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I was an employee of this company. Eric will claim experience in taking multiple companies public. Not true. He has not ever taken any company public. He also claims to have written Peachtree Accounting software at the age of 15. Also not true.
The company has been investigated by the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC)since December 2009. The SEC seized all of UAV's bank accounts in 12/09. Investors have not received their monthly interest payments since 12/09. None of the employees was paid since the SEC seized the bank accounts either so they all resigned. UAV has one unpaid intern to answer the phones now.
Due to Eric Hollowell's hypochondria, the company has expenses far exceeding its income. One of his investors is a "cash-only" Mexican farmer who says he made his money "selling vegetables by the side of the road". They invested $1 million in cash, all in $100 bills. The investor said he "doesn't trust banks". Draw your own conclusions on the legality of that money. That money is now in the bank accounts that were seized by the SEC.
The SEC determined that the former president, David Thomas, was not licensed to sell securities in California. By the way, Dave was president in name only. He resided in a separate company, All American Capital. Their only product, Early Detect, never went public after 9 years and the investors know now that they have been scammed. Dave claimed to have a PhD degree, also a lie.
SEC sues Irvine firm for $10 million bond scheme
June 14th, 2010, 3:20 pm
Companies in Irvine and New Mexico settled charges that they defrauded investors who bought $10 million in so-called "convertible bonds, " the Securities and Exchange Commission said Monday.
The SEC said United American Ventures LLC of Irvine guaranteed investors a 10 percent up-front bonus plus a 25 percent annual return on their money. In reality, the SEC charged, the company never made a profit. It plowed investors' funds into exorbitant salaries and other expenses.
In addition to the company, the commission sued co-founders Philip Lee David Jack Thomas, 74, of Newport Beach, and Eric J. Hollowell, 37, of Irvine.
United American Ventures sold its bonds in $25, 000 blocks. It claimed to sell only to "accredited investors" - people with a net worth of at least $1 million plus at least $200, 000 in annual income. In fact, the SEC said, Integra, the promoter, used websites and other means to lure unsophisticated investors.
One investor, a retired Kansas teacher, plowed a $64, 000 lump-sum pension payment into the scheme.
Thomas - who also goes by the names P. David Thomas, David J. Thomas and Dave Thomas - was banned by a California court in 2001 from participating in securities sales. That order grew out of an enforcement action by the state Department of Corporations.
Sales materials for the bonds did not mention the ban on Thomas or a 2009 lawsuit against him for securities fraud, the SEC said. Nor did sales materials mention that 12 cents of every invested dollar went to the promoter.
See the SEC page here - http://www.sec.gov/litigation/litreleases/2010/lr21556.htm
I told you so.
As an investor in UAV I have come to know Mr. Hollowell not only on a business level but as someone I proudly call my friend! Honest to a fault, I find it appalling these smear tactics by disgruntled ex-employess and over zealous SEC investigators grasping for career straws!
If you want to KNOW THE TRUTH about the man and his mission to save millions of lives, Then take the time to read this investigated report that address each lie and accusation and SETS THE RECORD STRAIGHT! CAN YOU HANDLE THE
TRUTH? THEN BE PREPARED TO BE SHOCKED! www.uav-hollowell.org
www.uav-hollowell.org
That's not all. The weirdness and deception of Eric Hollowell extends to his wife!
The wife of this man is going around fraudulently submitting "change of address" requests to the local postoffice in Irvine (Sand Canyon Ave, Irvine, CA 92619) for homes they do NOT own, and trying to have mail belonging to OTHER people to a secret post office box.
Once again, this woman submitted THREE "change of address" requests for addresses they do not live at, and tried to have mail redirected to their post office box at USPS, Sand Canyon Ave, Irvine, CA 92619.
This is a federal offense. I don't know what exactly she was trying to do. The way "change of address" works is that only mail addressed to Hollowell will be forwarded to the PO Box.
1) Perhaps they are giving out other people's address as their own?
2) Perhaps they are having banned goods shipped to other people's addresses and then having them forwarded to the PO box?
3) There is a rumor that Eric Hollowell has gone missing. Maybe they are trying to confuse people who are trying to find Eric Hollowell?
I don't know what her motive is, but it's clear that this wasn't a mistake or a typo. She specifically filled out THREE change of address requests with the post office, trying to have mail forwarded from three addresses that they do NOT live at.
Please be very careful of this family.
I saw where the sec got a judgement against them and the judge ordered them to pay back the money does anyone out there know anymore than that?...as an investor that lost money do we need to make a claim?
