Behind The Scammer
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This episode is brought to you by The Hartford, a leading provider of employee benefits and income protection products that is dedicated to standing behind U.S. workers to help them pursue their goals and get through tough times. For more information about The Hartford, visit thehartford.com slash employee benefits. We've also got a link in our show notes. This episode is brought to you by Shopify. Whether you're selling a little or a lot,

Shopify helps you do your thing, however you cha-ching. From the launch your online shop stage, all the way to the we just hit a million orders stage. No matter what stage you're in, Shopify's there to help you grow. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash special offer, all lowercase. That's shopify.com slash special offer. I'm Nora McInerney. And I'm Marcel Malakibu. And this is Terrible Thanks for Asking.

And I am personally fascinated by scammers, Marcel. Me too. Aren't you? Aren't you? And guess what? It's not just you. It's not just me. It's us culturally. We are saturated with scam stories right now. Who is a scammer that you think I look like? Elizabeth Holmes. That's right. Elizabeth Holmes from Theranos. Yes.

Apparently, we look alike. I've watched the documentary. I've listened to every podcast. I was obsessed with the Bernie Madoff story, which was also a show on HBO. Firefest. Yep, yep. Ja. Ja got bamboozled, hoodwinked, led astray. Led astray. Led astray. We are fascinated by scammers because scammers...

scam people. They break the social contract, the unspoken agreement that allows us to walk through the world believing that the people we come into contact with are who they say they are. And for any scammer to be able to take what isn't theirs and

I feel like they have to be pretty likable, pretty charismatic. They have to have a certain something, like a person we're going to talk about in today's episode. His name is Isaiah Goodman. He is a Minnesota man who built himself as an entrepreneur and a financial advisor who was out to change the world of personal finance.

And on this journey to change the world of personal finance, he was on local TV a lot talking about personal finance, investing and how to avoid scams. You say ask about authorized users. What does that mean?

Yeah, authorized users is very unique. So it's very special for your own family. So maybe if you're a child, you know, college student, you can ask your mom or your dad, hey, can you add me as an authorized user on your credit card? Because now you'll be able to have their available balance and their history. Now, you might not want to actually get a credit card, but it shows that you've got some sort of line of history so that when you get yours, you know, you have a little bit better credit. There we go. The older, the better, right?

Isaiah Goodman with MoneyVerbs, thanks so much for joining us today. Thank you. And yet he is an unauthorized user of over $2.2 million of other people's money. Oh boy, ain't that the truth. Wow, wow, wow. So in June 2021, Isaiah Goodman was sentenced to seven years in prison for defrauding more than 20 clients of $2.3 million.

And this story, it came to us over a year ago. And it came to us through a woman named Cilicia, who is about your age, Marcel. I have a photography business and I've been doing it full time for about three years. And this is focused mostly on weddings, like couples, suits, engagements, that kind of thing. Like I love photography, but it was really about like, I want an opportunity to be like a business owner, to be an entrepreneur.

Fun fact, Marcel, did you know, not only is Cilicia a terrible thanks for asking listener, she came to our first live show. And at our first live show, we did this thing called the bummer awards, like a joke on, you know, everyone always wants to compare their terribles and she won.

Oh, shit. Okay. She texted me this week a picture of her holding. We'd gone to like thrift stores and bought old trophies and she has her still. And she sent a picture of her holding her trophy after the show. So funny. But she reached out to us saying like, oh, I actually have a real bummer. I got a real. Yeah. Turns out I want to turn back in my bummer award because I have a much bigger one.

So her bigger bummer is that Cilicia was one of Isaiah Goodman's clients and eventually one of his victims. And we've been working on this story for, God, Marcel, it was like seven months.

Yeah, it had to be. It had to be. The sentencing hadn't even happened yet. No, and we weren't sure if it was going to go to a trial. We were interviewing Cilicia and we were using pseudonyms because we didn't want to give this man too much attention. We didn't want to interfere with any sort of investigation. And then Cilicia texts me and says, oh, his sentencing is in June out of nowhere. Yeah.

