Injunction and Civil Lawsuit filed against PREVIOUS owner of Katrina Help.com

[Kevin]

The individual who donated the domains Katrina Help.com, Katrina Relief.com, Katrina Donations.com, Katrina Relief Fund.com, and Katrina Cleanup.com to Kevin Caruso and Project Care.com has been served with an injunction and civil lawsuit by Charlie Crist, the Florida Attorney General.

Here is the story:

TALLAHASSEE - Attorney General Charlie Crist today filed a civil lawsuit against Nassau County resident Robert E. Moneyhan and obtained an injunction prohibiting him from fraudulently soliciting relief donations intended for Hurricane Katrina victims. Moneyhan, 51, also known as "Demon Moon," allegedly created several Katrina-related websites, none of which was a legitimate charitable operation.

"While difficult times bring out the best in most people, unfortunately they also bring out the worst in a few," said Crist. "The devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina has elicited an agonizing plea for help, and thankfully countless Americans are responding from the bottom of their hearts. The thought that someone would seek to pervert relief efforts when assistance is so desperately needed is truly appalling."

As Hurricane Katrina was gathering strength in the Gulf of Mexico after passing through southern Florida, Moneyhan registered domain names for websites. He created katrinahelp.com, katrinadonations.com, katrinarelief.com and katrinarelieffund.com, as well as possible others that are yet unknown. As of August 31, the donations solicited from websites katrinahelp.com and katrinadonations.com were to be directed to Moneyhan's private Paypal account. Moneyhan did not file registration documents with the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to solicit donations, as required by law.

Moneyhan also misrepresented that "100% of all donations used for relief." Due to customary transaction fees charged by Paypal, this guarantee is not possible to honor, resulting in violations of advertising laws. Investigators with the Attorney General's Office determined that none of the websites represents a legitimate charity and no funds donated to Moneyhan's sites would reach Hurricane Katrina victims.

Moneyhan has changed the websites so they no longer solicit contributions, but now appear to offer the website names for sale to the highest bidder. Through quick actions taken by the Attorney General's Office and Paypal, Moneyhan was prevented from capitalizing on his scheme. Today's injunction will prevent Moneyhan from any further website modifications that would unlawfully solicit donations for his personal benefit.

The lawsuit was filed in Nassau County Circuit Court under Florida's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. Moneyhan faces penalties of $10,000 per violation.

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I have been contacted by several reporters concerning this development and I am deeply disquieted at what has transpired.

I have spoken to Robert (the man who donated the domains to me) several times over the past few days, and I can tell you that he was suicidal only a few days ago – because of the lawsuit that has been filed against him by Mr. Crist.

I have obtained extensive information on this matter and am firmly convinced that Robert had the best of intentions but simply lacked the experience to realize his objective of helping the Hurricane Katrina survivors.

He did use poor judgment on some of the things that he did, but his intentions were to HELP and not to EXPLOIT the hurricane survivors.

Period.

He lives in Florida. He has been through hurricanes himself, and he was trying to help.

Several of Robert’s friends have abandoned him simply because of the allegations leveled against him.

I just met him a few days ago, but I can tell you that I am EXTREMELY proud to say that he is a friend of mine. He is a good man. And I will stand by him and assist him and his family in every way possible as he endures the unwarranted actions being taken against him.

I, too, had suspicions at first when I saw his sites. And I understand the heightened sensitivity in a disaster such as this. I understand the anger that people felt when they believed that Robert was trying to exploit the hurricane survivors.

But probing more deeply into the facts quickly makes any reasonable person realize that Robert had GREAT intentions but HORRIBLE execution.

I have been working almost non-stop on Katrina Help.com and realize that through the grace of God and because of Robert I was not only given the domain Katrina Help.com, but Katrina Relief.com, Katrina Donations.com, Katrina Relief Fund.com, and Katrina Cleanup.com, and was thus able to place URL forwards on the latter four domains to bring more traffic to Katrina Help.com.

And because of the news stories in the media about the lawsuit, which all mention Katrina Help.com, innumerable people are coming to Katrina Help.com to take a look.

