Debt Settlement Outfit Cops Guilty Plea For Ripping Off Consumers Seeking Credit Card Relief; First Six Monthly Payments Went Almost Entirely Towards Fees: Feds

From the U.S. Department of Justice (Washington, D.C.):

• An Orange County, California, man pleaded guilty [] for his role in operating fraudulent debt relief firms that offered to settle credit card debts but instead took victims’ payments as undisclosed up-front fees, the Justice Department and U.S. Postal Inspection Service announced.
  
  Jeremy Nelson, 30, pleaded guilty to one count of an indictment alleging conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud in connection with companies known as Nelson Gamble & Associates (Nelson Gamble) and Jackson Hunter Morris & Knight LLP (Jackson Hunter).
  
  According to the indictment, Nelson and his employees portrayed the debt relief companies as law firms and attorney-based companies that would negotiate favorable settlements with creditors. Clients made monthly payments expecting the money to go toward settlements. Nelson and his co-conspirators instead took at least 15 percent of the total debt as company fees, with the first six months of payments going almost entirely toward undisclosed up-front fees.

For more, see California Man Operating Phone Room in Debt Relief Scam Pleads Guilty to Defrauding Consumers.