) in an offshore business deal: the purported sale of a Costa Rican condo to a Wisconsin man that ended with an unpaid $323,668 judgment against Sebastian Runza—a dispute that's still making its way through the South Carolina court system.
In an “Affidavit In Support Of Entry Of Default” filed on September 21, 2009, Wisconsin resident Keith Schmidt detailed his experience with Grupo Real Siambon, S.A., a company SuperBio's Sebastian Runza formed in South Carolina as Grupo Real Siambon, Inc. on February 2, 2007, before later registering it in Costa Rica.
Schmidt’s case was filed on July 27, 2009 in United States District Court in Wisconsin’s Eastern District against Runza and William E. Marvin.
While Runza’s current SuperBio “partner” Ronald Buckhannon, was not named as a party in the Wisconsin civil action, he did sign (as a personal “guarantor”) a formal $260,000 repayment agreement executed on November 24, 2008 with Schmidt, Runza and Marvin.
On September 25, 2009, in U. S. District Court for Wisconsin’s Eastern District, Keith Schmidt was awarded a $323,668.70 against Runza and Marvin. (It is unclear why Ronald Buckhannon, although listed as a partner and a guarantor of the $260,000 debt, was not named as a party in the civil action.)
Later that year, on December 11, 2009, Schmidt filed a formal “Notice of Filing of Foreign Judgment” in the Court of Common Pleas for Charleston County, South Carolina.
Although the Notice was personally served on Runza, he failed to respond within the time required.
On February 5, 2010, Schmidt filed an entry of default against Runza, and the judgment became enforceable according to South Carolina law.
In addition, the judgment became a lien on any real property titled in Runza’s name in in Charleston County that day.
According to documents filed in the matter in Charleston County’s Court of Common Pleas on July 21, 2017, Fidelity National Title Insurance Company paid Schmidt $100,000 to resolve a claim that his judgment was a first lien on an Isle of Palms, South Carolina property owned by Runza.
Runza sold the Dunescape Villa property on June 25, 2010 in a $555,000 short sale, and had claimed all liens against the property had been discharged, except for one that favored him.
Prior to September 25, 2009, Runza was the owner of the Isle of Palms condo, and had three mortgages against the property: a first mortgage to Pinnacle Financial Corporation securing a $997,500 loan; a second mortgage to Regions Bank securing a line of credit up to $275,760.00 and a third mortgage to Joyce Eagle in the amount of $200,000.00.
On July 21, 2017, Fidelity National Title Insurance Company filed a complaint against Sebastian Runza in Charleston County’s Court of Common Pleas on seeking recovery of the $100,000 it paid to Schmidt, plus pre-judgment interest.
Mediation proceedings in the matter are set to begin in Charleston County on February 16, 2018.
Ronald Buckhannon is not named as a property owner in Charleston County, although he is listed as the owner of a Florida mobile home at 163 W. Avenue A in Key Largo.
During April 2015, with the assistance of one or both of the principals of “Mitten Educational Management, LLC” (a Michigan Limited Liability Corporation formed on April 10, 2015 by Michael Randel and Brian Lynch), Steven Ingersoll took the remaining $20,971.81 from his Smart Schools Management, Inc. 401(k).
That money was rolled by Randel or Lynch into a newly-established American Funds 401(k) account under this name: “MITTEN EDUCATIONAL MANAGEMENT 401K FBO STEVEN INGERSOLL”.
Why did Mitten Educational Management initiate and execute that 2015 401(k) fund transfer on Steven Ingersoll’s behalf —before Mitten had even been awarded a management contract for Ingersoll’s Bay City Academy charter school—when Ingersoll had already successfully managed two prior transactions himself?
In my opinion, the amount taken by Steven Ingersoll as a distribution from his Smart Schools account was not the only cash that ultimately ended up in new Mitten Educational Management account set up “for the benefit of Steven Ingersoll”.
It is likely that Ingersoll’s distribution was enhanced by an undisclosed amount covertly provided to Ingersoll by Randel, Lynch or both, money paid to Ingersoll as a quid pro quo for the duo’s newly-formed firm being awarded a six-figure annual contract as the new Educational Service Provider for the Bay City Academy—a charter school Steven Ingersoll founded in 2011.
How can I safely reveal my considered opinion that money may have changed hands when the new management company “inherited” a hefty contract from Ingersoll?
Simple: because it happened one year before at another charter school Ingersoll managed, with Brian Lynch’s father-in-law, Mark Noss, the one making those clandestine payoffs.
In early March 2014, Steven Ingersoll set into motion a plan that, if it had succeeded, would have allowed him to continue exerting control over the Grand Traverse Academy, build a long-desired expansion at the school and pay off a massive business debt he owed Traverse City State Bank (TCSB) before he was indicted by federal prosecutors on tax evasion and fraud charges.
