Securities and Exchange Commission v. E-Monee.com, Inc. et al., Civil Action No. 0:13-cv-60637-WJZ (S.D. Fla)
The Securities and Exchange Commission recently filed fraud charges against E-Monee.com, Inc. (“E-Monee”), its president, Estuardo Benavides (“Benavides”), and one of its directors and a licensed Florida attorney, Robert B. Cook (“Cook”), for offering shares in E-Monee to investors under the false pretense that the company owned Mexican bonds worth billions of dollars.
The SEC’s complaint, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida, charges E-Monee.com, Inc., Estuardo Benavides, 59, of Margate, Florida, and Robert C. Cook, 70, of Tequesta, Florida for fraudulently offering shares in E-Monee from at least January 2010 through May 2011, while claiming, among other things, the company owned Mexican bonds purportedly worth approximately $5 billion, and that E-Monee’s shares would substantially increase in value. The complaint alleges that the Mexican bonds the company owned, in reality, were essentially worthless and there was no valid basis for the claims by Benavides and Cook that E-Monee’s shares would substantially increase in value.