And it just so happens, I don't live in Minneapolis anymore, but I'm going to be in Minneapolis the week of his sentencing. I tell Marcel, and we show up to the sentencing. And while we're there, we meet other people who were defrauded by the same man. And one of them is named... Reverend Michael Gonzalez. My name is Michael Edward Gonzalez.

And of course, people ask me, I am a black male and my last name is Gonzalez. My four parents, they escaped slavery and went down to Mexico.

And they picked up the, you know, surname there and they came back and they kept the name Gonzalez, originally from Omaha, Nebraska. Okay. So at one time, well, still am kind of sort of a big Cornhusker fan, you know, although almost everybody in the state is. But I came up here because of the opportunities here.

And job-wise. And so I came up here December the 26th of 93. And I was hired at a company that was right over by the University of Minnesota, a flexible packaging company. And what the main thing that we did was we made those little ketchup bags, the pouch for Heinz.

And so when I was, you know, older and everything, I was ordained a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. I had a presiding elder that's someone who is a regional person that handles churches and everything, gave me a church. And so for the past 15 years, I have always stayed in Minneapolis and or northern suburbs.

So the thing that these two individuals have in common, and in fact, a lot of the clients that were defrauded by Isaiah were

have in common is that they're all Black people. And so what he would do is use his Blackness or his proximity to Blackness as a tool for him to pitch his financial literacy to people of color and people in lower income neighborhoods. And so that's how Reverend Gonzalez and Solicia essentially met him was that they found that he could potentially help them do some financial planning.

Basically, it was an announcement that was sent to our church. And so the Urban League said, well, we're going to do a couple of Tuesdays to help people out with financial planning. And I'm always looking for more advice and, you know, different things and just to learn to help myself and help other people around me also. So with that being said, I went to the Urban League class.

And while there, met Isaiah. My mom actually referred him to me. She had met him at some events that he was speaking at. And he actually was at that event speaking specifically about how Black folks are

are so often like iced out of the financial industry and don't get an opportunity to like access a lot of information that like a lot of white people, you know, have as a result of just like generational wealth and parents who, you know, have experience with these things. So my mom was instantly like, oh, this guy seems like a great fit because, you know, he's super value aligned with things that you are already like really invested in.

And we just came in and sat down and there was food and you sat down, you know, we just conversating. He was walking around, you know, with a shirt tie on, you know, a very...

professional young man. Well put together. Well put together. You know, and he was always smiling. If you've been around him, he's always smiling. Always, always. And, you know, it just made us feel comfortable. His whole thing, mainly in the first class, was just making sure that we understood, you know, credit and those type of things.

Talked a little bit about life insurance, you know, mutual funds, and a number of things to help you out to make sure that not only were you doing better, but people, family members. A lot of us had children or grandchildren at that time that you could leave something behind and or to help them out right now. I was like immediately just like,

taken by how just, I don't know, comfortable he, he just like had a comfortable vibe. Like he just was very charismatic, just like friendly, talkative and, and like extroverted. Um, and just seemed genuinely excited to be talking to me. Um, and, you know, kind of asked me like, what made you want to have a financial advisor? Yeah.

One thing I remember about his website is he had like reviews on there. And there was like people who just seemed like normal people, like teachers or like just like average people. And they were like, wow, like Isaiah helped me budget for a house or helped me, you know, start saving for retirement. Just like,

really sort of introductory goals in the financial world. And so that made me feel really reaffirmed. And he said that he was a fiduciary, which I knew that being a fiduciary was a good thing. You're taking on extra legal burdens, essentially, if you're a fiduciary, because you have to do what's in the best interest of the client. And everything I had read to that point was like, if you can get a fiduciary as your financial advisor, this is the best case scenario.

