No One Gets Hurt
JJ Jorgenson is a lawyer. Tonio is a felon. Together they talk about crimes, scams, schemes, comedy and more!
No One Gets Hurt
You Don't Know $#!+@
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Welcome back! On this weeks episode we welcome Evan Cassidy to the podcast and cover topics including religious investment scams and a maple syrup heist?!?! Thank you for stopping by and don't forget to follow the podcast for more content like this and to support the channel!
All right, listen up and no one gets hurt.
SPEAKER_01This is a podcast that focuses on crimes and scams where no one physically is harmed. This is a podcast for information and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this podcast should be taken as legal advice.
SPEAKER_07So listen up and no one gets hurt.
SPEAKER_01You already said that.
SPEAKER_07All right. Well, don't forget to like and subscribe, and in the comments, tell us which scam you'd like us to cover next.
SPEAKER_01Thank you.
SPEAKER_07Are we rolling?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. James, are we rolling? Yeah, we're rolling. Okay.
SPEAKER_07We're rolling.
SPEAKER_01Oh.
SPEAKER_07I think we're rolling.
SPEAKER_01Yes. So today we have a very special guest, Evan Cass, the Cass Man.
SPEAKER_02The motherfucking man himself. Cast the wide net. Cast me if you can. Cast me outside.
SPEAKER_01I can't even keep track of all the shows that you produce. You want to give us a shout out of all the shows that you produce and your uh Instagram handle?
SPEAKER_02Stand up. Uh yeah, I uh well uh actually on this street, we're halfway between uh the Harp In comedy night. Right down the street. I've done it a couple times. Great room. Every Monday in Costa Mesa, beautiful Costa Mesa, and then also Lacave once a month. Last Thursday of every month, and then um a few other spots. We do the op we do an open mic competition in Fountain Valley, my hometown of Fountain Valley. I have a lot of FE, you know. I rep the FE for Fountain Valley.
SPEAKER_00F yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um if that's okay to throw that out. Yeah, it's okay. Safe. It's a safe space. It's a safe space. So that that one is uh it's an open mic competition. We give away cash. I I'm trying to be, you know, do you know Trax NYC?
SPEAKER_00No.
SPEAKER_02No. He's this jeweler. Um, I think he was in, he had like an extra part or a line or two in uncut gems, and he's a jeweler in the diamond district in New York, and he just gives away. Oh, I do know that guy. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07He's always giving away like bars of gold and shit.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, he's got like uh $100,000 in gold, and he goes up to New Yorkers and just like, oh no, it's like don't talk to me. I mean, he's trying to give it away.
SPEAKER_07And people just walk right by him, like he's trying to give away literal gold bars.
SPEAKER_02They walk right by him, they disrespect him, and so that's that's what I'm trying to do on Tuesday nights in Fountain Valley is we're you know, we're giving away like 40 to 70 dollars.
SPEAKER_01I've seen up to 200.
SPEAKER_02Up to yeah, that wasn't me. That was St. Patrick's. I've seen international currency. St. Patrick's Day, it was 200. That was St. Patrick, that wasn't me. I can't, you know.
SPEAKER_01So not like, okay, the New York situation where someone's coming up to you handing you a gold bar. I have been in a situation in New York where I'm standing there and a guy dressed as a monk, I don't really believe he was a monk, comes up and he's like, Do you like my bracelet? And I was like, Yes. And he takes the bracelet off and he puts it on my hand. And I'm like, Oh, thank you. And I'm sitting there thinking like it's a sign of friendship or something, you know? And he's like, Hell no, he wanted $10. Oh, he wanted more than $10. And he's like, How much, how much are you gonna pay me for this bracelet? I'm like, What? I don't even want the bracelet. He's like, Well, you're wearing the bracelet. I'm like, I don't want the bracelet. And he's like, I go, I I I guess five dollars, and he's like, No, he's like, fifty dollars. And I was like, what? And then and then he wouldn't take it back, and I'm it was it was a shakedown. So I'm just saying, I can understand. Yeah, scam. Here we and here we are. Yeah, that's yeah, that's my personal.
SPEAKER_07We're all about nonviolence on this here podcast, but I ought to punch that man in his face and told him to get away from me.
SPEAKER_01I know, but like that it actually fits in nicely with my story, which we'll get to later. But yeah, I mean to to prey upon someone trying to be like I'm a monk, I'm a you know prophet, I guess. I don't know what a monk would be considered. You're you're more of a spiritual guru than I am. You know, I don't know about that. No, you you no, we've talked about it. Like I'm I'm very impressed with like your knowledge of all the different, you know, religions and such.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, oh yeah, history. But yeah, I guess it's uh well monk, yeah. You know, at least uh the the faith I'm familiar with, like I don't know a lot of monks to uh be hucking jewelry. Right, you know I don't know what uh denomination or uh creed he came from, but I don't know about jewelry hucking.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um to be uh sort of that's the 14th commandment. Yeah, you're just praying at the monastery and just uh yeah, they're just pouring the the gold uh jewelry.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But uh but you also do road dogs, right? Are you part of that at all? Like a little bit?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I so I um every Wednesday in Pasadena at Barney's Beanery, we do road dogs comedy. That's that's my homies, John Shevsky and Robert Thompson. And I I've been hosting that, you know, I host a lot of shows, and you know, no at most live stand-up shows, no one wants to really host. It's it's hard. It's the roughest spot, and there's sort of a lot of like babysitting involved, and so they sort of um I got the call at midnight, like, you know, we got to send in the the shock troop host, the cast man, yes, you know, to cast it wide. So I don't really know what I'm I'm kind of losing myself in the moment, but um, I host that every Wednesday, and yeah, you know, I I've been uh you know putting together stand-up shows here in Orange County for quite some time, and um, yeah, it's uh you know, it's fun. I'd be doing some do I do some stuff also out in Joshua Tree. Um I have some ties to the community there, you know, and so we uh put together some stand-up for yeah, people that are I guess Instagram influencers on vacation and Germans and um you know specifically Germans, and uh kind of the the the doomsday preppers that are sort of native to the the region up in we do a show there kind of over summer, but uh yeah, I try to keep busy. You guys are doing some producing here, it's impressive. Thanks, thank you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, speaking of babysitting, I heard Tonyo needed babysitting at the uh provisions blend comedy night for the music. Tony was supposed to be in charge of the music transitions and he went a little MIA after about like the second or third comic.
