Up North Progressive

The Steve Ingersoll federal fraud trial adjourned until February 24 due to a juror becoming ill. The first week already revealed the long-established habit of money mishandling that brought Dr. Ingersoll to a federal district court room. Miss Fortune and Bay City Times crime reporter Cole Waterman both do an excellent job covering the trial.

Something significant to already come out of the proceedings is the testimony of James Camiller, a CPA from Lewiston (Idaho?), who very aptly described Ingersoll’s financial methods in a single word. Camiller was hired by Ingersoll in December of 2010 to help with his finances, by April of 2011 Camiller told Ingersoll he didn’t want to work for him any more and that his lack of accurate, clear records were going to cause issues with his taxes. The word James Camiller used to describe what he found was:

ENRONIn case the name doesn’t trigger any memory, Enron was the large conglomerate energy company out of Houston, Texas, that fabricated rolling blackouts in the western part of the country, most notably California. Then they jacked up prices claiming it was necessary because the company couldn’t produce enough energy to meet demand. The company also warehoused a team of executives who were experts at cooking the books, shuffling money around trying to hide what they were really doing until the SEC began investigating. The final act of these executives was to convince employees and shareholders to buy more stock as they quietly offloaded theirs, making lots of money while robbing everyone else at the same time.

Sound familiar?

Statute of limitations in federal cases when financial institutions are involved can be extended past the normal 5 years, which is a good thing because thanks to a brave teacher coming forward and sharing their story, there’s evidence that Steve Ingersoll’s shady practices go back at least 20 years:

I worked as an administrative assistant in the office that treated kids with disabilities such as ADD/ADHD and autism. I never once saw someone cured, but of course I’m not a doctor and was too young at the time to fully understand the BS he was spreading. Lots of shifty practices, sub-companies and corporations that moved A LOT of money around.

This teacher worked at Livingston Developmental Academy, the first school Ingersoll opened with then partner Chuck Stockwell in the mid 1990’s. The optometrist turned educator even then had the habit of moving money from company to company to make funds disappear when he needed funds to reappear in his personal bank account. What makes this even more repugnant is Steve Ingersoll has been playing the Enron shuffle game with taxpayer money.

Stay tuned, the fun resumes next week. It’s a good idea if you haven’t done it yet to bookmark Miss Fortune and Cole Waterman for updates. There may also be the occasional article here as well.