So, I mean, it's not hard to see why people would trust this guy at all. He has like a good energy to him. He seems to be really invested in them personally. And a fiduciary, again, feels like an extra level of like safeguarding, right? They have a duty to act in your best interest legally. Right. So it's like at the end of the day, you wouldn't suspect that

somebody so knowledgeable, so giving, smiling all the time could possibly have any other intention. So I never invested with Isaiah Goodman, but I probably would have. I did follow his company on Instagram. I followed MoneyVerbs for a while because he was working with a friend of mine who's like a Minneapolis investor.

influencer and because I'm so interested in money because it's one of those things that I don't know a lot about. And the fact that I don't know a lot about money is like an insecurity of mine. And I think a lot of people have that insecurity. You want to be financially intelligent, not just financially literate. It feels like a part of adulthood, you know,

It's so tied to our security and money is also a really emotional thing. Yeah, of course. It's like, especially if you come from a place where you grew up with having less or you're aware of the fact that you don't know what to do with money. I think that's the main thing is like the awareness that

people like Cilicia and Reverend Gonzalez have that, you know, we don't know what to do with money and we're aware of that fact. And so it's like easy for someone to end up playing on that fact and let you know, because it's like, if someone tells you, Hey, you could be in better shape and you could be in better shape, then you're like, well, yes, this is true.

Yeah. And also when you look at his life on Instagram, his life, his wife, things look really good, right? They've got four kids. They live in a really nice suburb. They've got a beautiful house. They're taking vacations. You know, they have professional photos. I think one of the reasons why money is so emotional is because money is...

What helps us take care of ourselves, take care of our lives, take care of the people that we care about? Right. And you got to think like Reverend Gonzalez, his sister-in-law has early onset dementia that came on when she was 54 years old. She's only 62 now. And for a while, the family's just helping to take care of her at home. But it got kind of harder and harder as time went on.

And so eventually, Reverend Gonzalez's wife, Robin, gets granted power of attorney over her sister's medical care and financial assets so they can figure something else out. They just finally realized that they just couldn't do it anymore because everybody worked. So it was just a strain. And it was hard to find, you know, good people to come in and want to take care of her. And so they had to put her into a care place. Okay. Okay.

It basically costs about $6,700 a month for her to have her care. So that's about $80,000 a year. With that being said, Robin's family, they live a long time. Her grandmother had been in a care place for 13 years.

So if her sister was going to live at least that long, that would be a million dollars. Right. So we were looking, you know, to put her money in a place where it can grow to help to, you know, to offset some of that cost.

And Cilicia's situation is obviously different. She's much, much younger. She was growing her business, her photography business. It was getting successful. She just wanted to basically take care of her future self. And she knew from experience, from life experience, how hard it is to be living paycheck to paycheck. You know, she didn't want that for her future. She was looking out for future Cilicia. Yeah.

I kind of realized from a young age that like you have to be very intentional about the ways that you're using that money, the ways that you're saving and investing that money. I think the system is like super complicated. And so I kind of like really wanted to not be in a situation when I was older where I felt like I had to work

my entire life. And so my thought was, okay, like I've started this business. It's relatively successful, you know, financially, that's great. I'm able to like pay all my bills and have extra leftover. So,

I know these bigger goals that I have are going to be a lot more money than just like monthly rent or like the food that I eat on a daily basis. So I need to plan right now for those things. Cause like, apparently if you don't start saving for retirement when you're 25, you just might be screwed. So I was like kind of going into it with that in mind. It was like,

I need a financial advisor because there's all these rules and I don't understand them. And there's this huge system that is super confusing to me. And I don't understand anything about stocks. And I just like need somebody to be able to explain this to me and that I can like trust to do this so that I know that I'm doing it correctly.

And, you know, the thing is, Isaiah is not just helping people plan their finances. He's also created this new app called Money Verbs that helps people sort of educate themselves about money. And so he's been making his rounds on local talk shows as a finance expert.

Well, hey, everybody. Super, super excited to be sharing this with you today. We've got the team from MoneyVerbs, and we're going to be talking about how we experience money differently and how at MoneyVerbs, we're hoping to have you do the exact same thing. Joining us now is Isaiah Goodman from MoneyVerbs. Isaiah, thanks for being with us.

Hey, guys. It's a pleasure. I'm talking to Isaiah Goodman. He is the CEO and founder of, are you ready for this? Money Verbs. And what did Money Verbs consist of? What was that about? Well, the same type of thing, except for it was going to be an online training to where he was going to set up online classes. And you could take these classes and you would pay for them.

And that way you could build up your financial knowledge. So we were talking about him and he asked us if we wanted to kind of invest a little bit in it, you know, and we said, yeah, yeah, you know, we can do a little something. And so we invested $4,000 to help him to get started. He pitched it to me on our very first call when we were talking about like,

systemic inequality and all that, he said, you know, for folks who cannot afford to pay my $1,500 fee, like I have this alternative, which is this app that I've been working really hard on. And it gives people all of this information about financial planning so that they can, you know, basically play around with money in the app where there's no risk and learn all of this stuff and then like apply it to their life.

So again, this is another reason to trust Isaiah because he's not just asking people for their money without giving anything back. He's actually giving people who don't typically have access to financial planning or financial advice a chance to learn how to plan their financial future and make smart investments with their money. We have this money sitting here and he said, well, I can get you a better return of what you're doing now.

So my sister-in-law's money, hers was the most. And then Robin and me both have 401ks. And so we transferred them probably about a couple of months afterwards. So how much money do you turn over to Isaiah Goodman when you give him this money? Over $450,000. That's the first time I've said that out loud to anybody. It is what it is.

But, you know, we turned the money over. He, quote unquote, puts into these accounts. We can go online and look at the money. And so, you know, some people say, well, did you have a statement set out? He said, no. You know, everything was done online. You know, a lot of it is online now. So and we was looking at it and Robin was always checking it and looking at it. And she said, oh, man, this is kicking.

You know, this is doing real good. So the accounts were showing growth, like when you would check every month or every whatever, they were showing growth. Yes, yes, yes. I mean, it was like, all righty then.

he suggested $20,000 and $20,000 is obviously like a ton of money to me. Like the amount of money that I had at this point was like more than I had ever even conceived of having. And so the idea that I would have to invest $20,000 was like, maybe like want to puke really. But he was like,

This is a good amount. Like realistically, like if you wanted to put a 20% down payment on a home, like that's not necessarily even going to be that depending on what you're buying and stuff. So, you know, you want this money to grow. If I take $20,000 for the investment account, then you're still going to have money for your like personal expenses and business expenses to at least float you a couple...

months, a few months. And then, you know, at any point, this is what he just kept emphasizing to me at any point in the event of an emergency, you can withdraw these funds. He was like, you just have to wire it over. And here is my

information. Whenever I think of wiring, I just think of like those emails that you get where they're like, hi, I like am looking for funds to like support this poor family, wire money to this location. So like immediately when he says wire funds, that's my only context for understanding wiring. So I'm like, oh, that's weird. But again, not suspecting anything negative about him. I was just like, that's how you do it. Okay. Like that's so wild.

So Cilicia wires the money. But then the next day... He responds to me and he was like, hey, Cilicia.

I didn't see the funds come through. Like just wanted to check in on this. And I like go back to my bank and I check and the wire had been reversed on suspicion of fraud. And I was like, oh, that is really odd. So I called the bank and they were like, we only allow wires from your account to either another account that you own or to a title company.

So, Silesia lets Isaiah know this, that she basically got a fraud alert. How do you think he responds to that? Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, that kind of thing happens all the time. Don't worry about it. Ding, ding, ding. Exactly. And then he says, it's wild, you know, there's been such a rise in fraud recently that it is such a good thing that there are these protections in place, you know, to protect you. And...

He's like, we're going to have to come up with a different solution, but I'm glad that these things exist to protect people from fraud. And then I'm thinking, wow, how awesome is it that I have this financial advisor who really actually genuinely seems to care about me and wants the best for me.

So at this point, Cilicia and Isaiah are meeting biweekly. They're talking about her financial future. They're making vision boards and they're talking about making another asset transfer. He brings this up multiple times, but Cilicia is busy. I can avoid a task that takes two minutes. I can avoid it for weeks, Marcel, as you know. And so does Cilicia. Intel? Eventually he emails me and he says, Hey,

hey, it's Lisa. How about we initiate the ACA transfer from my side? So I didn't really know what that meant, but basically he was like, I can just do it. If you just give me some information, I can do the transfer. So we hop on the phone. He asked me for my like bank account number and my routing number. And he's like, great. All right. I'm going to get these funds transferred over. And then we're all set. And then I get an email, which says, we got your funds.

So he uses something called Right Capital, which is basically this platform for independent financial planners. Yeah, I went to the website and this is such a software description. Our innovative financial planning solution helps financial advisors grow their business.

differentiate your services with intuitive financial and tax planning. Like it's a website platform for them, right? So you don't have to build your own platform to show people like how your banking works. The website stresses that it is basically about making things easy for your clients to understand. Yeah. So you can log in, you see your money, see the plan, all that. I mean, it's all there.

He actually asked me to invest again. So that was like the first of like two investments that I ended up doing. And part of the thing about this right capital system was that because I had hooked up all of my accounts to it, he basically got to see at any point how much money I had on hand.

And so on one of our meetings, he goes, Hey, Silesia, by the way, I noticed on right capital that you, you know, you have like a good amount of funds in your account. I think you should make another investment. And this time it's $15,000. So now at this point, this puts my account funding at $35,000. I was like, Oh my God, this is scary. And he was like,

You know, in a few years, this is going to be so much more money. You're going to be so happy to this. He's like, you're doing great. Like the fact that you're making these steps right now while you're so young is like so great. So awesome. Like you should be really proud of yourself.

When Reverend Gonzalez and Cilicia log into their accounts, they're seeing incredible growth. They're seeing 12% growth, then 20% growth. That's bonkers. Like, all I want in a graph is for it to go up and to the right, you know? Right. Right. If I get 3%, 4%, that's... I don't care. I got a savings account with like 2%. I have a savings account that's 0.05%. And I'm like, ooh. Ooh, that $3.00.

This year really helped. I'll declare it on my taxes. I'm not afraid.

Okay. Yeah. It's called profit. Look it up. Right. So like nine months pass, Reverend Gonzalez and his wife had previously taken out a loan to fix up their kitchen. And so since their money's doing really well, they're like, you know what? Let's take out some of that investment money and get rid of the remodel loan, which makes sense. So Robin calls Isaiah and she said, Hey, you know, I want a check for X number of dollars.

And he said, yeah, well, you know, let me work on that. Be able to do it and stuff for you. And she went back online and she started to have problems. And then she said, I called back. And the first time I called, the guy said, oh, yeah, you know, I'm going to check in and get it all out. And the second time, he said nobody answered the phone. So we was like, oh, no, this is not good. I went down there.

to his office and stuff. And so he was no longer there. But he had already said, well, I'm going to move into a larger space. So that was one of the things he said, well, is he moving into a larger space? And his phone system, you know, it's not working or whatever that might be. But he was no longer there.

What is going through your mind when you go down there, he's not there, you don't know where he is? Like maybe that day when you're driving back home, like what's going through your mind? What's going through my mind? That sinking feeling, that feeling of this is not really happening. I know that he's going to call us and is going to be there soon.

and everything is going to be okay. And, you know, I'm taking deep breaths because I know that when I walk in the house, I'm going to have to be strong and, you know, and talk with my wife about this. You know, I'm hearing him say this and I'm imagining myself like talking to my wife, talking to my family, a friend of mine, whoever, and bringing them an idea to say, hey, let's

Make some extra money. Let's invest this money properly. And then this happens. And thinking about how much guilt and how sick to my stomach I would be feeling at that time. You're having this conversation with Mr. Gonzalez in the home that he and his wife live in. They've given all their money to this man. Yeah, all their money. And she's

At work, you know, the entire time that I'm there, which Reverend Gonzalez didn't say was fully because of this situation, but in part it was. And the way Cilicia finds out, it's not that different. There's a lot of evasion. On our last call that we had on Zoom, he says,

Hey, by the way, my app is doing really well and it's taking up a lot of my time. And so we might have to like kind of reschedule some of the meetings that we have coming up. You know, we'll still do everything as planned, but like, just keep in mind that we might have to be flexible. So I get an email the day before we're supposed to meet the next time. And it was a weird email because it was just like a calendar invite. And the note said something like,

Hey, with the success of my app, we're having to pivot and I'm moving to distance planning. And like, let me tell you, like in a normal circumstance, if I paid somebody $1,500 and they were like, I'm going to move everything to distance and like, not even like tell me that face to face, just send me an email. I would have been pissed off.

But because I had felt repeatedly like I had been dropping the ball and like he had been so flexible with me, that was just totally not my reaction at all. I was just kind of like, oh, okay, cool. And then Thanksgiving happened. So that was kind of my focus. And then the next week after that, it's about midweek. And I realized, huh, odd. I haven't heard from him yet.

So I sent him two emails, nothing. I don't know where this feeling came from because I had not had this feeling not even one time. But out of nowhere, I just had this like thought pop into my head like, huh, what if like he stole my money? And I don't, I literally don't know like what made me feel that way. But I was just like, what if that happened? I knew I could feel it. I could feel it at that point. I said, the money's gone. And I kept thinking,

Taking deep breaths and my wife kept talking to me and said, you know, we'll check on some more things and we'll try to see what is happening here. And she said, you know, calm down. We are going to be OK. So she basically talked me off of the ledge. I said, OK. So everything is all right. And then it isn't.

And this is how Cilicia and Mr. Gonzalez find out that they've been scammed. I saw this like really weird thing when I was on his Twitter, which he had like tweeted like this really ominous message like on that Friday that I had reached out to him. And it was like at one of the lowest points and darkest moments in his life, he discovered how he would change the world.

at 2:20 a.m. on December 2nd. Like, that's what he wrote. And I was like, "That's really odd." And when I read that, I was like, "Okay, clearly this man is going through something." I get a text back from him finally, and all it says is,

"Celicia, I'm sorry to advise you that I have reported myself to the Federal Bureau of Investigations in Minnesota Department of Commerce at the advice of my counsel. I can't comment anymore at this time. If you have other questions or whatever, like send anything to my email address and I'll follow up with it when the time is right." That's how he phrased it.

So one day, Reverend Gonzalez's wife, Robin, is at work and she gets called by the FBI. And she's told that they're calling about something to do with Isaiah, but she couldn't talk for very long. So Robin tells the agent to just swing by the house later and talk to her and Reverend Gonzalez. The doorbell rang. And so Robin says, honey, would you come upstairs, please? There's a woman here from the FBI. So I come up.

And I said, okay, what's going on? And she is, do you know Isaiah Goodman? I said, yeah, that is our finance person. And she said, well, he is under investigation. And I said, okay, some people have said that there are some irregularities with their money. Have you had any of this before?

And we said, yeah, yeah, yes, yes, we have. And so she said, well, I will be back in touch. My first reaction was just like numbness, shock, because at this point, you know, I had already all but confirmed it to myself. I just this was like the final confirmation that.

But I hadn't actually like let myself fully believe that that could be true. Also, I didn't want to call the police in any capacity. I had no interest in doing that because I'm like,

Very like opposed to the prison industrial complex and all of its elements and calling the police is like something that I just feel like is such a last resort in so many instances where things can be resolved other ways that I just hadn't done it. And so I was like, oh, my God, do I have to actually call the FBI? Yeah.

So Alicia actually finds out it's not the police she needs to call. It's not the FBI she needs to call. But in fact, and this is a real plot twist, the Minnesota Department of Commerce. OK, so I call the Minnesota Department of Commerce. The very first woman who answers, you know, she goes, this guy is under investigation by the Minnesota Department of Commerce in her area. She actually happened to be the one on his case.

And they had suspended his license because of his investigation. We'll be right back.

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Okay, so we've talked about the money that was lost, the money that was lost by Mr. Gonzalez, the money that was lost by Cilicia, the money that was lost by how many other clients? At least 23. At least 23. What we haven't talked about is what the money was spent on. Well, according to some court documents, this is where their money went.

23 different victims slash clients were defrauded of at least $2.2 million, and it was spent on a $76,000 payment for the purchase of a house in Maple Grove, Minnesota. That's a suburb of Minneapolis.

Around $58,000 to a remodeling company for improvements on that house and $13,798, let's round up and call it $14,000 for the purchase of a hot tub. Look, I love sitting in my own soup as much as the next person, but that feels excessive.

Then there was another house. He put down payments of about $91,000 for the purchase and construction of a $1.69 million house in Plymouth, Minnesota.