SPEAKER_02Well, I'm you played MIA, dude, paper playing.
SPEAKER_01Didn't play MIA, he went MIA.
SPEAKER_07It happens. I get sidetracked, I get high and I have ADD, and just one thing leads to another, and I end up bow back smoking weed with somebody.
SPEAKER_02Getting high and having ADD usually lends itself to being a good DJ. You would think so.
SPEAKER_01Is it ADD or ADHD? I have no idea. Okay. That's that tracks. That tracks.
SPEAKER_07I said I had ADD. I say I was stupid. Fuck.
SPEAKER_01Nice.
SPEAKER_07Well.
SPEAKER_01Alright. Well, Tonya, do you want to tell us about your story today?
SPEAKER_07No, you're being mean to me. Uh I actually have a pretty fun story for today. Uh uh Today I want to talk about one of the biggest heists in North American history. Can you guys guess what was stolen? Artwork? Take your wildest guess.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so you're saying artwork.
SPEAKER_07Wilder. I'll give you that one for free. I would farm animals. No.
SPEAKER_01Uh natural minerals and resources.
SPEAKER_07Sort of.
SPEAKER_01Oh.
SPEAKER_07Have you ever heard the saying it's not a stereotype, if it's true?
SPEAKER_01Maybe.
SPEAKER_02For some reason I thought rice just before you said that. Not quite. Okay.
SPEAKER_07Now that's a little more racist than we're doing today. Well, I said before. Before you said it's not a stereotype. Thieves in Canada stole $18 million worth of maple syrup.
SPEAKER_01Maple syrup. Sorry to interrupt you.
SPEAKER_02Maple syrup. Dude, they they should have sent those guys away for life, man.
SPEAKER_07$18 million worth of fucking maple syrup.
SPEAKER_01Gangsters.
SPEAKER_02That could really upset the world economy.
SPEAKER_07Listen, no, seriously, though, there's an entire maple syrup like cartel. They call it the maple syrup cartel. It's called the fucking Federation of Quebec maple syrup producers.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07This shit is all real, bro. Like I dug into this.
SPEAKER_01CMP? Was that the right one?
SPEAKER_07Uh CMSP, I guess?
SPEAKER_01CMSP.
SPEAKER_07Uh but dude, they have an entire fucking maple syrup reserve. And I'm talking like thousands of 600 pound barrels of maple syrup. And in like there's the whole fucking so this federation or whatever, they they call it the cartel because it like that's how it operates. Like they control the prices, they control the distribution. Like in a lot of cases, like you have to buy from them. They and like they shake down places that fucking are selling it independently, like to the point where they've done literal like kick-your-door in raids, like the DEA looking for fucking cocaine.
SPEAKER_02I know you got maple syrup in there, eh?
SPEAKER_01Oh, sorry.
SPEAKER_02We got a report of a bunch of barrels coming in here, huh?
SPEAKER_01Can I tap your trees, please?
SPEAKER_02Is that pancakes? They're polite. Would you mind if we enter and knock your door down?
unknownHey.
SPEAKER_02One satisfy.
SPEAKER_07I might have got too hot for this episode, dog.
SPEAKER_02Trop haute, too haute. That's what that's high in French.
SPEAKER_01My husband took uh his French in high school, and he'll say he thinks like this is a saying like jeunesse merde.
SPEAKER_02Je ne sais merde.
SPEAKER_01And he said that to a French speaker, and they're like, What? He's like, I don't know shit. And they're like, Yeah, that's it's not a literal translation.
SPEAKER_02I think it would be je ne sais pas merde.
SPEAKER_01I don't, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Don't ask me. Forgot the neg the negation. Yeah. I have a hard enough time with the English, so I'm not gonna try and learn for it. Yeah. You don't know married, man.
SPEAKER_01I think we have the title of the episode.
SPEAKER_02All I know is I don't know marriage. That's what that's what Socrates said, man.
SPEAKER_07Philosophical in here. Oh, that's funny.
SPEAKER_01All right, so don't give us the slow drip. Let's uh slow maple drip.
SPEAKER_02Hey, hey, she's here all week, guys. That's scary, man. Uh I thought Canada was so just wholesome and friendly. I mean, that there's sort of this steamy underbelt.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, but come on, like this has to be like if ever there were a major Canadian crime, like this would be it.
SPEAKER_02There's no question. Maybe maybe like underground moose racing or something. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_07It doesn't make caribou in Canada. You don't get much more Canadian. Junis Aybu. Too high for your shit.
SPEAKER_02Have some maple syrup, bro. Have some maple syrup. You'll get less high, off.
SPEAKER_07No, I'm a diabetic gonna make it worse, I probably.
SPEAKER_02Oh man. Sugar-free. We got we got stevia syrup.
