A FRENZY OF GREED | KeysNews.com

Florida Keys News

Friday, February 1, 2013

A FRENZY OF GREED

Cay Clubs and its investors saw big money in the developers' grand vision, but it now appears to have been a $300 million Ponzi scheme

BY GWEN FILOSA and ADAM LINHARDT Citizen Staff

Until their Cay Clubs venture collapsed in 2008, along with the national real estate market, Key Largo couple Fred "Dave" Clark and his then-girlfriend, now wife, Cristal Coleman, lived large off other people's money for a few frenzied years, luring some 1,400 investors to pour a collective $300 million into their pockets.

Yet Cay Clubs was nothing more than a Ponzi scheme p...

For the complete article, please pick up a copy of The Citizen for this day or purchase this day's electronic edition at http://secure.floridakeys.com/keysnews/enews. Home Delivery & Electronic Edition subscibers to The Citizen may access this article, once logged in to keysnews.com, at no charge. If you forget your password, please call us at 305-292-7777, ext. 4.

Share your thoughts and opinions related to this posting. Login or register to post comments. More Info

Pritam Singh

Submitted on Fri, 02/01/2013 - 11:05pm by The_Falcon

Wasn't Pritam Singh affiliated with these hucksters at one time? No mention of that in this article. Reporters asleep at the wheel again. Always missing the real story. No shocker.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

No, Singh was not involved.

Submitted on Sun, 02/03/2013 - 9:40pm by .

But why not have a little fun by anonynously smearing someone's good name.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

They were both involved together

Submitted on Mon, 02/04/2013 - 3:03pm by Get Real

with Tranquility Bay.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

Zecca

Submitted on Fri, 02/01/2013 - 5:28pm by Bonefish

Zecca our hire for hit guy also worked at Cay Clubs. A little investigative reporting may show some ties.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

And let us not forget that our elected 'leaders' threw in with

Submitted on Fri, 02/01/2013 - 11:08am by Tina

this bunch of crooks. Remember McPherson and how he promoted them (and we all know, the kickbacks fueled his enthusiasm). Same with Dixie Spehar, DiGennaro, and other city and county leaders. I can't understand why it has taken so long to expose them when we all knew it was a Ponzi scheme way back then.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

Federales

Submitted on Fri, 02/01/2013 - 11:10pm by The_Falcon

Are a joke. They have no interest in protecting anyone or making real arrests of criminals. They prefer high profile cases busting lobster harvesters that grab headlines. This is what bolsters their bloated federal budgets and "justifies" their jobs. It's all a snake oil hand job perpetrated upon the taxpayer.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

The Feds who prosecute lobster cases

Submitted on Sun, 02/03/2013 - 9:45am by trapper

are from National Marine Fisheries; they don't have anything to do with real estate . Only fisheries related violations, you are comparing apples and oranges.

Login or register to post comments
Flag as offensive

Criminal charges?

Submitted on Fri, 02/01/2013 - 8:27am by John

Whether the five defendants will face criminal charges remained unclear Thursday? ...It's too bad they didn't get caught with a pound of pot then it would be, 'lock em up and throw away the key'.