AirKatrina.com a big scam?

yah i remember hearing about that on gfy, forgot who was posting it though... but i saw it a lot

Yep Gary Kraser nearly pulled a $40K fast one on all the domainers in Rick's forum. Luckily the FBI nailed him fast when everyone in the forum started asking questions and compared notes and things weren't adding up. What a piece of shit. He was really good though, and took advantage of the groups desire to provide direct relief and had everyone believing he was a former special ops guy and was a secret service agent and even posted a pic of himself showing his government agency seals and awards on the wall.

He did own a jet charter service, and had done biz with people on Ricks board and people had met him in person, and everything he said about flying his rescue missions to airlift critically ill kids sounded completely legit. He even went so far as to have jet engines roaring in the background when one of the forum members called him on the phone to get an update. LOL.

Here's the full news article story.


MIAMI - (KRT) - Working from his Florida apartment, Gary Kraser posed as a pilot to solicit thousands of dollars over the Internet to pay for relief flights to Hurricane Katrina-ravaged Louisiana, the FBI said Monday following his arrest.

Among his pitches on www.AirKatrina.com: That he evacuated a 7-month-old infant who underwent transplant surgery in South Florida.

"None of this was true," Acting U.S. Attorney R. Alexander Acosta said. "There were no flights. There was no 7-month-old child in need of a transplant. In fact, he did not even have a pilot's license."

FBI agents arrested the 50-year-old resident of Aventura, Fla., in what authorities are calling the country's first Internet charity fraud case involving the exploitation of Katrina victims.

Kraser allegedly conducted the scam from Aug. 28 to Sept. 6, pocketing at least $40,000 during a two-day period from 48 victims in South Florida, Canada, Mexico and Europe, authorities said. One foreign contributor kicked in $20,000.

Much of the money - sent to help pay for costly jet fuel for relief missions - already has been returned to victims, according to the FBI.

Kraser made his first appearance in Miami federal court on Monday afternoon and will have his bond hearing on Thursday.

The grand jury returned the four-count, wire-fraud indictment - based on an initial complaint to the FBI - under seal last Thursday. If convicted, each count carries a maximum of 20 years in prison.

"While this is one of the first cases to address fraud related to Hurricane Katrina, my experience tells me it will probably not be the last," said Michael Clemens, special agent in charge of the FBI's Miami field office.

A spokesperson for the American Red Cross in Washington, D.C., said that while the relief organization has raised and spent close to $1.2 billion on victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the group has to be constantly vigilant about fraud.

"People are getting more creative and sophisticated in their fraud schemes," said Devorah Goldburg of the Red Cross, which is investigating 261 cases on its own and working with the FBI and authorities.

"A disaster like this Katrina brings out the best in people, but unfortunately, it also brings out the worst in people, too," Devorah said about the South Florida Internet case.

Kraser, who sells domain Web sites for a living, launched the one for Katrina relief through an online forum/bulletin board to which he belonged as a member. Called Targeted Traffic Forum.com, Kraser posted the message about how he rescued the 7-month-old in need of a transplant.

Fellow forum members considered him a "hero," said Rick Schwartz of Boca Raton, Fla., who founded the Targeted Traffic Forum.

In one communication posted on Aug. 31 - two days after Katrina made landfall - Kraser posted this message: "I'm flying full loads out, and offering the empty plane on the outbound for Air Ambulance. If we didn't have the plane, I don't think the little baby would have survived. ... She is undergoing transplant surgery at this moment I am writing. ... Seven months old and smiling the whole way, as if she knew."

Schwartz and other members helped Kraser to establish the Web site, www.AirKatrina.com, to raise money for jet fuel to pay for flight deliveries of medical supplies and to rescue victims in the devastated Gulf Coast.

They said Kraser told them he was an Air Force veteran and former DEA agent who once worked in the White House.

In another Web site posting, Kraser said that he "tipped wings" with Air Force One while flying over Louisiana. Soon after the storm hit, President Bush flew over the devastated area on his way back to Washington, D.C., from Texas.

"We were under the impression that he hadn't slept for days and he was flying back and forth to New Orleans," Schwartz said. "We thought he was a hero. We thought, `What can we do to help?'''

