The Securities and Exchange Commission shut down ZeekRewards about 20 months later, calling it a Ponzi scheme on the verge of collapse. Burks' former chief operating officer, Dawn Olivares, and her tech-savvy stepson have made plea deals with prosecutors and are expected to testify against him.
Olivares became friends and worked with Burks on multilevel marketing companies since in the s. He was a former county music disc jockey and performed as a magician in nursing homes in the s and '90s. After Burks' company was shut down, federal investigators found a massive country music memorabilia collection that has since been auctioned off to refund investors.
Defense attorneys counter that Burks didn't misrepresent the ZeekRewards program and didn't mastermind a Ponzi or pyramid scheme. The parent company behind Burks' operations sold actual products -- bids for the penny auction site or stakes in ZeekRewards, defense attorneys wrote in summing up expected trial arguments.
A federal jury convicted Burks in July of wire and mail fraud conspiracy, wire and mail fraud, and tax fraud conspiracy following a three-week trial. Burks and his conspirators induced more than , victims — including over 1, victims in the Charlotte area — to invest in their fraudulent scheme, by falsely representing that Zeekler was generating massive retail profits from its penny auctions, and that the public could share in such profits through investment in ZeekRewards. Burks and his conspirators did not keep books and records needed to calculate such daily figures.
In addition to promising massive returns on investments, Burks and his conspirators used a number of ways to promote Zeek to current and potential investors. For example, the conspirators hosted weekly conference calls and leadership calls, where participants could call in listen to Burks and others make false representations intended to encourage victim-investors to continue to invest money and to recruit others to invest in Zeek. During these events, Burks and his conspirators made false representations about the massive retail profits generated by Zeek.
They also used electronic and print media, including websites, emails and journals, to make false and misleading statements about the success of Zeekler to recruit victim investors. Following a three-week trial, the jury convicted Burks, 69, of Lexington, N. This massive scam is one of the largest in breadth and scope ever prosecuted by this office.
Attorney Rose. According to filed court documents, court proceedings, evidence introduced at trial and witness testimony:. Burks and his conspirators induced more than , victims — including over 1, victims in the Charlotte area — to invest in their fraudulent scheme, by falsely representing that Zeekler was generating massive retail profits from its penny auctions, and that the public could share in such profits through investment in ZeekRewards.
Burks and his conspirators did not keep books and records needed to calculate such daily figures. In addition to promising massive returns on investments, Burks and his conspirators used a number of ways to promote Zeek to current and potential investors.
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