Goldfinger/eBullion President Charged With Murder Of His Wife

The Los Angeles District Attorney’s office announced today that in addition to Jose Moya, James Fayed, has been charged with capitol murder, in the death of his wife, Pamela Fayed.

Fayed, with his wife, owned Goldfinger Bullion & Coin and eBullion. Fayed has been in jail since the murder on charges relating to illegal business transactions.

Fayed reportedly paid Moya $25,000.00 to arrange the murder of his wife. The complaint also lists the involvement of at least one additional co-conspirator who is not yet in police custody.

EPJ Frontdesk

Arrest In Goldfinger Murder

Paul Huebl at Crime, Guns and Videotape is reporting that records of the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reveal that, Jose Luis Moya, 47 has been charged with the hacking, slashing and stabbing death of Pamela Fayed, 44 last July in Century City, CA. Moya was ordered, held without bail by a L.A. Superior Court Commissioner.

Fayed was the wife of James Fayed who is being held without bail on charges related to his Goldfinger Coin & Bullion and eBullion businesses.The state has taken control of some $24 million in gold that was part of Fayed's business.

Moya was arrested on September 11 by the LAPD Robbery/Homicide Division.

"Sources close to the investigation revealed that Moya, a key employee of James Fayed is part of a conspiracy to murder Pamela Fayed and that he is not believed to be the actual killer of the woman," according to Huebl.

-EPJ Newsdesk

US Attorney: Terrorist Link to Some Goldfinger Bullion Money Transfers

The murder of Pamela Fayed , the subsequent arrest of James Fayed for operating a money transmission business without a license and the government seizure of some millions of dollars in gold bullion, now appears to be simply the surface story as the first details emerge of terrorist links to the movement of some money through Fayed's firm.

It appears that the arrest of Fayed on charges that he ran a money transmitting business through Goldfinger Coin & Bullion and also through eBullion without proper licenses may have been a forced hand of prosecutors because of the murder of Pamela Fayed (and their belief that James Fayed was responsible for the murder of his wife, possibly killed by James Fayed's brother).

According to a filing made this week by attorneys for Fayed, Godfinger Coin and Fayed may not have been be the targets "of a long standing" FBI and IRS investigation in which Assistant U. S. Attorney Mark Aveis told a US District court magistrate back in February, in a sworn statement, that Goldfiner and eBullion were highly visible going concerns and that an indictment at the time should be sealed, so that "real-time monitoring of the flow of criminal proceeds could continue.".

Aveis added that the indictment of Fayed and Goldfinger were " one of several steps in a long-term investigation by the FBI and IRS regarding fraud, money laundering and terrorist financing..."

With some $24 million in gold bullion involved, there's room for all sorts of funny transactions.In fact, the filing states that in the past 36 months, Fayed had cooperated on numerous investigations with various government agencies, including the SEC, the CFTC, US Attorneys in Connecticut, Nevada and Washington, the FBI, the FTC and state and local governments.

The filing states that since its inception in 2001, eBullion has had over 466,300 users accounts.

One promising bit of news for those with gold accounts with Goldfnger or eBullion, the filing states that the government seized $24 million in gold and silver, which suggests that account holders may eventually receive some, if not all, of their original investment.

Link to filing via Crimes, Guns and Videotape.

Goldfinger Murder Suspect To Be Arraigned In Federal Court On Monday

Because we have readers who have money tied up with Goldfinger and/or eBullion, we will continue to post updates whenever they are available.

The latest comes from Paul Huebl over at Crimes, Guns and Videotape, who reports:

James Fayed is suspected of having his own wife, Pamela Fayed murdered during an acrimonious divorce. Pamela Fayed was assisting the FBI who was investigating Fayed’s gold trading, Ponzi scheme businesses. That was until she was horrifically stabbed and slashed to death in a Century City parking structure.

Monday, Aug 18, Fayed is expected to enter a formal plea to the Indictment charging him with operating without a required license. This is also the time that a trial judge will be assigned and a schedule of discovery matters will start. A pre-trial court date will be given and an actual trial date will be projected.