SPEAKER_01You know, there's a coffee spot on Balboa Island, I think it's called Huskins, and it's owned by a guy who I think played on the Ducks, Mighty Ducks, or not Mighty Ducks, sorry, Anaheim Ducks, same thing, whatever. Anyways, and he's Canadian, and his like secret ingredient to the different coffees is maple syrup. So like they have different wow, yeah. You can have maple syrup in your coffee. You don't seem to care about that.
SPEAKER_02That is delicious to me.
SPEAKER_01It actually is good.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I've done that, I've done that at iHop like at four in the morning, like drunk for sure.
SPEAKER_07Put syrup in your coffee?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Fucking funny story. So the first time I ever went to a concert, right? I went with my cousin and what concert was it? Stained.
SPEAKER_03Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, dude, nice. Aging myself. Nice. Uh, dude was crazy. I won pit tickets off a fucking radio show. Uh so me and my cousin go to this concert, and afterwards, uh my stepdad picks us up and takes us to IHOP. It's like two in the morning at this point. And uh we're sitting there, my cousin's eating his pancakes. He gets about two-thirds of the way through his pancakes, and he's like, Man, these pancakes taste like coffee.
SPEAKER_00Oh no, he was pouring coffee.
SPEAKER_07And then ate two-thirds of it. Because we were already smoking weed at this point. We were fucking 13 years old. Yeah, we're high as fuck. Wow. Yeah. My teenagers were pretty crazy, dude. Stained pancakes, bro. Yeah, stained with cow cake.
SPEAKER_01Well, I hope I think don't they have like multiple different types of syrup? Like they have like different flavors of syrup.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they got like the regular, the blueberry, blueberry. I think I think it's all the same, just with different food coloring, you know? Red 40, blue, one's a little sweeter.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and it's probably actually corn syrup, not even maple syrup.
SPEAKER_07Right, right. A little bit of fucking maple leaf extract in that shit. Yeah, yeah. Man.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so let's keep Tonyo back on track.
SPEAKER_07I'm on drugs. What's the hell's excuse?
SPEAKER_01Allegedly.
SPEAKER_07Allegedly, yeah. It's not illegal to be high, it's fine.
SPEAKER_02Uh how would they test that? They just like play you YouTube videos. See if you laugh.
SPEAKER_03See.
SPEAKER_07See if you laugh. At this point, if they say maple syrup, I'm going to jail. Oh man. But what they were doing, dude, they were breaking it'cause it's like a a big ass warehouse full of maple syrup bottles, and they're breaking in, and they're slowly stealing little bits at a time.
SPEAKER_02I think I did a don't tell there at the uh the maple syrup bottles.
SPEAKER_07That's another story. Um so they ended up stealing fucking $18 million worth of maple syrup. 18 million dollars worth of fucking maple syrup. Uh and then the guy um the alleged mastermind behind it, um Robert, Robert V something. I can't pronounce his last name, so I'm not gonna try, but I'll put it right there. Um was trying to sell it on the black market. And like where does one go to even sell syrup on the black market? Is my question. Like, I feel like I could find a place to sell anything else on the black market.
SPEAKER_00I I have a proposal.
SPEAKER_07You have a place to sell syrup on the black market? I I feel like the Waffle House would I fucking love Waffle House, and you are so fucking right.
SPEAKER_01Have you ever been to a Waffle House? Yeah, uh if you if you if you have to hesitate to answer, you haven't been.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. No, you know, I've been to one in uh Nawlins, my my uh wife. Oh, you probably went to a good Waffle House, yeah. Um yeah.
SPEAKER_01I think I went to the best one. I went to the one by the Atlanta airport off of Martin Luther King Jr. drive. Oh yeah. It was and it was like midnight when I went.
SPEAKER_07The sketchier the parking lot, and the later in the night you go, that that's gonna be your best Waffle House experience.
SPEAKER_00Oh, absolutely. At midnight. I was like, geez, yeah.
SPEAKER_07I went to Waffle House in uh in Florida one time, I think it was St. Petersburg, and uh I walked in and every single Waffle House worker had one of them big fucking neon colored wigs and fucking long fingernails. I was like, this shit's about to be fire.
SPEAKER_01They're hustling back there, by the way.
SPEAKER_07I fucking love Waffle House.
SPEAKER_01I I heard an interesting thing that there's like a Waffle House, I want to say like index or something where the weather, you know, if a city is gonna be shut down based on Waffle House. Like if Waffle House, because Waffle House I think is open 24 hours, 24-7. So if Waffle House has reduced hours, then they know like the weather's gonna be this bad. But if Waffle House is shut down, then they know it's gonna be very bad. I for something along those lines.
SPEAKER_07I don't know if that's true, but Waffle House will be open during the rapture.
SPEAKER_01Right. But that's what they're saying. They're like, if if the Waffle House is open, then then it's gonna be it's not like there's a threshold. Like they they basically have thresholds based on what Waffle House is doing. I've seen that.
SPEAKER_02That's where I get my weather reports as well.
SPEAKER_07Why not? You get weather reports and a waffle at the same time. That's right. Can't beat it.
SPEAKER_01Alright, so we keep interrupting Portonio, keep going.
SPEAKER_07Uh that's alright. Interrupt me. It's fine. It's fine. Just go cry about it on the way here. Uh so they were slowly steering stealing the syrup over time. And uh eventually got caught because uh obviously they're gonna do inspections. And I mean, like, I guess the odds of getting caught because there's so many fucking barrels, like, what are the chances if we siphon from random barrels that they're actually gonna start finding it? And then like at the same time, I was thinking when I was reading about this shit, so the inspector found it because the barrel fell off. But what they were doing was replacing it with water, which obviously isn't gonna be the same weight.
SPEAKER_02They replaced the original barrels with water?
