Okke Ornstein in Panama | Dispatches from the isthmus

Years ago I broke the story (here’s part 1 and here is part 2) on how a fugitive con man, Thomas McMurrain, had set up shop in Panama together with some other scammers and child rapists. They called themselves San Cristobal Land Development and they sold noni and teak plantations (they called it “Tropical Working Farms”) that did not exist. They claimed they sold tons of noni without ever harvesting a single noni. Most people dumb enough to invest in it lost their money – if not to McMurrain then to one of his accomplices, such as Michael Pierce who stole money held in escrow and then offered to pay it back with a container full of booze.

Needless to say that the scam was hyped by notorious drunkard Roger Gallo of escapeartist.com and then McMurrain found a defender in Don “never a scam I don’t like” Winner, while his buddy Brett  “Double O Brett” Mikkelson provided the goons who followed and harassed me and Panama News publisher Eric Jackson. The bookkeeper of the stolen noni funds, one Thomas Rowley, is now a financial columnist on Panama Guide, pumping his shady services to other con men and innocent expats. Oh, and then McMurrain had a bunch of drug dealing monkeys from Bocas on his payroll with criminal records from here to Tokyo, who called themselves “Angel Patrol” and made death threats to my sources and whomever else they wanted. Then they proceeded to kill my lawyer.

Anyway. McMurrain was arrested and extradited to the US on charges dating two scams back from the noni swindle. What was left of the noni tubbies collapsed, McNoni himself was convicted and went to jail.

But! He’s out! I found him on LinkedIn!

Please, go over there and read his profile for a good laugh (his username: “the lead king” – wahahahaha! ). The world may have changed, but McNoni hasn’t. You wondered why the judge ordered psychiatric treatment, well, now you know. Under “experience” he lists the “Emergency One Holding Corporation” as one of his success stories – but that is the scheme that landed him in jail. Global Etutor was a pump and dump stock fraud. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Yes, you read that right. This guy is not trying to hide his criminal past that got him in jail, he is hyping his scams as if they were notable corporate accomplishments. Imagine Bernie Madoff promoting his securities firm as a big success story and giving Mr. Ponzi as a reference. That’s Tom McMurrain for you.

And he is already preparing new schemes! He’s involved in something called H2 Creative Management (Tom Lennon style nonsense together with someone called Ron Hutton, quote from site: “At H2 we treat everything as a positive” – that’s how they got involved with McMurrain, no doubt). RPM Autopartners appears to exist in McMurrain’s head only, where it is filed next to such other imaginary things like “paying back victims” and “Thou Shalt Not Steal”.

The great thing with McNoni being back among us is that because he presents his previous fuck-ups as success stories you just know he’ll cook up some wacky new scam again and get in lots of trouble because of it. Let’s just hope he makes it back to Panama.

Here’s a screengrab of his profile (Click for Big) so that you can read what an overwhelmingly successful track record this guy really has:

(UPDATE: Eric Jackson, annoyed by McMurrain’s self-promotion from the halfway house he’s currently in, complained to the USDOJ and the LinkedIn profile was quickly removed. So this is currently the only place where you can still see it)

Tags: barry miller, con man, don winner, dump, escapeartist.com, extradition, fraud, jail, mcmurrain, michael pierce, noni, Panama, payday loans, peter ernst, pump, roger gallo, scam, stock fraud