Soon we can expect to see a flurry of defense motions designed to get the indictment tossed.

Since Fayed is in custody, I doubt that he will waive time under speedy trial rules and force the government to try him expeditiously. It’s too early to tell exactly what defenses may be raised. However, I have my own expectations.

I would not be surprised to see the defense claim that Fayed relied on his murdered wife to obtain the necessary licensing from the State of California and that he reasonably believed she got the license. Of course I suspect that will be followed with a claim that his wife did not get the license and then falsely informed the FBI that James Fayed had no intention of getting the license.

As for the LAPD murder investigation, it is still stalled because they have been unable to locate and interview Anthony Fayed, the older brother of James Fayed who is being sought on unrelated felony warrants.

It appears that the working hypothesis of the LAPD is that James Fayed had his brother Anthony kill Pamela Fayed. James and Pamela were meeting with their divorce lawyers, before she was killed in the parking garage of the Century City-Los Angeles office building where the divorce meeting took place. James lingered after their meeting with his lawyers so he has an alibi for the time of the murder. His brother Anthony has a rap sheet for various barroom brawls and the like. Some time back, Pamela sought to have a restraining order placed against Anthony.

Huebl has actual court documents at his site, here.

U.S. District Judge Reverses Bail Decision on Fayed

Today A District Court Judge overruled a U.S. Magistrate by reversing the order that James Fayed be released on $500,000.00 bail. According to the AP the judge ruled Fayed a flight risk and ordered him held without bond.

For details on this financial murder mystery go here.

Should The Name 'Goldfinger' Have Been A Tip Off Of Trouble...

..for those who sent money to James Fayed?

Writes Paul Huebl at CrimeFileNews.com:

Goldfinger Coin and Bullion Sales was the apparent brainchild of James Michael Fayed, 45. Today the government says it was nothing more than a $20 million scam...

Author, Ian Fleming created that great spy, James Bond and among others that master criminal, Auric Goldfinger. Goldfinger was a man of unparalleled greed who concocted a scheme to contaminate and make useless the world’s gold reserves starting at Fort Knox, KY. Goldfinger’s plan was to make all gold but his own nonnegotiable thereby dramatically inflating his own immense wealth.

James Michael Fayed had his own scheme for wealth and adopted the Goldfinger name for his business. It was just a decade ago in 1997 when Fayed filed Chapter 7 Bankruptcy listing thousands in debts. Today he was found to have surrounded himself with millions in gold bullion, cash, guns and real estate. Prosecutors say Fayed’s new wealth came from a common Ponzi scheme designed to part investor’s from their money...

Over the years I’ve investigated some really interesting characters that have stolen millions through Ponzi schemes. Some like Fayed have taken dark names for their businesses that should have tipped off their customers such as Quality Screw, Sunovabeach Club and Mein Geld.

Ed Schneider of Quality Screw who bilked his way into a fortune before he went to prison was famous for the savvy businessmen he ripped off. They were almost all accountants, lawyers and physicians.

Murdered Fayed Wanted to Cooperate With Prosecutors

About a month before she was stabbed to death in a parking garage in Los Angeles, CA in an area known as Century City, which is a high rent district consisting of office towers for high-priced lawyers and the like (Robert Shapiro has office space in one of the towers.),Pamela Fayed notified federal prosecutors that she wanted to cooperate in a criminal probe into the international gold trading business she owned with her estranged husband, James Fayed, according to documents filed Tuesday in federal court by Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark Aveis.

The government has been investigating the couple's business as a possible Ponzi scheme. They operated under the names, Goldfinger Coin and Bullion Sales and an associated Internet firm, e-Bullion.

At a hearing Monday, Aveis told a federal magistrate judge that an SUV linked to the attack on Pamela Fayed was rented with a credit card bearing James Fayed's name. Aveis also said that Fayed had previously threatened his wife, with whom he was going through a bitter divorce, and said that he could have her killed "and my hands would be clean." Citing this and other evidence, Aveis asked U.S. Magistrate Judge Ralph Zarefsky to detain Fayed without bail.