SPEAKER_07The the syrup, so they would take out little bits at a time. I'm I'm saying cups, but I don't know how much. They would take out little and then replace it with water. So they weren't just like stealing barrel after barrel after barrel. It was kind of like a yeah, like did you ever watch Breaking Bad? Yeah, you know how they were fucking siphoning out the the methylamine from the train?
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07And replacing it with water, same concept, except so it was so random yeah, yeah, fire ass scene.
SPEAKER_01You know the Johnny Cash song one part at a time? Have you heard that song? No, he talks about working in a I think it's a Cadillac dealer, uh Cadillac uh like factory, and he steals one piece at a time.
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01Because it doesn't cost them a dime or something like that, is like the the and then like some Johnny Cash.
SPEAKER_02That's that's how I got my act, ladies and gentlemen. Hey yo, whoa.
SPEAKER_01And then at the end he's like, I have a 57, 56, 58, 59, 60 Cadillac. I have a like or whatever the car is. So like so because he's stealing over a course of many, many years. Oh, yeah. So the the point is totally the same thing they finally when he puts the car together, it's like just a hot mess, anyways.
SPEAKER_07This was recent too. This was 2011, 2012.
SPEAKER_01All right.
SPEAKER_07When I first started reading about it, I was like, this has to have been a long ass time ago, but no, it was extremely recent.
SPEAKER_02Wow. Yeah. Um they got caught. Yeah, where are they now? Are they uh still doing time?
SPEAKER_01Sounds like a sticky situation.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but I'm she's here all weekend. Gloves on for that one.
SPEAKER_07Jeez. Uh you know, to be honest, I neglected to find out how much time they did.
SPEAKER_02One of them's probably got a TikTok or something now. I'm curious. One of the heisters.
SPEAKER_01We're doing uh live updates.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Well, I don't want to lie.
SPEAKER_01Just what the podcasters love is uh dead time.
SPEAKER_02I just picture a caravan of like black vehicles pulling up to a waffle house, like, hey, we've got eight million gallons of maple syrup. We'll cut you the the deal of a lifetime, eh?
SPEAKER_01We got a sweet deal for you.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Whoa. Alright, if you guys had to guess how much time he ended up doing for Steel.
SPEAKER_01And this is in Canada.
SPEAKER_07Uh C. Yes. Did you say C? I did.
SPEAKER_01Uh wrong, wrong border town.
SPEAKER_02Whatever. Canada's like weirdly strict about certain things, I know. Like, uh, I don't know. But I'd say. Especially their maple syrup. I'd say. At least let's say seven years. It's a very close guess.
SPEAKER_01I'm guessing ten.
SPEAKER_07Eight. Okay. There we go. Very close guess. Yeah, they were sent to eight years in 2017. Nearly 3,000 tons of maple syrup, 18.7 million Canadian dollars.
SPEAKER_02Well, you you could they're out now, you could get them on the pod next episode.
SPEAKER_07That would be great.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07If you guys are listening, tap in. We got you.
SPEAKER_01Literally tap in.
SPEAKER_07Just don't steal our audience. Whoa. We're here all week, guys. Crazy. Uh and they also fined him $9.4 million. Oh, he had an inside man. I did not do my research properly. I thought I did. The inside man got five years in prison and $1.2 million Canadian dollar fine.
SPEAKER_01I bet there was a lot of co-conspirators, because it seems like that'd be a pretty hard heist to do quietly.
SPEAKER_02It's hard enough to produce a podcast, let alone like a it takes a team. Yeah, I don't want a heist. Oh, his dad was in it too.
SPEAKER_06He got supportive family? Two years, yeah. That's crazy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. My story actually, oddly enough, connects to that because this is an individual who was preying literally on worshipers to steal money.
SPEAKER_07Oh man, which is a lot of those.
SPEAKER_01So um which one? Huh?
SPEAKER_06I said which one?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. So um I was looking up, I I hate being that person that looks up quotes, but I was like, I feel like there's a quote that would be uh like similar to what's going on. So like Thomas Jefferson had something along the lines of that we should build a wall between church and state, right?
SPEAKER_02I think we should build a wall. School that's we're gonna build a wall.
SPEAKER_01A different kind of wall.
SPEAKER_02We're gonna build a wall and make the queen pay for it. Well, I think at that time it was a king, but that's gonna build a wall and make the Ottoman Empire pay for it.
SPEAKER_01Uh but in this situation, I would say there should be a wall between the church and the bank because yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07So there is one. That's why they don't pay taxes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I know, I know. That's that's a whole other separate issue. I mean, you didn't.
SPEAKER_07I'm not gonna go there. I'm just kidding. Yeah, so uh not that high.
SPEAKER_01The individual's name is Efron Taylor II.
SPEAKER_07Sounds like a douchebag.
SPEAKER_01Um so so this is a child of uh a man who is an electrical engineer and nuclear power plant operator, very smart father, mother's very uh you know, strict mother uh you know, wants her kids to be raised, you know, just so wants them to be proper. So Efron, he goes to his mom, he's like 12 years old, he's like, Mom, I want a video game. And she says, No, I'm not gonna give you the money for it. But if you want a video game, you build it yourself. So he went to the library, he figured it out, he built his own video game, and he sold it to his classmates.
SPEAKER_07Dang it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so this guy he starts out. I mean very smart individual, right?
SPEAKER_07Wait, and what what was the like like time period did this take place?
SPEAKER_01Uh this was 90s.
SPEAKER_07Oh, okay, okay, okay. Exactly. So that's not like a small feat, like you're not fucking hopping on YouTube and watching videos.
SPEAKER_01Exactly.
SPEAKER_07That's crazy.
