Kevin Trudeau is a ginourmous douchebag who’s been preying on every sort of idiot who’d give him an audience for decades now. His get rich quick schemes prey on the greedy and stupid, but he’s one of the leading proponents of basically calling all legitimate medical institutions a conspiracy and encourages people with real illnesses like cancer to stop seeing their doctors and to instead stick magic crystals up their ass, or whatever the flavor of the week is. He’s not ideological, like a lot of alt med nuts, where they sincerely believe in their cause - he’s an opportunistic huckster who capitalizes on whatever is in vogue at the moment. He knows he’s full of shit, he knows anyone who listens to him seriously suffers and may even die, but thought it was all worth it to line his own pockets.
In general, the US government has very weak consumer protection against this sort of fraud, and while he’s been fined and admonished before, I never expected he’d end up in jail. I wonder the legality of the conviction and whether it’ll stick. Couldn’t have happened to a worse douchebag, and it’d be nice to see people going after these sorts of fraudsters with some teeth.
Trudeau has been such a flagrant con artist, that even the most fervent woo believers have a hard time defending him.
When Trudeau gets out of prison, he’ll likely have access to plenty of money raised through his various enterprises.
*"One of those businesses is a private club called the Global Information Network (known by the acronym GIN), which Trudeau claimed had been conceived by the “GIN Council,” described by Trudeau as a secret cabal of the ultra-wealthy who held secrets to abundant wealth and happiness.
“The Global Information Network is a club that has been developed by thirty people who are on the GIN Council,” Trudeau claimed in an Internet video pitching the club. “They’re all billionaires from around the world.”
The club was formed in the island nation of Nevis and had revenues in excess of $60 million over three years, according to accounting records filed in the case…
Trudeau had touted that program in another Internet video as one of the “greatest money-making opportunities of all time.”
But the FTC argued it was an illegal pyramid scheme, and that GIN was simply another of Trudeau’s crafty attempts to keep assets away from the government."*
I remember the guy. I’m glad he’s actually getting in trouble for this crap. But, ultimately, he was just ahead of the curve. He’s just promoting some “weird tricks” that will solve X that “they” don’t want you to know about. He was clickbait before the Internet.
I actually used to seek out his informercials to watch because they were so seriously bullshit that they almost seemed like parody. My favorites were the ‘interviews’ with some low-level reporting hacks, usually female, who’d failed out of serious work.
My idiot mother used to order his stupid books. I sent them back, over and over. “Blueberry juice will cure diabetes! Arthritis: cured by eating raisins soaked in gin! Beets are good for ‘inflammation’.” All those stupid bullshit cures, if they worked we’d all be living to be 110 and in perfect health.
Dr. Oz seems to have stepped into his place now, on TV at 4 p.m. instead of peddling books in the middle of the night.
Up with a bout of insomnia I just watched part of “Free Money They Don’t Want You to Know About.” A classic. He was even throwing in a free copy of “Debt Cures They Don’t Want You to Know About.”
Very entertaining at 4:00 - 5:00 AM. Thanks Kevin!
God, 10 more years of draining money from the public, only this time it’s “all taxpayers” instead of “the poor, sick, and desperate.” At least Don Lapre had the class to just kill himself.
Important thing to note: he didn’t go to prison the first time because he was dishonest, because he lied about the benefits and couldn’t back up his claims, or because customers felt deceived because he tricked them. No, that would make him a garden-variety health fraud asshole. He got busted for stealing credit card numbers of customers and putting fraudulent charges on them. As in: it is much harder to say that the FDA or whoever was oppressing him compared to what supporters of others of his ilk might say. So this current conviction is hardly the shittiest thing he’s done.
But it’s okay, as he was young and also it was someone else’s (“their”) fault. :dubious:
