The attorneys ran into a problem. Many investors refused to file, refused to even talk to government investigators. The problem was the Internet, and the never-ending stream of rumors led by Dove and others that urged Omega victims to clam up.
"All this miscommunication, all this misinformation," Sanchez said. "Everybody kept saying, ´I´m told that it´s gonna pay tomorrow, so I´m not talking to you.´ No matter how hard we tried to persuade people that the information being put out there was erroneous, people didn´t want to believe it. We fought for a long time to find somebody who did not distrust the government - somebody who believed that they had been defrauded."
Hood´s former attorney, Douglas McNabb, received phone calls and e-mails from Omega investors for months after the trials ended. They wanted the truth - the real truth.
McNabb told them that Hood said Omega was a scam. He had testified to it in open court.
The callers politely said they understood. They figured Clyde had to say that, just to cut his exposure. But when would Omega pay?
"Some of these people, they just really, really believe it," McNabb said. "That´s why these people are so susceptible to being victimized again."
It´s true, according to experts: For some reason, being defrauded affects the victim like a drug.
"A very well-known phenomenon," says Andreas Schroeder, co-chairman of the creative writing department at the University of British Columbia and author of several books on scam artists and confidence games.
"People who have been suckered once are your very best bet to be suckered again. You´d think they´d be the last people willing to be conned. Nope. It´s almost as if you´re genetically prone to believing that kind of stuff. Once you´ve gone one step of the way, there´s no reverse - it´s only forward."
Fame
On Sept. 11, 2001, hours after planes hijacked by terrorists struck the World Trade Center and Pentagon, Dove posted the message that made her a star.
"The three targets today were ALL connected to NESARA and the banking changes. I just learned that at 9:00 a.m. in New York this morning, there was an IMPORTANT banking activity set to be activated in the IMF international banking computer center in the World Trade Center!" she wrote. "This was obviously WHY the World Trade Center was attacked TODAY at just before and after 9:00 a.m.! ... The orders for these plane attacks came from U.S. citizens who are trying to stop our deliveries/funding and NESARA."
The impact on the Internet was electric. Here was a new rumor to chew. Almost immediately, Dove´s message appeared on every Omega bulletin board, and leapfrogged to other sites devoted to conspiracy theory.
In Illinois, assistant U.S. attorney Sanchez, who had continued to follow the doings of the Omeganites, read the message and turned away.
"Once I saw that, I said I´m not going to follow this anymore," he says.
From Louisiana, Harvey Barnard posted an angry message on his NESARA Web site.
"Pure idiocy," he wrote. "Such stories would be humorous if the tragedies of that infamous Tuesday had not happened. We find all such rumor-mongering to be despicable, and the nature of such messages is mindlessness at its worst."
Again, Dove waved off the criticism.
"What would you expect them to say?" she wrote.
With one stroke, Dove mixed con, conspiracy, terrorism, faith, finance and politics. Within a month, her e-group gained more than 1,000 subscribers.
"Brilliant," says Schroeder, the scam historian. "That´s cunning. That is definitely magnificent."
Sean Robinson: 253-597-8486
[email protected]SIDEBAR: FROM CANDACE TO SHAINI TO DOVE
May 4, 1947: Candace Darlene Goodwin, later known as Shaini Goodwin and "Dove of Oneness," is born.
August 1962: Goodwin crowned queen of the McCleary Bear Festival.
June 1965: Goodwin graduates from Elma High School.
April 1980: Goodwin begins working on a temporary basis for the state Department of Social and Health Services as a computer operator. She works for the state off and on for the next decade.
1988: Goodwin joins or partners with a Las Vegas woman to create EAN Corp., a Delaware corporation.
June 1989: Goodwin returns to state employment with DSHS.
July 18, 1989: Goodwin files for bankruptcy.
1990: Harvey Barnard, an engineer from Louisiana, writes a proposed congressional bill he calls NESARA: the National Economic Stabilization and Recovery Act.
1992: Goodwin leaves state employment, moves to Port Angeles, changes her name to Shaini.
1994: Clyde Hood and co-conspirators begin the Omega investment fraud scheme in Mattoon, Ill.
1997: IRS files lien on Goodwin, seeking unpaid taxes of $12,000.
1998: Goodwin, now living in Yelm, buys two units in the Omega investment fraud scheme for $100 each.
November 1999: Goodwin begins writing Internet reports as "Dove," citing secret sources who tell her Omega will pay as promised.
Aug. 13, 2000: Goodwin´s reports begin to discuss a "secret law" that affects "prosperity programs," including Omega.
Aug. 28, 2000: Hood and 18 co-conspirators are indicted on fraud and money-laundering charges related to the Omega scheme.
Aug. 29, 2000: Goodwin´s report says the Illinois court case "has been staged" to stop Omega from paying out.