SPEAKER_01Right. He went to the li it's the library. He didn't he didn't go to YouTube, he went to the library. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, and oh, and by the way, this takes place in Kansas. So he was born in Mississippi, moved around a little bit, but eventually ends up in Kansas, just for context.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_01Um so he then at 16 years old, it's like 1999. He in a high school class may take $500 in savings, and they create a website. And the website uh is 14's network, they change it to gofarritgo.com. And the concept is putting teenagers in contact with businesses that want summer employment. So kids in their teens that want summer employment, businesses like Home Depot or the grocery store, whatever, they put it on, so it's just a limited idea. Okay.
SPEAKER_02Any website with recruiting of teens seems like they could be a little sketchy.
SPEAKER_01Sketchy.
SPEAKER_02Probably a government website, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Right, right. So he's alleging that this is a very profitable website, something to the tune of allegedly like $3.5 million that he's making in the 90s.
SPEAKER_07It was fucking right.
SPEAKER_01This is like 1999-2000.
SPEAKER_07Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And there's nothing to confirm this, but that's what his laurels are. He's like, I started this video game, and then I got the bug to be an entrepreneur, and then I did I developed this thing. He ends up um winning an award, uh, I think it was called the um Microsoft Teen Tech Award. It's like a nation nationwide tech award. And then he also gets a scholarship. I I couldn't figure out what college he went to, so I'm not sure where that was, but he got some kind of a scholarship for entrepreneurial leadership. And he ends up getting all these investors into the website, but then they don't actually make any money, and they put the investors decide they're not gonna do it after about a year, and he he they pull out. Uh so about age 19, he decides I'm I'm just gonna retire. I'm good. Again, I don't know how he's retiring because it doesn't sound like there's that much money.
SPEAKER_04Right, because the company flawed.
SPEAKER_01It didn't do what he thought it was gonna do. Yeah. So um he's like, I'm just gonna sit at home and enjoy my time. But then in around 2002, his father uh wanted to be a pastor, a minister. Uh so he uh junior the second, Efron the second, comes in talks to his dad and helps him to develop this church in Kansas. And it's a Johnson County Church. And he then decides he's gonna bring, he's gonna try to help the members of the congregation with investments. And he creates different kinds of uh corporations, but eventually he ends up creating the uh city capital in 2006. That's their church? Uh no, that's his investment group. Oh, the investment group. Right, right, right.
SPEAKER_02Okay, okay, that would be I was like, what an awful name for a church. I got baptized at City Capitol. Got baptized at Capital One.
SPEAKER_07What's in your wallet? What's in your baptism water?
SPEAKER_01Um and Efron is black, he is targeting black churches throughout the United States of America.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Wow, really? Yeah. I pictured Efron as a fucking white guy. What a crazy fucking plot twist. I'm so serious.
SPEAKER_01Wow, that's kind of you're like, wow, you didn't you didn't use it. No. All right, okay.
SPEAKER_02F F is it is it ephrin or ephron?
SPEAKER_01I thought it was F, it might be Efron, Ephron, Ephron. I've heard it pronounced multiple interesting.
SPEAKER_02Okay, well, I'm color me surprised.
SPEAKER_01There you go.
SPEAKER_02So he's targeting the black churches, though.
SPEAKER_01I believe that's one of his main focuses is targeting the black churches. Um, I believe he also ends up at that megachurch in, I believe it's Texas, uh Joel Austrin's church. I think it's called Lakewood.
SPEAKER_02Oh, Joel Olstein.
SPEAKER_01Joel Olstein, that's right. That's his name. Yeah. So he basically is pitching this idea to his congregates or his father's congregates that he um is wanting to uh invest money in things like real estate. He's a socially conscious investor, so he wants to revitalize, revive distressed properties and give back to the community. And he's selling it as like, hey, you know, if you invest in the stock market or if you invest in these different kinds of um 401ks, that you know that they're investing in in unchristian like businesses, so businesses like strip clubs. Do you want your money going to things like strip clubs? And the worshippers are like, no, we don't want that. We want to put it into um smoothie shops and to sh and to small businesses so that are are strip clubs part of it.
SPEAKER_02Is that the S in S P 500? Is it strip? Strip strip clubs, and and I don't know what the I don't know what the P is, folks, but I think we know strip the clubs and Pimps 500. Keep it 500.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's right, that's right. Um yeah, so so the the worshipers are like, no, like we you know, we want to invest in businesses that are gonna give back to the community and be a a place for teenagers to get jobs. I mean, in theory, strip clubs could be a place where teenagers can get jobs, and you just have to be 18.
SPEAKER_07Jesus Christ, JJ.
SPEAKER_04It's too early in the morning for your shit, dog.
SPEAKER_01It hits hard when you have daughters, right? You have two daughters, right?
SPEAKER_02I don't know that I want to be involved in this conversation, though.
SPEAKER_00That's what I was saying.
SPEAKER_02I think it's anywhere near this conversation.
SPEAKER_00I think it hits dads harder when you manage it.
SPEAKER_02She's the lawyer though. She's got the legal, she's got the she's got the law on the on the books here.
SPEAKER_01That's well, I mean, it's it's 18, right?
SPEAKER_07I'm not that I'm not fun fact, I've never been in a strip club.
SPEAKER_01Really? Yeah. Okay, allegedly.
SPEAKER_05So uh my cousin You're a fucking asshole.
SPEAKER_01So my cousin was living in Vegas, and he it was so funny. He's like, oh my gosh, he's like, I was driving on the freeway. He's like, and there's like this big strip club off the freeway, and they have this big marquee sign, and it was something like, Congratulations, class of 2025, accepting applications now.
SPEAKER_07Oh man. I live up the street from a strip club, actually, and their marquee always has something funny on it. Yeah, like at Christmas time, it says, uh, when I think about you, I touch my elf.
