minneapolis upside down

--Loosestrife

There's some sort of theme here. I leave town, things succumb to gravity.

Watching the sinking SS Michele from the distance makes her possibly fatal "misstatement" blend into the general Republican disaster. She's going down, the question being whether it is fast enough.

El Tinklenberg has his chance--for the first time in this election, he may control his own fate.

It's an open question whether El is up to it. This race is suddenly fun to watch.

Meanwhile, one can imagine repug operatives burning files in metal barrels as the Democrats speed toward them unimpeded.

Here come the waves.

--Loosestrife

(((Man, I can't keep up with the Vennes/Petters thing, but this very interesting comment on my last post deserves some attention. I have taken the comment and made it a little more user friendly. All credit and blame goes to anonymous. I have not verified any of this. Everything here comes from anonymous, except stuff in triple parentheses--and the photo of Vennes, which comes from the link but did not appear in the original comment.)))

Photo from the web (taken from a Crown Financial Ministries letter) (((Frank Vennes)))

http://img507.imageshack.us/img507/2260/vennesphotoou4.jpg



Here is a picture of the dynamic duo (page 1, lower left): (((Note too some of the other celebrities here.)))

http://www.mnteenchallenge.com/uploads/pdfs/Newsletters/newsletter_200707.pdf

Link to Vennes so-called conversion to God/faith (page 3):

http://www.faithstudies.org/news/letter/archive/2001/06-07JuneJuly_1.4MB.pdf

Court cases. Give close attention to the verdicts as they show the actions of someone who has not been changed by faith in God:

http://www.websupp.org/data/DMN/0:05-cv-01780-13-DMN.pdf

http://www.websupp.org/data/DMN/0:06-cv-01041-39-DMN.pdf

http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F3/26/26.F3d.1448.93-1737.html

Frank E. Vennes, Jr. and his attorney, G. Craig Howse, are real slime. I pray that the government prosecutes them to the maximum extend of the law. They steal and cheat honest people out of their money, under the guise of giving MILLIONS to Christian charities.

(((--Loosestrife)))

Frank Vennes Jr. leads an interesting life. Turning himself over to Jesus Christ, he leapt from the federal prison in Sandstone, MN into a lucrative life of ordained wealth, this after a modest pre-prison existence as a pawnbroker and felonious sleaze bag.

Now Frank's little winning streak has probably ended.

But not before Vennes braided a multicolored cable of born-again politics, chem-dep conniving, faith-based "nonprofits," questionable business practices, holy higher education, poverty pimping, and the mysterious ways of Allah.

Vennes still has not been charged with any crime but Jon Tevlin of the Strib details Vennes' role in the corrupt Petters operation: "Vennes was a facilitator who persuaded five major investors to invest $1.2 billion in companies controlled by Petters. The document says Vennes collected more than $28 million in commissions for his work."

*******************

A little digging brings it all back home to south Minneapolis, where the notorious Minnesota Teen Challenge is left holding the (empty) bag.

Minnesota Teen Challenge is an oddly named chem-dep treatment nonprofit corporation that serves primarily adults--linked to a national organization, Teen Challenge USA, it is a religiously based operation, an arm of the Assemblies of God, as is Sarah Palin's church .

It's reputation is infamous. Homophobic, bigoted, rigid, and religiously biased it nonetheless operates with the apparent blessing of the "community," while privately some in the treatment industry will confess that its doctrinaire Christian approach to addiction is beyond the bounds of propriety and doesn't treat anything. Victims of its programs are a bit harsher. They'll tell of the rather wacky theories of addiction espoused by the "counselors" in the program (ie. demonic possession) and of those counselors' irrational of fear of sexuality and hatred for anyone who does not accept their word as scripture.

It's not that some people don't get sober through the program. It's that MnTC makes unsubstantiated claims about its success rate, and if you know anything about the Minnesota treatment industry--and are honest--you know that treatment programs can easily cook the books by running off bad risks early and relying on addicts' own words about their sobriety.

Further, if you are Jewish, Muslim, the wrong kind of Christian, a skeptic, or of any of the myriad wayward faiths and are not willing to swallow the lunch meat that is being served, you will not get any help with your addiction at MnTC. That's because an individual's sobriety is the tertiary goal at Minnesota Teen Challenge after his or her religious conversion.

But I digress.
*******************
More importantly at the moment, Minnesota Teen Challenge has rapidly expanded operations like an overly aggressive start-up company in the past few years, mirroring Petters rise from a dealer of second hand goods to a multifaceted corporate machine. Under the firm thumb of Assembly of God alpha-male pastor Rich Scherber, who took the languishing business--I mean program--and scammed lots of donations to jump start it, MnTC has turned into a local treatment industry juggernaut. The program has moved into education, residential treatment, after care, publishing, and into our schools--with outposts now in Duluth and Brainerd. You can read the legend here.

Thanks to Mr. Vennes and the Star Tribune, we have been given a glimpse into a another side of the success of MnTC, financial.

MnTC now is faced with the harsh reality, that that other success was predicated on Petters Ponzi scheme and that they are likely out a cool $5.8 million according to the Strib.