I can barely believe the statistics page when I look at it. The traffic is extremely high.

And I am thus able to serve the greatest number of people possible.

So my original objectives of assisting as many hurricane survivors as possible, raising as much money as possible for the survivors, and educating as many people about the disaster are being realized.

But now an additional objective has arisen: assisting my good friend Robert.

And I will stand by him and his family and assist them in every way possible.

God bless you Robert.

I love you.

Kevin Caruso
Katrina Help.com
Founder, Director, Editor-in-Chief
Project Care.com
Founder, Director
Tsunamis.com, Prevent Suicide Now.com
Founder, Director, Editor-in-Chief

 

[Mr. Deleted]

Good luck man!

 

[Dave Zan]

Unfortunately, what your friend's going thru is the reality some may face at 1
point. But good luck to you and your friend anyway, he'll really need it.

He'll definitely need counsel, especially legal.

 

[GodBlessYou]

Best of luck Kevin. I'll be praying!

 

[lawpsych]

Good luck, Kevin, and I hope that your efforts on behalf of the many who need assistance are successful.

Sheila

 

[cooljeba]

best of luck for it.

..:: peace ::.
Jeba

 

[Theo]

Accepted a set of domains while the previous owner is in fresh litigation for fraud? I would not want to be in your shoes.

 

[Prosperous]

Sorry to hear this, Kevin, best of luck!

Let us know if there's any updates.


Bless ya!
Rob

 

[marketing]

Simple solutions to these problems.

First, donate the domains to the red cross. This shows your intentions 100% without any doubt.

Second, since the media is so very into publishing info about stories like this. AFTER you have donated the domains to the red cross, make sure EVERY news outlet is aware that this happen, providing quotes from the domain owner, contact info for the persons you spoke with when donating the domains. When you speak with the media outlets (you will need to contact all of them to get good coverage), make sure that you agree or suggest that you are up to a phone interview...which will give them more info and quotes to publish the story (a short story is no story to them).

ALL of this will not only make this situation right, but will allow your friend to right his name, get his side of the story out their (he meant well not harm) and should quiet and stop the litegation against him by the state. Nothing makes a court system look more stupid than trying to press charges against someone who has been generous, like donating domains to the red cross.

You do all of this, and everything will be fine. If you get greedy and try to hold on to the domains...you are looking at even more future problems as ANYONE can claim they were frauded by you once the fraud charges are made public against a domain.

 

[financialtraffic]

People who donate their time, effort or money to help others are truly beautiful people.

Unfortunately creating a Web site to do so and not going through the proper steps and licensure to accept donations can obviously create a tremendous mess. And it appears that has occurred. Even the greatest intentions can misconstrued if things aren't done properly.

That being said I hope that everything works out for all parties involved. Kevin, I wish you the best of luck in aiding your friend.

 

[Theo]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Internet sites purporting to be charities related to Hurricane Katrina have been popping up faster than the FBI can look at them, and many appear to be fraudulent, the head of the FBI's cyber division said Thursday.

There were roughly 2,300 Katrina-related sites by midday Thursday, FBI assistant director Louis M. Reigel said. The number had more than doubled just since Tuesday, Reigel said.

New sites are popping up "faster than we can pound them down," Reigel said. The number of sites and the money being donated already exceeds what the FBI saw following the tsunami, he said.

The Red Cross, whose Web site is one of the most imitated, is working with the FBI to try to identify bogus sites, he said. Several Red Cross impostors are especially well done, he said.

The FBI has so far been able to look at roughly 800, of which 60 percent have an international connection in Eastern Europe, Asia and elsewhere, and are presumed to be bogus, he said. The FBI has opened eight criminal fraud investigations of domestic sites, but no arrests are imminent, he said.

The bureau has received 250 complaints at its Internet complaint center about hurricane-related charities, he said.

Reigel again cautioned people not to respond to solicitations and also warned that such e-mails could contain computer viruses.

People wishing to contribute should contact a well-known organization, he said.

Also Thursday, the Justice Department established a Hurricane Katrina Fraud Task Force that will focus on phony charities, identity theft, insurance scams and government benefit fraud.