SPEAKER_01That's funny. That's funny. But he's also uh promising high returns, something like uh 2400%, which I think if you're promising anything over seven percent returns, it's probably a big red flag, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, 2400 seems like a lot.
unknownYeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Even I though, I'm like, I gotta hear him out. I think 2400. That's how my bank account's set up right now, too. Even though the what you in spite of the way you're presenting it, I'm like, man.
SPEAKER_01I know. Well, I mean, and that's the thing, you know, you've got these people that are true believers and you know, they want to believe. I think personally, like you're you think in a church, like you're not, I would not expect there to be um, you know, a wolf among the sheep, right? I would think that you're gonna be around trustworthy people. At least I'm I'm you know, thinking what the individuals who are victimized here probably were thinking, like, I'm here because I'm a good person, the people next to me are good people, I'm gonna trust them. You know, it's like it's not a situation where you're gonna be like, oh my gosh, let me see your tax returns, let me see your bank receipts, you know. You're gonna be trusting, I think.
SPEAKER_05I mean no? Uh no.
SPEAKER_01I don't want to uh no so um but he ends up not investing his money at all. Like all the money that he's collecting, he doesn't invest it in anything other than himself.
SPEAKER_07So he took the money from all other people and then didn't he just kept that shit.
SPEAKER_01Correct. But he also, I think along the way, had like made like a suggestion like he invested, he like got more money from an investor, said we're gonna revitalize this one part of proper part of town, and then he didn't. Then they sue him, then he gives them money back, and then I think or he was supposed to give the money back. I think it was like $250,000, and he didn't give it back. I think he uh defaulted on the payment.
SPEAKER_04Probably didn't even have it no more.
SPEAKER_01Right. Well, that was the first part, and then he develops this new racket where he goes after the uh the worshipers. So yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um so he's basically doing what every bank does. It's just uh take money and promise, oh I'll pay you, yeah, you'll you'll get your money back.
SPEAKER_01Uh right. So uh he's uh what I call a for-profit profit.
SPEAKER_02Hey, hey. She's here all week, guys.
SPEAKER_01Uh so uh yeah, so but he in she doesn't he ends up not investing any of the money and he just can we just pause for a second to say that your puns are top tier. Thank you.
SPEAKER_06Yes, I mean your puns are always very clever.
SPEAKER_01I I appreciate that, but then see, I feel like other comics think that's like uh pedestrian, like doing puns is like a pedestrian.
SPEAKER_02Fuck them, tell them to come up with good puns for the untouchables. Yeah, well, uh there's so many people that have so many opinions on I was like just they say that, but then you you know their whole act is puns, and you know they're they're like, oh, I don't do uh you know, I just do I just do beatnik poetry comedy, and then they're just doing you know puns as well.
SPEAKER_07Christian slam poetry, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, man, dude. This guy needed to hear some Christian slam poetry, it sounds like man. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's interesting. I was with some friends last night and they were asking, like, how come there's so many uh Instagram clips of crowd work in comedy? And I my explanation was my thought would be I think a lot of comics, you know, have a sacred set of jokes that they don't want to release because maybe they're afraid they're not gonna have other as good of jokes, or uh, you know, they maybe they're afraid that they're giving away what the their you know their show would be. And so with crowd work, it's unique every time and it's fresh content, it's easier, right? But then it was interesting because they were they were like asking about crowd work, and I said, Well, some purist comics think that crowd work is like you know, not real comedy, but I think it's just different skill sets, honestly.
SPEAKER_07Like it's just a different kind of comedy. It's like the difference between like fucking like trap rap and like backpack rap, or or you know what I mean, or like classic rock and metal. Like there's different genres of comedy, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02Uh I'm not familiar with backpack rap, man. No, you're the age for backpack rap. Oh man, maybe maybe I know it as a different term.
SPEAKER_01He's more of a ska guy.
SPEAKER_02Ska. I could see that. Well I sort of little Wayne. I I kind of stopped paying attention to hip hop after the Carter 4, you know? Yeah.
SPEAKER_06That was when I'm my favorite rapper.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah, yeah. Lil Weezy, dude? Yes, sir. Lil Lil Louisiana? Absolutely. Dude. Louisi money.
SPEAKER_07Oh yeah, and the F is for phenomenal.
SPEAKER_02It's phenomenal. Yeah, that uh I think comedy should just be a script that you recite.
SPEAKER_01You know, it's it should be No, I I was just like, I think it's just different skill sets. Because I mean, if you think about it, like there's so many different comics that have so many different like there's a Robin Williams delivery that is just so unique, how he rapid fires things. And then there's people like Jocelynack who's slow and methodical. I mean, so I just think it's just different skill sets, it's different delivery.
SPEAKER_02I don't like all the like, you know, pitchfork uh, you know, like I don't like all the reviewer comedy reviewer stuff, you know, of like just in sort of uh it's like just you know be funny, you know. I don't know, people kind of pontificate or try to put their, you know, it's all subjective. Yeah, we well a lot of it is, and and a lot with the crowd work people just uh people see it because people click on it. And it's because it's like, oh, it's you know, there's the element on social media like, oh, this could go wrong. Oh, some this guy could get beat up, or you know, it's like that's that's the type of brain that's scrolling versus like oh, I might hear a clever witticism by the end of you know, and well and also the people in the crowd like to be involved, yeah.
SPEAKER_07To it to a degree. I know people that will absolutely refuse to sit in the front row of a comedy show because they don't want to be fucked with. Yeah. But I also know people that will sit right up front and be like, please fuck with me. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, then there's my friend, the waste management guy.
SPEAKER_07Oh, dude.