On July 27, 2012, five months after Steven Ingersoll renegotiated his $989,825 Traverse City State Bank line of credit debt, he hired Bloomfield Hills-based criminal defense attorney J. Terrance Dillon.
Dillon would later be replaced by Detroit-based Martin Crandall and Jan Geht, who'd both represent Ingersoll during his 2015 tax evasion and conspiracy trial.
By early March 2014, Ingersoll had rejected a plea deal, choosing instead to go to trial.
Having renegotiated the repayment terms of his TCSB line of credit debt with Daniel J. Stahl, the bank’s Senior Vice President of Commercial Lending, in late February 2012, Ingersoll then engineered a remarkably swift off-loading in early March 2014 of that obligation from his Smart Schools Management, Inc. to Mark Noss, then president of the Grand Traverse Academy’s board of directors.
A contemporaneous string of emails from March 2014 among Steven Ingersoll, Mark Noss and Dan Stahl revealed a deal was struck on March 16, 2014 for Noss to assume the obligation to repay Ingersoll's outstanding debt, days before the GTA board formally voted to sever ties with Ingersoll and award a management contract to Noss.
Mark Noss was formally awarded a management contract during an early morning meeting of the Grand Traverse Academy board on March 19, 2014.
With three days to go before Mark Noss even ascended to the seat of management at the Grand Traverse Academy, Ingersoll had already negotiated the restructuring of a new deal, with Noss assuming the obligation to pay the $925,000 balance of a $1,000,000 line of credit loan originally made by TCSB to Steven Ingersoll's Smart Schools Management, Inc.
Noss began making $12,500 monthly payments directly a Smart Schools Management, Inc. account at TCSB controlled by Steven Ingersoll shortly after he assumed control of the GTA, with the first payment (April 17, 2014 for $17,741.94) including a $5,241.94 March 2014 payment—prorating that five-figure monthly cloak-and-dagger amount to the exact penny.
Noss began making those payments to Steven Ingersoll shortly after his newly-formed Full Spectrum Management, LLC was awarded a no-bid contract to manage the Grand Traverse Academy. (That contract set Full Spectrum Management’s minimum annual compensation at $650,000 and capped it at $2,000,000. Noss was paid over $850,000 during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2015.)
Forced in March 2016 by a whistleblower’s disclosure to finally acknowledge the payoffs, Noss claimed that he had continued to speak with Ingersoll “for guidance with respect to regulation, compliance, and reporting, as well as the requirements of the State of MI, LSSU, and our bond issue” even though he was barred by a federal restraining order from contacting Ingersoll during the early months of 2015.
On July 27, 2012, five months after Steven Ingersoll renegotiated his $989,825 Traverse City State Bank line of credit debt, he hired Bloomfield Hills-based criminal defense attorney J. Terrance Dillon.
Dillon would later be replaced by Detroit-based Martin Crandall and Jan Geht, who'd both represent Ingersoll during his 2015 tax evasion and conspiracy trial.
By early March 2014, Ingersoll had rejected a plea deal, choosing instead to go to trial.
With three days to go before Mark Noss ascended to the seat of management, Ingersoll had already negotiated the restructuring of a new deal, with Noss assuming the obligation to pay the $925,000 balance of a $1,000,000 line of credit loan originally made by TCSB to Steven Ingersoll's Smart Schools Management, Inc.
That's what we know.
Here's what we don't know: exactly how much money was transferred by Mitten Educational Management into that American Funds Service Company, Inc. account established solely for “the benefit of ” Steven Ingersoll?
Did the amount exceed the $20,971.81 401(k) distribution Steven Ingersoll stated on his 2016 federal financial disclosure form?
Why did Mitten initiate and execute the 2015 401(k) fund transfer on Steven Ingersoll’s behalf when he'd successfully managed two prior transactions himself?
Where did the money go after the account was closed on April 30, 2015?
Did a trusted insider serves as the registered financial advisor who executed the transaction on Mitten Educational Management's behalf?
Who closed the account, how was the money distributed and where did that money go?
And, finally, did the suspicious timing of this transaction—the Ingersoll/Mitten 401(k) financial activity occurred between its formation on April 10, 2015 and April 30, 2015 although a formal transfer of Smart Schools Management’s 401(k) plan to Mitten Education Management did not occur until January 1, 2016—have any connection to Mitten Educational Management receiving a contract to manage the Bay City Academy, a transaction formally announced by the charter school's board on April 29, 2015?
Epilogue: On December 14, 2016, one day before he was sentenced to 41 months in federal prison by United States District Judge Thomas L. Ludington, Steven Ingersoll (who successfully convinced this federal judge his broke-ass was too strapped to pay the cost of “a fine, the costs of incarceration and the costs of supervision”), miraculously scrounged enough cheddar to pay the $13,623.54 his Webster House Bed & Breakfast owed in delinquent Bay County property taxes.
Where did that money come from, and why didn't Ingersoll use it to pay his federal fine?