Risky venture seeking dockworkers' retirement funds.
Los Angeles Business Journal, March 15, 2004
A group with plans to start a trucking company at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has raised $3 million, mostly from unionized dockworkers who are being encouraged to raid their 401(k) retirement accounts for an investment that is described in the prospectus as high risk.
The stock sales, led by a self-described Investment Banker
While there is no indication that the private offering itself is illegal, the prospectus is filled with unusual provisions and claims.
Among the examples: If all of the targeted $12 million is raised, company insiders will own about 80 percent of the company, despite having contributed few hard assets. Typically, financial investors would take a much larger stake in a start-up than 20 percent. The company projects sales of $36.7 million this year--and ramping up from there--even though it has yet to begin operations, has not signed a lease on a container storage yard and has no customers.
On the second page of the prospectus encourages investors to withdraw funds from their 410(k) retirement accounts--even offering to offset the 10 percent early withdrawal penalty with a 10 percent discount on the $6 per share offering price.
"If it were a friend or relative who was going to invest their 401(k) money in this venture, I would stop what I am doing and drive them to an insane asylum, " said Jeff Winikow, a Century City attorney specializing in employee rights. "If you have to dip into dip into your 401(k), you shouldn't be investing in something this speculative."
Under Securities and Exchange Commission Rules; enacted by the SEC to assist in the regulation of US financial markets, investors must be "qualified" to buy into private offerings that will not be registered with the SEC. The purpose of these rules is to shield unsophisticated investors from highly risky offerings.
By virtue of their high net worth and high incomes--over $100, 000 a year, in many cases--many unionized longshoremen qualify.
"We tell the people basically, if you want to take a high risk and put in a small portion of your assets, then do it, " said David Thomas, president of Irvine-based All American Capital Corp., which has taken the lead role in promoting the offering.
Thomas, who serves on the board of the start-up company Allied Port Transporters Inc., minimizes the risk involved. "To me, this is a slam dunk winner because we have hired the best people in the United States that we can get and because the unions are working cooperatively with us, " he said. "We don't have any competition because we're the only ones running 24 hours in the harbor."
Thomas claims that the company has already signed contracts with the longshoremen's union and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters; but a local Teamster official denied last week that any agreement with Allied Port Transporters had been reached. "If someone at the company told you that, it's inaccurate, " said the official, who requested anonymity. "Not only is there no contract, there are no formal negotiations."
Plans call for the company to have 200 trucks in operation within 30 days--many of them aging vehicles purchased from independent owner-operators. As of last week, only 27 trucks had been purchased.
No securities license
Thomas, who claims in the prospectus to have headed "leading investment banking firms" in recent years, admitted that the only investment-banking firm he has headed recently is All American Capital, which is not licensed by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) He added that in 1983, he co-founded another company, American Central Stock Exchange Co., to write laws for a stock exchange that was established in Panama.
The prospectus also indicates that Thomas has "successfully assisted over two-dozen private placements and IPOs." In an interview, he said the IPOs include Agouron Pharmaceuticals Inc., U.K.-based Bitter Automobile and PharmaPrint Pharmaceuticals Inc.
Only PharmaPrint was named in the prospectus. That firm, where he claimed to serve as a director, was trading for 1 cent a share last week on the pink sheets.
Several companies where Thomas is listed in the prospectus as having served as a director, in addition to "many other successful companies, " did not turn up on Web searches or searches of the Factiva database. They include Century National Bank of Texas, Newport Film Producers and Spaulding Sports Refresher.
Another company listed is Ozelle Pharmaceuticals, where Thomas said he was a director in 1996 and 1997. The Food and Drug Administration barred Ozelle in 1999 from shipping an extract of the poisonous oleander.
In May 1997, Ozelle issued a statement promoting the extract as a "new weapon against cancer and AIDS" that was "especially effective against prostate and breast cancer."
Thomas said the herbal treatment has been used successfully in Ireland and Belize, and he blamed the FDA for not recognizing the importance of the medication.
He said he saw patients dying in an Irish hospice who were then cancer free after 90 days after they began herbal treatments. "If you could see what I saw in Ireland, you would wonder sometimes why the FDA does what it does, " he said.
There also is the matter of his name. In state incorporation papers for All American Capital, Thomas lists it as "David Jack Thomas, " but in the offering prospectus, it is listed as "Philip David Thomas" in one place and "David Thomas" in another.
He told the Business Journal that his full name is Phillip Lee David Jack Thomas, a combination of names he kept after learning as a young adult that he had been adopted...