Taps = Fraud?!

tkingdoll said:
So...are you suggesting that they did not use the money as claimed and instead pocketed it for their own personal gain?
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No suggestion must be made. The simple fact is that they claimed a legal status which they did not have.
 
Good work RemieV. Maybe this will be Taps' Watergate! Or maybe like the Department of the Treasury getting Al Capone for tax evasion instead of bootlegging. If you can't get viewers to turn off Ghost Hunters for producing an obviously contrived "reality" TV show, maybe you can get viewers to turn off if you can get some press by showing the purported way that this orginization takes money under apparent false pretenses.

My favorite bits of the show are the parts that are so obviously contrived that it is painful. For instance when our two heroic protagonists are fixing someone's toilet (they are Roto-Rooter Plumbers in their day job, of course), with camera crew present, and they all the sudden get a phone call from TAPS central about a problematic ghost haunting a 250 year old house. It just so happens that there is another camera crew at TAPS central to show whatever flunkie is on the other end of the phone (a miracle!).
 
Good stuff Remie!
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I saw the sudden appearance of the Rumor Mill post yesterday. They tried to back date it to 1-22 but it was uploaded yesterday morning.
 
It is interesting to me that almost all the TAPS donators are women.

My guess is if it was a 9-11 CT site, it would be mostly men.

I have no evidence for that, just a hunch. Of course, the number of TAPS donators is very small. Bad sample size.
 
Not much squabbling, though. Looks like TAPS is losing fans anyway. The TAPS message boards are strangely quiet.
 
IllegalArgument said:
It is interesting to me that almost all the TAPS donators are women.

My guess is if it was a 9-11 CT site, it would be mostly men.

I have no evidence for that, just a hunch. Of course, the number of TAPS donators is very small. Bad sample size.
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I believe RemieV's screenshot of donations represents donations for only one month - a month in which TAPS chose to post a list of recent donators. Since TAPS is not a legal nonprofit they have not filed any public records detailing donation amounts and dates - for all the years they have been "in business". One can only wonder how much money was donated in 2004/2005 when the TV show was at its peak of popularity.
 
It seems bizarre that they would only publish one month's worth. I don't see the point. Either you have transparency and publish them all or you don't.
 
According to the archive records of their website for August 31, 2005, they list donations made in August AND "September". Either TAPS were able to see into the future a month ahead, or I don't understand how the archive works.
 
Well two fans have made their way to Mondo crying foul.

"TAPS has more fans than you do!"

"You people are retarded!"
 
CLD said:
According to the archive records of their website for August 31, 2005, they list donations made in August AND "September". Either TAPS were able to see into the future a month ahead, or I don't understand how the archive works.
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That one's just an archive.org thing. The closest match they have of the donations page is 20051110, so they show you that when you click donations.
 
Zygar said:
No suggestion must be made. The simple fact is that they claimed a legal status which they did not have.
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Then I don't see the problem. That's just a small admin error which, presumably, they have made attempts to address. At the very most, they will just produce receipts for equipment for the value of the funds they collected and that will be that. Of course, if they can't do that, or continue to make non-profit claims, then yes, they are being dishonest. The major mistake made was that the guy claimed he was aware that it was a legal term - that will be hard to wriggle out of as he went ahead and used it anyway. But as there are two definitions, can they equally claim that the majority of their donors are likely to have taken it in the spirit it was intended (i.e. dictionary not legal definition)?

Their 'transgression' is, I suspect, pretty common on a small scale, and it depends how much money is being talked about for the Powers Wot Be to make it worth the cost of an investigation. For $700, I'm not sure anyone will find it worthwhile pursuing a prosecution. Even if threatened with one, TAPs can probably just offer to refund the donations and that'll be that.

The illegal gambling thing is unlikely to attract much attention as it was removed as soon as the illegality was called to their attention.
 
I think the problem is similar to Sylvia Browne saying her reading fee goes to her church and not in her pocket. It's misleading. TAPS has been marketing themselves as NPO for years now. It's in all their press releases. That's not playing on the level if they are not really a Non-Profit Organization.

The transgression could be small or it could be very large depending upon how much money was made and how it was reported tax wise. According to Jason Hawes MySpace blog, donations reached several thousand $$ recently. Of course, that's just what was said in a blog and not the actual bookkeeping.
 
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The Vampire said:
I think the problem is similar to Sylvia Browne saying her reading fee goes to her church and not in her pocket. It's misleading. TAPS has been marketing themselves as NPO for years now. It's in all their press releases. That's not playing on the level if they are not really a Non-Profit Organization.

The transgression could be small or it could be very large depending upon how much money was made and how it was reported tax wise. According to Jason Hawes MySpace blog, donations reached several thousand $$ recently. Of course, that's just what was said in a blog and not the actual bookkeeping.
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Does Sylvia say her reading fee goes to her church when it actually goes to her pocket?

OK, if TAPs has been saying it for years in press releases and are claiming thousands in donations on a blog (I didn't pick up on any of that from the article), then the authorities might be interested, but again, it's a small figure compared to the cost of an investigation so I think this might have a disappointing result, depending on what outcome is wanted.

ETA: Looking at the update, it seems to me they are taking the necessary steps to address the issue, so I think that'll be the end of any potential prosecution. Surely the desired outcome is for them to stop claiming NPO and to fix their raffle age issue? Which they've done.

They might be in some minor trouble with the taxman if they didn't declare the income but if it's only a few thousand, it won't be much trouble.

Don't get me wrong, I think Remie's progress is great and it's a real result to have embarassed them into fixing the things that were wrong, but now they have, to continue to solicit for complaints does sort of look like a vendetta. If a donor has an issue with TAPs, their best recourse would be to contact TAPs directly to request a refund, surely?
 
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But then again, as many donors are teenagers and those a little on the dim side, do you think they will request a refund -particularly someone who is a true believer of sorts?

I think you are overlooking the principle of the thing. This is why Secretary of State Offices compiles lists of legal charities - so people donating will know if the organization is legitimate or not. It's also why we have a set of laws to define business - so everyone will not go willy-nilly and set up NPOs taking money under false pretenses.

I have to ask, are you looking at this at a state or federal level? At a federal level the best you would get is a tax audit. On the state level, though you could face fines for not having a chartable solicitations license plus a tax audit.
 
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