December 2000: Goodwin´s reports begin to reference NESARA, which she says Congress has secretly passed.
April 10, 2001: Hood pleads guilty to charges of mail fraud, wire fraud and money laundering, admits that Omega is a scam.
April 13, 2001: Goodwin calls the court action in Illinois "a smoke-screen," and dismisses Hood´s confession.
DELAYS AND DONATIONS
Sept. 11, 2001: Goodwin´s Internet report says the terror attacks were planned by the U.S. government to prevent NESARA from being announced.
Nov. 4, 2001: Goodwin claims NESARA will be announced "anytime this week."
Nov. 29, 2001: Goodwin says she will not ask her readers for money.
Jan. 1, 2002: Goodwin says NESARA announcement was "seconds away," but delayed by U.S. Supreme Court.
Jan. 15, 2002: Goodwin claims "mass deliveries" from prosperity programs will arrive "this month."
Jan. 25, 2002: Goodwin thanks readers for sending donations.
April 4, 2002: Goodwin claims NESARA will be announced "tonight."
April 11, 2002: Goodwin starts Dove "voice reports" on a Seattle phone line.
April 14, 2002: Goodwin says prosperity deliveries will arrive by mid-April.
June 10, 2002: Goodwin asks for donations.
July 8, 2002: Goodwin claims the World Court has delayed NESARA announcement until spring 2003.
July 28, 2002: Goodwin claims those who speak against NESARA will lose their funding.
Oct. 15, 2002: Goodwin claims the East Coast sniper attacks were a CIA operation and that some reported deaths of sniper victims are "not true."
Nov. 19, 2002: Goodwin asks for donations.
June 20, 2003: Goodwin asks for donations.
Oct. 4, 2003: Goodwin claims NESARA supporters have sent 51,000 e-mails to the World Court in the Netherlands.
Feb. 4, 2004: Goodwin asks for donations.
April 7, 2004: NESARA billboard trucks appear in Washington, D.C.
April 22, 2004: Goodwin asks for donations.
June 24, 2004: Goodwin urges supporters to hand out NESARA fliers at theaters showing the Michael Moore film "Fahrenheit 9/11."
SIDEBAR: ANATOMY OF A CONSPIRACY THEORY
Shaini Goodwin, who calls herself Dove of Oneness, is the architect of a conspiracy theory that grew out of a financial scam. Here it is, in a nutshell:
•In 1998, she puts money into Omega, an investment fraud scheme that runs from 1994 to 2000 and robs victims of $20 million.
•Omega´s ringleader, Clyde Hood, confesses his crimes in 2001, and admits Omega is a scam.
•Goodwin writes Internet reports as "Dove," says Hood´s confession is a lie and that Omega is real. She claims a secret law called NESARA - the National Economic Security and Reformation Act - will unlock the wealth held in Omega and other "prosperity programs."
•Dove´s reports claim Congress secretly passed NESARA in 2000 but that leaders cannot reveal its existence because violating a U.S. Supreme Court gag order on NESARA is punishable by death.
•Dove claims the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the East Coast sniper shootings and the Iraq war are diversions planned and plotted by the Bush administration to prevent NESARA´s announcement.
• According to Dove, once NESARA is announced, banking rules will change and "mass deliveries" from more than 60 "prosperity programs," including Omega, will arrive.
SIDEBAR: THE SECRET LAW ACCORDING TO DOVE
Despite facts to the contrary, Dove of Oneness insists Congress passed a secret law in 2000. Here´s what her Web site, www.nesara.us, says the secret NESARA law does:
•Forgives credit card, mortgage and other bank debt.
•Abolishes the IRS, creates a flat-rate sales tax.
•Initiates the U.S. Treasury Bank System, which absorbs the Federal Reserve, and new precious metals-backed U.S. Treasury currency.
•Restores constitutional law.
•Requires resignations of current administration to be replaced by NESARA president and vice president designates until new elections within 120 days.
•Requires the president designate to declare "peace," enabling international banking improvements to proceed; ends "U.S. aggressive military actions immediately, and many more improvements."
Coming Monday: Dove battles "the dark agenda"
Up against ´the dark agenda´: Shaini Goodwin says those who question her word risk the loss of their prosperity. She swears that those who deny the existence of the secret law NESARA are lying. She claims those who debunk her claims are tools of the CIA and other powerful forces. Still, her following is growing.
The feds are so pedantic with their scams, they just literally fall over you - IF YOU´RE PAYING ATTENTION. What is the name of this lady again?
Shaini Goodwin (CIA)
This is and always was - as I´ve been stating for years, a CIA Op. It´s not real. It´s a misdirect. A pack of farging lies. And look at her name. GOODWIN. Ooops.
:o(
