Yesterday, the authorities arrested the founder of Gameon Technology, Alexander Charles Beckman, and lawyer Valerie Lau Beckman (a married couple) because they allegedly betrayed investors of $ 60 million.
In an indictment of 25 years, the US Justice Ministry said that the couple had supposedly fake dozens of bank statements and exams reports that cheated the gameon investors. The alleged fraud lasted six years.
Beckman was the founder and former CEO of Gameon and last year He stepped back After the company claimed that 11 million US dollars were missing in the company’s bank account, which was only left 37 cents instead. The Schloss company and took off the employees in July 2024. The authorities accused him and the lawyer Valerie Lau Beckman – a married couple – for conspiracy, cable fraud, securities fraud, identity theft and other crimes. Lau was also charged with the disability of the judiciary.
According to the indictment submitted on January 21, Beckman (41) and Lau (38) from San Francisco allegedly exchanged ideas to investors, Gameon and a bank. Gameon was a private company in San Francisco that offers a software program that claims artificial intelligence functions that imitates human conversation and interaction, which are generally referred to as chatbot or “chat”.
Customers included prominent American professional sports leagues and teams as well as leading luxury fashion and retail stamps. In the course of the alleged program, Beckman collected over 60 million US dollars from Gameon investors from September 2018 to July 2024. Lau was a lawyer who worked from at least 2016 to 2024 to Gameon company and transaction matters.
The couple married Beckman and Lau in October 2023.
“The Bay Area houses incredible innovations and hard -working entrepreneurs, but innovations cannot grow through fraud. Systems such as those who have commissioned the defendant to with our financial markets and cheats of investors, ”said Patrick D. Robbins, the United States’ first deputy lawyer, in a statement. “This indictment should serve as a memory that we will examine fraudsters and take account of.”
“Fraud undermined the integrity of our capital markets and undermines the trust that investors put in them,” said Dan Costin, incumbent special representative of FBI, in an explanation. “The FBI endeavors to ensure that our financial markets remain fair and transparent by examining and holding those who do deceptive practices.”
As claimed in the indictment, Beckman’s statements against Gameon investors often described non-existent income, bloated money credit and fake and otherwise exaggerated customer relationships. To promote the program, Beckman supposedly used the names of at least seven real people – including fake e -mails and signatures – without their permission to distribute false and fraudulent gameon finance and business information and documents to defend Gameon and its investors .
Among the people whose names Beckman had committed the fraud program was a Gameon CFO, two bank employees and an employee of a large professional sports league, according to the document. Beckman also learned two Gameon Audit reports with the names, signatures and brands of renowned auditing companies, including one of the four large accounting companies to validate incorrect financial degrees, and distributed over a dozen fake bank statements for Gameons accounts as part of the scheme, the indictment was claimed .
After Lau had changed law firms several times, Lau entered a risk capital company in September 2021. The indictment claims that Lau has sent one of these fake audit reports by e -mail to a representative of a Gameon investor via e -mail who knows that it is wrong to invest further investments in the company Ministry of Justice.
In June 2024, Lau promoted the system to defraud by taking a fake Gameon account declaration – one that she knew that Gameon’s credit at a certain financial institution as over 13 million US francisco and ask a bank employee, the fake explanation in one Keep envelope in the bank so that Beckman can be picked up later that day. Lau knew that Beckman was planning to pick up the fake explanation with a Gameon director that represented a great investor in Gameons board. That day Beckman picked up the fake statement with the Gameon director, the indictment says.
In August 2024, when Laus employers Lau turned out to Gameon.
Beckman and Lau were arrested this week and initially performed in front of a federal court in San Francisco. They were not guilty. We tried to reach Beckman for a comment.
An indictment is only claimed that crimes have been committed and all defendants are considered innocent until it has been demonstrated without any doubt. If you are convicted, the defendants will be exposed to the following maximum penalties to a bank; 10 years in prison to assume money transactions that were derived from defined illegal activities; and two years in prison for many serious identity theft. Lau will also face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison due to disability of the judiciary.
The deputy US lawyer Patrick O’Brien follows the case with the help of Lance Libatique and Maryam Beros. The law enforcement is the result of an investigation by the FBI. Beckman and Kalin Stanojev, Chief Product Officer, founded the company in 2014 to build a conversation AI platform for company quality.
In July in July, Stanojev and the head of the company Jon Layman, head of the operations (also not accused), wrote a letter to the shareholders of other corporate officers who claimed that they had discovered their “shock and horror” that the bank account, the millions in Should have millions in whom it was almost empty. The letter states that the board of directors put Beckman under pressure on July 1, 2024.
“This money was of crucial importance for the ongoing business activity of the company in which you invested,” says the letter. “To our shock and our horrors, we found that in reality the account balance in this bank was only 37 cents. The company opened this discovery in a liquidity crisis, and the board and management had to act quickly, in the hope of warding off bankruptcy. “
In an interview in July 2024, Beckman confirmed with Gamesbeat that he left the company in early July. He said that he was unable to discuss the company’s decision to hire the company.
“From the beginning I just wanted the best for the company and its employees. And I stepped down because I thought it was in the best interest of the company. I am aware of communication that describes my departure. This communication contains a number of exaggerations and false information and does not paint a precise picture of what happened, ”he said. “I look forward to correcting the recording, I am working on the whole story at the right time.”
Beckman said that he could not comment on whether there were legal disputes. He confirmed that the company had collected 35.5 million US dollars in a few rounds and that it corresponds to more than 60 employees. He said he loved society and this is an “incredibly painful time”. More of what he said Published our story at the time.
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