But Zarefsky denied the request, citing "pretty thin" evidence connecting the murder charge to the federal case, and set bail for Fayed at $500,000. But he also ordered Fayed held until today to allow prosecutors to appeal his decision.

Aveis told the court on Monday that the Fayeds had taken in some $20 million in what he termed a "Ponzi scheme". $3 million in gold was seized from James Fayed's house on Friday. There has yet been no public accounting as to how much is still owed to depositors of the $20 million that the couple originally took in, and how much, outside of the $3 million seized, can be accounted for.

UPDATE: We are now reading the latest filing from Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Aveis, according to the filing James Fayed has $2.2 million in real estate equity and $7 million in assets.

Three Million in Gold Bullion Seized at Gold Dealers House

Authorities have seized $60,000 cash, some of it sealed in shrink wrap, and $3 million in gold bullion at the Moorpark, CA ranch house of James Fayed, whose wife, Pamela, was murdered last week. Twenty-five assault rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition were also seized from the house, according to Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark R. Aveis

Fayed, who was seeking a divorce from his wife, both jointly owned Goldfinger Coin and Bullion Sales and an associated Internet firm, e-Bullion.

Fayed was arrested Friday evening on charges relating to his business. In a court hearing today in Los Angeles, CA, Aveis characterized Fayed's business operations during 2005 and 2006 as ponzi schemes in which individuals invested up to $20 million.

In a further bombshell development, police have determined that the vehicle used by the murderer in the slaying of Pamela Fayed was rented with a credit card bearing the name of her estranged husband.

The credit card was seized from the wallet of James Fayed during a recent search of his Moorpark ranch house, said Aveis.

On Gold, Murder and Privacy In California

I have been following the story of the murder of Pamela Fayed, who with her husband, ran Goldfinger Coin and Bullion Sales and an associated Internet firm, e-Bullion.

She was seeking a divorce and had recently asked a friend about getting an armed bodyguard. This past Monday, she was attacked by a man with a knife and killed in the parking garage of a Los Angeles office complex where she had been visiting a lawyer. The murder does not appear to be random.

The husband, James Fayed, was arrested on Friday by the FBI on charges related to his gold trading business.

Rick Copelan, president of the Better Business Bureau for Santa Barbara, Ventura and San Luis Obispo counties, said e-Bullion has an "F" rating, primarily because of "16 unanswered complaints going back as far as 36 months.

According to LaTi, Mark Werksman, Fayed's attorney and a former federal prosecutor, said he was troubled by the timing of his client's arrest.

"They accelerated this as a result of Pam's death on Monday," he said. "I believe they are using this as a tactic to apply pressure at a time when he is most vulnerable because of this tragedy that he suffered."

One former client who's not complaining is Stephen Leeper, who said in an interview with LaTi that he invested $10,000 with e-Bullion and got a return of a little more than $30,000 in less than five months. With those kind of returns, it sounds like a possible Ponzi scheme. If you hold gold there, I would be at their door tomorrow morning, faster than you can say, "I have uninsured money on deposit with IndyMac".

So there's gold and murder involved, but the real story may be your privacy if you have a California driver's license. Check out The Los Angeles Times coverage of the story and notice the picture of Pamela Fayed, here. Does the pose look familiar? Does it look like a driver's license pose? It should. Now, check out the credit for the photo on the bottom right hand corner. It's DMV. A source has tipped us off that the California DMV has sold access to all it's driver's license photos to LaTi along with the right for LaTi to print those photos any time it chooses! Welcome to the world of Big Brother trying to make a little scratch.

As for Goldfinger and e-Bullion, there has to be some very worried gold buyers, who hold gold with these companies. It should be a lesson learned for the rest of us. Why put someone between you and your gold, if you are going to buy gold take possession and store it yourself.

UPDATE: Three million in gold bullion found at Fayed's house. Prosecutor charges Ponzi scheme. Car used in murder was rented using James Fayed credit card. Full details here.