SPEAKER_01And he sits like mid, he sits like in the mid section. He always gets picked on no matter no matter what. I'm not kidding you. No, and we were, I was up, he went with me to floppers, and uh we were in the green room, and you could see the back of his head on the screen, and I pointed him out, and I go, hey, I go, I'm just letting you know, like if you are tight on time, don't pick on this guy because this guy will ruin your set. And they're like, Oh yeah, what? And I'm like, no, trust me. Like he you're you think he's gonna answer yes or no, he's gonna answer, like, you know, purple zebra, and you're just gonna be like, what? And then it's gonna totally it's gonna wreck you.
SPEAKER_07And they're like, okay, so then of course that's exactly the guy I'm going to fuck with.
SPEAKER_01Right. The the next girl goes up, she's like, Oh, JJ told me not to pick on you. I'm like, oh, here we go. And then so then he tried to wreck her, and then like it was, but that's the thing. Like, then she got off her set, and then it was like, you just you had a seven-minute set, you know, and you you spent four minutes, not four minutes, probably, but like a minute and a half on him, and then you know, and it was me and one other person trying to outweird each other for seven minutes is comedy gold.
SPEAKER_02I probably sometimes yeah, he he called it he works in like refuse engineering or something or waste management engineering, yes. Yeah, I feel like that that speaking of scams, I feel like that's a scam. That's my scam. I don't know if I get a scam to share, but absolutely that he said that to you, or no, no, no. I I I feel like the three cans, the three, you know, the three, the the green can, the blue can, I I feel like they're all just putting in the same place. I'm so confused by it. That's my conspiracy.
SPEAKER_07The fucking the same truck that picked up my blue can came ten minutes later and picked up my green one. Yeah. I missed it.
SPEAKER_01So here's like, okay, pizza box, does it go in the trash or does it go in the recycling?
SPEAKER_07It goes in the recycling, it's cardboard.
SPEAKER_01It goes in the trash. It's cardboard. It's got food on it though, so it's supposed to go in the trash.
SPEAKER_07Well, I mean, if it's covered in old cheese, but if it's just an empty pizza box.
SPEAKER_01Well, uh well, I'm i i my understanding is it's supposed to go in the trash. But yeah, I agree. I no one, there's no rules on this. Like even there's no rules. There's no rules.
SPEAKER_02I was trying to ask him about it. The guy your friend who works in engineering. Oh, yeah, they put He's a banker. That that's like on tier with the oh, he's not really a witch.
SPEAKER_01No, he's a banker.
SPEAKER_02Oh, he was just that's one thing too. Whenever someone has a wacky answer, you can never, you know, you never know if they're, you know.
SPEAKER_07Right, because that seems very specific.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Whenever people have wacky answers, or even just anything. People, people, people get, you know, in at comedy shows, or if you're asked, oh, where are you from, they'll they'll make up where they're from. And it even just they're like, oh, I just didn't want to really say where I'm from. I don't, you know, which I understand. It's like, why do you want to, why do you want to give information to this guy up there?
SPEAKER_07Weirdo on the stage with a microphone.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but but uh I'd I would rather talk to a waste engineer manager than a than a banker, I feel like that because I I'm I was yeah, I was excited because it's like that's been something I'm always like, dude, uh yeah, I've seen like you said, uh you see the same truck, you know. I feel like there's sort of a hush-hush thing about it. I feel like it's more for it's more for the city and just the residents, but um, I've done no research to uh uh justify my conclusion.
SPEAKER_01Well, I I had friends in college that played professional sports, and they told me, I mean, allegedly, who knows, uh, that when like a girl would come up to them and be like, oh, what do you do for work? And they would be like, Oh, I work at SeaWorld. What do you do at SeaWorld? I'm a penguin trainer because they were like trying to be, you know, like, oh, like not that I played for this professional team, but that, you know, maybe to try to uh weed out the the pro hosts. I don't know. But yeah, who knows? I'm sure if the chick was hot enough, they would tell them the truth, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02Damn right. I tell people I'm a I'm a football player all the time. Yeah, you have the build, bro. Seahawks, dude. Linebacker. Yeah, yeah, I could see it.
SPEAKER_07Bobby Boucher. Dude.
SPEAKER_01Well, anyway, so my guy he ends up getting convicted of wire fraud, financial fraud schemes. Uh, he is sentenced to something like 19 years and seven months, and he has to pay restitution in the tune of 15.6 million dollars. Yeah, yeah. Man, he also had a co-conspirator, it was a lady, uh, her name was Wendy. I guess she was allegedly also involved with like use they were he basically had her be like her hype, the hype guy, but hype girl for him, and that sealed the deal for a lot of the investors to be like, oh, this is a this is Oh the hype girl, I get it.
SPEAKER_07She's in there throwing neck to kitty. These people to invest this one up here.
SPEAKER_01We're talking about godly people here.
SPEAKER_07Come on. I know.
SPEAKER_02Everybody's a sinner, y'all.
SPEAKER_01I don't know about what you just I thought you were having a seizure, to be quite frank, but I literally was like, wait, are we having a medical emergency live on the podcast? Anyways, yeah, so no, so she I think got something like five years and I think she was ordered to pay restitution in the range of like $5.8 million. I know. But the people they never were able to recover their money. So he just and they don't even know what he spent it on. So that's what's even more hystericus.
SPEAKER_02Um maple syrup on the black market. This investment 2,000% profit in maple syrup.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I don't know. What would you spend it on?
SPEAKER_07How much was it?
SPEAKER_01Uh he allegedly took over 16 million dollars.
SPEAKER_0716 million? You'd never see me again. I'd have been on an island somewhere that neither one of us can pronounce.
SPEAKER_02Jesse Pinkman, man.
