Treasure hunter marks five years in jail for refusing to give up his gold

For all we know he wants to be in jail. When you're talking about that much money there could very easily be people waiting to kidnap and torture him for the location if he was ever set free

 

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I agree, but I hope he bugs out and leaves them hunting for him.

 

Prison is not the safest place to be.

 

Depends what kind you're in. Minimum and low security prisons are pretty safe, its medium where you start to see violent offenders and of course maximum and the super maxs are the really dangerous ones

 

I wouldn't shed any tears for those investors. At $12.7M contributed by 161 people, that's an average of about $79K per investor. Anyone who can afford to put $79K into something like that, or even anyone who's likely to even hear about the opportunity, can afford to lose $79K.

Besides, investments have risk. There was a huge upside on this, and a fairly limited downside. They knew what they were getting into, and if they didn't, then they should be glad their losses were fairly limited.

I don't think it said that. It said the coins were under the control of a Belizean trust. I don't believe that implies that the coins are, or necessarily ever were in Belize. I guess I could be wrong, because I don't know anything about Belizean law.

The only crimes he's mentioned of being convicted of are failure to appear and contempt of court.

What makes you think that? He apparently suffers from chronic fatigue syndrome, and I don't think even the government objected to that. They simply claimed that his condition had no bearing on the matter.

Having suffered myself from something like chronic fatigue syndrome for, luckily, only a few months, I can tell you with certainty that if he does have it, his brain is pretty much Swiss cheese right now.

I'm with the people who say he should be let out. After all, the Feds let out an alleged pedophile who was locked up for contempt for over 4 years because he wouldn't decrypt some hard drives for them.

I admit I am not a lawyer, but I am curious how many of those who believe he should be let out are versus how many who think he needs to rot forever.

 

It doesn't matter if they could afford it or not, theres right and theres wrong. Breaking your deal and trying to steal the treasure is wrong.

Massive difference between being unsuccessful and being stolen from which is exactly what he did to the investors. It's basically like a major company saying thanks for investing in our stock but we're selling your shares and keeping the money you should have known their were risks.

It is self inflicted, if he gives up the location of the treasure he gets out and gets his plea deal. He's the one deciding not to give up the location

 

Risk is risk. If they didn't do their due diligence on this guy, that's their fault. And, if they did and invested anyway, that's on them, too. I'm sure for $79K, any one of them could have been on that boat with them during the recovery, if they wanted. No sympathy still.

As for self inflicted, what exactly are you saying? That he's faking chronic fatigue syndrome, or that CFS doesn't turn your brain to Swiss cheese? You, and the government, have a burden of proof here if you want to make either of those assertions.

 

No it's not. Theft is theft

 

If they believed he was likely to steal from them and they invested anyway, too bad. If they didn't do due diligence, too bad. If they did and he stole from them, they have recourse through the courts. IIRC, they were awarded a civil verdict against him, as well. No sympathy.

 

So if someone stole from you everyone should just say too bad?

Which they will never see a cent of the millions he owes them unless he gives up the treasure

 

If I gave them money as part of an investment contract, I do so knowing I could lose my entire investment. We're not talking about someone coming in and stealing my coin collection out of my safe here. We're talking about sophisticated investors who either did due diligence and accepted the risk, or didn't do due diligence, and deserve what they got. Either way, too bad for them.

Are you telling me these people didn't accept any risk when they signed the contract? Because that's not how investments work.

 

Might as well be

Are you telling me it's okay to steal from people or rob your business partners?

He couldn't have even had the chance to find it if it wasnt for his investors

 

I'm telling you that's how investments work. You do your due diligence on your business partners and either accept what happens or go to court and settle it. Or, you don't do due diligence and take whatever you get.

This in no way resembles robbing anyone's coin collection. You're being ridiculous. Moreover, you still haven't met your burden of showing that either CFS is not real, that he doesn't suffer from it, or that it hasn't turned his brain to mush.

This is not me imposing a burden of proof on you. You accept that whenever you accuse someone of a crime.

 

Being stolen from is not how investments work.

Your right this is far worse because this involves 100s of millions of dollars and very few people have a collection that even gets within spitting distance of the value

 

Investments have risk. Signing an investment contract to dredge up gold coins carries risk. Part of that risk is that the guy doing it is going to take off with the gold. Get over it. I never said stealing wasn't wrong, and if you want to keep saying that, I defy you to quote me doing so.

I'm actually glad you brought up my coin collection now. What would you say to me if my collection got stolen, and I didn't have a safe or insurance?

Are you asking me to have sympathy for a group of supposedly sophisticated investors who either did or did not do proper due diligence, who nonetheless chose to invest, and didn't take out insurance?

Don't you believe in personal responsibility?