"I even donated $1,000," Schwartz said. "We felt bad because we raised over $40,000 in 48 hours and it didn't do anybody any good. ... It was a scam and we all got scammed."

According to the indictment and an FBI affidavit, Kraser's Web site included a schedule of suggested donations ranging from $5 for a "partial tank" of jet fuel to $3,000 for a "full tank."

The Web site instructed people to make the donations to either an Aventura bank or a trust account set up with attorney Howard Neu of Pembroke Pines, Fla. He could not be reached for comment Monday.

The name of the bank account was World Class Jet Corp., a company incorporated by Kraser in 1994.

People could also make their donations to PayPal, owned by eBay, which had a direct link to www.AirKatrina.com.

According to the FBI, some contributors started to sense something was wrong with Kraser's Web site and contacted its Internet Fraud Complaint Center in Washington. Schwartz and fellow Targeted Traffic Forum.com provided the FBI with Kraser's message board postings.

"The FBI contacted my attorney about one hour after we had taken down Gary Kraser's web link to WorldJet because there were so many inconsistencies in his stories about where the money was going," Schwartz said.

"The beauty about what happened is everything was documented because it happened on a chat board. The rest was on e-mail," he said. "That's why the FBI was able to jump so hard on this case."

Last month, U.S. Attorney Alberto Gonzales set up the Hurricane Katrina Fraud Task Force to target fraudulent charities, identity theft, insurance fraud and false applications for government damage benefits. In Miami Beach last week, Gonzales stressed the dangers of cybercrimes - especially hurricane relief efforts - at the International Association of Chiefs of Police's 112th annual conference.

"In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, a devious few sought to take advantage of the outpouring of charitable support for victims by committing charities fraud and insurance fraud," Gonzales told hundreds of police officials gathered at the Jackie Gleason Theatre.

"Within a week of the flooding from Hurricane Katrina, there were over 2,000 Web sites dedicated to relief efforts - there are more than 4,000 now - and a fraction of these turned out to be criminal fronts designed to prey on generous contributors."

The Hurricane Katrina Fraud Task Force consists of the FBI, Federal Trade Commission, the Postal Inspector's Office and Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys. Collectively, they are tracking complaints, investigations and cases involving fraudulent schemes for illegal gain.

According to Kraser's Web site, "every dollar, every nickel would go directly into the tanks of these pilots planes on their missions of mercy."

Said Acosta, the Miami U.S. attorney: "He intended to keep the money for himself. He exploited the goodwill of the American people."

what a piece of shit that guy is...

Wow somebody gave away 20k $ ? That's some big $...

damn how low can you go

South Florida, Canada, Mexico and Europe


Read the sentence again ... AMERICAN people. Some ricans are so self-centered

seems a few people donated to them.

This fucker went to the bottom of the pit. He was posting the rescue updates telling us about how all these critically ill kids were now safe at Texas hospitals and had people in tears describing all these stranded folks,kids and pets he could see when he was flying in and landing in New Orleans.

Really as sad as it gets. I'm sure the judge is going to nail him hard with the max sentence. He could get 80 years if convicted on all the charges the prosecutors pinned on him.

I gave money to them. Saw the link here, I am pretty sure. I didn't give alot, because it wasn't a recognized charity. But I wanted to try to do something to help those people that were in immediate need. There were still people in the Superdome when I sent money via Paypal.

I got it back a few days later, with a note saying he had decided to fund it another way.

LOL, that's when he began to realize we were all on to him and the Feds were going to be giving him a knock knock. He thought by giving back everyone's money he'd be off the hook. It doesn't work that way. That'd be like a bank robber running back in the bank and putting the money back in the vault.

What a fuckin' piece of shit. Hope they send him to the pokey.

I wondered. I had seen the link about him getting busted. So I went and compared the dates of the arrest to the dates that I sent/received money. I got my money back before he was busted. So I was kind of puzzled on the timeline of things. Couldn't tell if he sent it back, or the feds did.

Not that it mattered. He was lowlife fucktard for taking help away from people who needed it.