SPEAKER_07That's what I'm saying. 16 million? I'm getting a villa with a bunch of land on him. I might buy me, I might buy Epstein Island. It's probably on sale right now.
SPEAKER_00That's not juju, but whatever.
SPEAKER_07It's probably cheap as fuck. I can blow that whole bitch down, build a whole new fucking thing. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Easy with blow that bitch. That's Epstein Island. That seems problematic.
SPEAKER_07I mean, you gotta do what you gotta do sometimes.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think I would I would buy a bunch of gold, I'd become an actual Trax NYC, you know, I'd better give out to open my competition, I would give out a gold chain or whatever, you know. Maybe for a few weeks after that I'd stop.
SPEAKER_01So you guys both just admitted that you would take money from God-fearing people. Cool.
SPEAKER_02Oh no, I wouldn't do that. I I thought it was only I thought it would the question was just if I had that money. Uh but not uh, you know, making um making a pro that seems like a lot, it seems like a lot of work too to to defraud a bunch of people.
SPEAKER_01It was like I think it was over 400 victims.
SPEAKER_02Wow.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like that was probably harder than just getting a job.
SPEAKER_01I think that's what's interesting about all the different people we've covered uh on these on the podcast is like so many of them are so smart that it's like how they decided to make a left turn when I mean we had a guy, we're you're saying a guy that at 12 years old created a video game that other kids his age were willing to buy.
SPEAKER_07Out of nothing because his mother didn't fucking have the money to buy him the video game.
SPEAKER_01So I don't know if that's the case. I think it was more like she didn't want to she didn't want to spend $40 on a video game and she was like, you learn how to do it, which I mean I don't know. That's that's that's what I'm saying earlier. His mom was a strict mom and you know was very you know wanted to raise her kids to be producers and the dad obviously was very smart and uh there's been no implications of the father. So the father, they don't believe he was involved in any of it, because again, they he started this out at the first church, and then he moved her. So there's no uh there's no connection at this point that they could see that his dad was involved, so it was just the son, which I'm sure as a father who's a pastor or minister or whatever, I mean that would be pretty scandalous, you know.
SPEAKER_06Juicy J's dad was pastor.
SPEAKER_07Who? Juicy J, 36 Mafia. Okay. His dad's a pastor. Yeah. I don't know if you're familiar with 3-6 mafia at all. I heard there's yeah, I know who they are.
SPEAKER_01I didn't know I don't know Juicy J. I'm only, you know.
SPEAKER_07He's he's half of 3-6 mafia.
SPEAKER_01I think again, were we talking I think my hip hop laurel.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, his dad's a pastor.
SPEAKER_01My my hip-hop my hip-hop probably stops at like ludicrous, you know, before the 2010s. After 2010, I'm I I've kind of aged out and I went, you know, I don't know.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. 36 Mafia is in the 90s. Oh, it is?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's not I probably I probably know a song or two. I just don't know it, you know. Um, but anyways. So do you have any shows coming up? I know this show will this episode launch after probably you have done them, but what have you got coming up?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, big one uh May 11th. I'm gonna be headlining the harp. You know, a lot of time every week I I host there every week, but May 11th, come see me headline the harp in, which is blocks from where we're sitting, you know. Yeah, so far. And um, so yeah, it's it's my birthday week that week, so I'm gonna um be headlining, you know. Come on out.
SPEAKER_01Who's who's hosting, who's featuring?
SPEAKER_02I don't know. That's a crime. Special guest, special guest. Um Juicy J. Well, there'd be maple syrup. Yeah. Um, yeah.
SPEAKER_01I think you need to say surprise guests.
SPEAKER_02Surprise, yeah, surprise guests. Yeah, that's that that can be fraud sometimes too, or it's special guest from, you know, HBO. But um, yeah, come see me uh May 11th. And then I'm I'm there every Monday hosting the show if you're uh if you uh are around every Monday in Coast, beautiful Costa Mesa, California.
SPEAKER_07It's always a good time, and they have good ass food too. They do, and they have good food and they're very heavy-handed on the drinks.
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah, yeah. Um uh yeah, they're not defrauding you, they're not uh skimping, they're not pouring water in the uh tequila. But uh and then I guess last Thursday uh of every month at at Lakave here as well.
SPEAKER_00Also delicious.
SPEAKER_02If you're less of a Monday connoisseur, you know. Yeah, I think that's that's about it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01What do you got coming up, Tonyo?
SPEAKER_07Uh I'm doing Roastbusters on the 10th. Looking forward to that. Where's where's that? It's uh oh shit. I forget the name of the place, Cin LA with uh Joseph Carter. Okay. Yeah, we just had him uh last week actually. Really good update.
SPEAKER_00It's in Hollywood, right?
SPEAKER_07It's called Legacy Lounge.
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_07It's at 9 p.m. on the 10th. And then outside of that, I don't really think I have anything uh scheduled except for the night. Uh that we can get to at a later date. What about you?
SPEAKER_01Uh uh this Wednesday, April 8th, I'm doing Dennis Vargas's show.
SPEAKER_04Oh, hell yeah.
SPEAKER_01Third place Costa Mesa.
SPEAKER_04Funny guy.
SPEAKER_01Oh, so funny. Uh and uh Johnny Roquet is on the lineup.
SPEAKER_04Also a funny guy.
SPEAKER_01Uh-huh. Yeah, so I'm looking forward to that. He's he's always uh I'm like, where is he going with this? Oh my god, that is so hilarious. So yeah, he's a funny guy. But yeah. All right, well, I think that that concludes today's episode. Thank you so much for joining us, and we'll see you next time.
SPEAKER_07And no one got hurt. Peace.