Four Arrested in Large-Scale Telemarketing Scheme

On July 11, 2013, Patricia M. Ferrick, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Milwaukee Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), was joined by Pete Zegarac, Inspector in Charge of the Chicago Division of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, in announcing the arrest today of four individuals charged to have owned, operated, and engaged in a timeshare telemarketing fraud scheme in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 371, 1341, 1343, 1344, 1349, 1956, 2326, and 2.

The subjects are identified as Mark S. Parks (age: 39) of New London, Wisconsin; Ashley M. Conant (age: 28) of Bellevue, Wisconsin; Eileen M. Goltz (age: 51) of Port Charlotte, Florida; and Mindy L. Parks (age: 34) of Brussels, Wisconsin. All were taken into custody without incident.

From October 2009 through April 2011, the aforementioned individuals are alleged to have engaged in fraudulent and deceptive business tactics associated with several telemarketing businesses. Those businesses include National Timeshare Resales (NTR), Intergrated Advertising Solutions (IAS), Administrative Timeshare Resales (ATR), and Midwest Timeshares (MT). All these companies based out of Green Bay, Wisconsin, were owned and operated at various times by all four subjects. Telemarketers employed at these companies would contact timeshare owners by telephone to inquire whether they were interested in selling their timeshares. In the majority of cases, these companies falsely represented they found buyers for consumers’ timeshare properties and solicited fees ranging from $200 to $2,500 from each consumer, totaling more than $2,000,000 in fraudulently obtained funds.

This case was a joint investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service with assistance of the Brown County Sheriff’s Office, Door County Sheriff’s Office, Waupaca County Sheriff’s Office, and the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture Trade and Consumer Protection.