The picture is incomplete, but we know that Vennes sat on the board of MnTC and that he allegedly worked as a "facilitator" of the Petters Ponzi scheme (inc.), encouraging investment in various Petters enterprises.

Soon after the Petters story broke, MnTC posted this letter which in part says,"[A] donor suggested that we work with the Harvest Fund, and later the Fidelis Foundation, organizations that work with many other Christian ministries, and consider investing some of his large charitable gifts in the Petters Companies, a once strong, respected corporate entity in Minnesota."

Who was that donor? At this point, MnTC won't disclose the donor's identity except to say that he or she knew Petters. The donation was significant, $3.225 million. Did Vennes use the "nonprofit" MnTC as just another way to facilitate investment in the Ponzi scheme? He apparently "reviewed" the investment as a member of MnTC's finance committee.

Isn't it a little odd that no one at MnTC seems to have wondered about the fabulous rate of return they were getting on their investments, as much as 24% on 90 day notes at one point? I know that it is unusual in the nonprofit world for a donor to earmark its donation as an investment in a specific company. At least, I used to think so.

But of course, God was at work.

The money was invested through the aforementioned Fidelis Foundation, the nature of which is a little vague, the Strib reporting that "Fidelis is a public charity that also serves as an investment agent for other public charities and nonprofits, including Teen Challenge."

But it is a "public charity" that invested $27 million+ in Petters but nothing in a website, apparently. Unless?

Who is the chair of the Fidelis Foundation?

That would be Craig Howse, Vennes personal attorney who often conducts Vennes' business.

So let's get this straight. MnTC invested money from an unnamed donor in Petters enterprises at said donor's recommendation. The donor knew Tom Petters. The money was invested through the Fidelis Foundation, chaired by Craig Howse, Frank Vennes Jr.'s attorney, while Vennes sat on the MnTC board and also operated as a facilitator recruiting fresh investors to the Petters Ponzi scheme.

Hmm, and who does your laundry?

Howse, appears , as does Rich Scherber, in this youtube video extolling the virtues of Hope Commons, located at 2300 Chicago Avenue South, which houses, among other "faith-based" programs, a part of the Minnesota Teen Challenge empire. A picture of Vennes appears nowhere on the web--odd for a man with his connections.

Meanwhile, the story of Vennes' (and Howse's) political contributions to Michele Bachmann and her letter on Vennes' behalf asking for his pardon is breaking wide open, thanks to the diligent work of the Dump Bachmann folks and the local independent press.

I hope some enterprising journalist has picked up this side story to the Petters fiasco--the connections between easy money and faith-based initiatives at work in Minneapolis, the nexus of Christian poverty-pimps and sleazy business types, and the hypocrisy and corruption behind it all.

I'd love to do it myself, but I have to go to work.

UPDATE: (10/9 6:34 PM) Judge Ann Montgomery's order to seize assets lists Frank Vennes Jr. as a defendant and lists Hope Commons as one of his businesses, ie. Frank Vennes Jr. dba (doing business as) Hope Commons. I am no lawyer, but that would seem to mean that Hope Commons is in receivership.

--Loosestrife

Before Tom Petters became a player, the name Petters evoked a certain low-end charm. I'd hit a Petters Warehouse store looking for bargains: there'd be pallets of cheap and tacky home furnishings to step around to get to the electronics or office furniture or appliances or sporting goods. Thinking this over, I don't remember ever buying anything substantial, but it was always kind of fun to run through a Petters Warehouse just to see what they had. More often it was ridiculous rather than sublime--but ultimately just entertaining enough for a few wasted minutes.

Not in the market for floral themed coasters, I eventually gave the Petters remainerama thing up for the cheap thrill of Savers, but I of course remembered the Petters name. Not one to spend my days mulling over the business world, I didn't expend effort considering it, but I did often wonder how Tom had leveraged his foothold in the retail detritus world into a powerful business presence and membership in the philanthropic elite.

Maybe now we know.
********************
If one is to believe the Feds, Petters success came the old-fashion way: he worked hard, and he cheated whenever practicable .

At its core, it's a dog bites man story, really. Scams are as quintessentially American. From Enron to the bailout, there is always the sales pitch, always the other set of books, always the failure of memory, and always the suckers.

No Jeff Skilling, Petters allegedly ran the oldest scam in the book, the classic Ponzi scheme. Nothing as innovative as the Enron style vaporware investments like weather derivatives, although the Petters story is still developing. I could be selling Tom short, so to speak; there may be plenty of creative twists in his business practices that have yet to come to light.

Today, the Strib reports that federal judge Ann Montgomery ordered that Petters assets be seized and designated Doug Kelley, a Minneapolis attorney, as the receiver. Meanwhile, Tom Petter's owned Sun Country Airlines declared bankruptcy.

This story is huge and would be dominating the Minnesota news cycle except for a most significant presidential election in the midst of a world-wide economic meltdown.

It's the devilish details that fascinate me, however, casting light as they do on darkened corners of south Minneapolis. Prayer doesn't protect you when there is no honor among thieves.

--Loosestrife