Cars, vehicles, $49,500 if we want to be exact, for a 2019 Ford Expedition. And then a few months later, $12,000 down on a 2020 Ford Explorer. And then there was his business, MoneyVerbs. It looks like between July 2019 and October 2020, MoneyVerbs

There was $439,000 spent to a consulting company. I need to get into consulting. FYI. And then $147,000 to additional parties for services rendered to that business and payroll in the approximate amount of $109,000 and overtime.

Ooh, personal expenditures, including $12,000 on a cruise line, $8,300 to a gym, which honestly is just not that... I mean, it's bad that it was stolen money. And $8,300 sounds like a lot at a gym, but when it's like a family membership, you use it every day. Why am I justifying this? I have no idea. $114,000 for various online and retail purchases. Holy crap. Including...

$4,516 to Tiffany and Company and $11,000 to Best Buy and approximately $195,000 to pay his various credit cards, debts, and loans. So when we are going through that, what we're seeing is truly that's not just any money that

That money, especially, I would say the money that was spent in 2019 and 2020, belonged to people. And one of those people was Mr. Gonzalez, who is not living in a $1.69 million house. Yeah. I mean, like, you got to put it in perspective. He's at the end of his career. He's a pastor. He's not making millions of dollars or anything like that.

His wife is 63 years old. His sister-in-law needs continuous care in a care facility. And at this point, the impact is that her care is going to have to decline because they had this really exemplary care that she was receiving at the first memory care facility. And now they don't have that kind of money anymore. And so she has to be moved to a considerably less exemplary facility.

They have barely any money left for retirement and most of their 401ks are gone. See, this impacts the whole community. As black people, we're moving into realms where we're starting to have some finances now. And we want to be able to do the best thing that we can with them. And we are looking for people that are able to help us out and to make things grow.

People were listening to him and they wanted this kind of advice to be able to help them out. And now I am reading in my local news out here, you know, in Maple Grove and everything that it says that this man is now being indicted for embezzling $2.2 million.

So now the whole community, all of our trust factor is now gone. It is making it harder for the other people that are out there that are really doing good work and trying to help people and do all of those things. Now, how do I trust you? See, you've impacted all of these folk now that are really wanting to do the right thing

You beat them down and say, oh, I don't know if I want to go with that particular person or not. Now, Robin has always worked and she loves working, but she's at that point where she wants to work when she wants to work. But now that is not the same. She just started a full-time job. Oh, man. That's really, like, that's very hard to hear. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, that's super hard to hear. A lot of times we say things like, if that were my family member, but even without this being a family member, sitting down with someone and hearing this kind of story and seeing the kind of man that Reverend Gonzalez is, he's a really decent, warm person and his wife is equally as warm. And so to think about the fact that she

feels the need to go back and work a full-time job when they should be, you know, chilling on a beach somewhere or, you know, he should be able to hang out with his family with no concern about whether or not he's going to be able to continue to eat and maintain his home. And his sister-in-law should have the care that she saved for, right?

Like, you know, he he talks so much about the impact on the community and he really, you know, plays down like the impact on himself when the impact on himself and his family is astronomical. And the difference is to like Isaiah's pretending to be working in service of a community. And Mr. Gonzalez spent his entire career serving small communities. Yeah.

And it sucks for Cilicia to lose $35,000. I, at her age, did not have $35,000 to my name. No way, no how. But it's also a very, very different loss. So one of the people Cilicia is in contact with over the course of the investigation is a local police officer from a task force that handles cases of financial crimes in Minnesota.

And she asked, if you were to not get this money back, what would that mean for you? And then I'm like silent because I'm trying to even process what this question means.

And then she kind of adds some additional context of like, you know, like, what would this mean for your life, for your business, for your future, for your family? Which I'm like, okay, logical question. And I go to try to answer in logical brain, but all of a sudden I am like crying. And now I am like acutely aware of the fact that I am crying on the phone with a police officer and this man has stole my money. And so...

So this is like the first time where I'm sort of forced to actually think about this as like a real thing and the reality. And so I basically am like, this was my whole life savings. It really represented everything that I had planned to do with my life. And I really like did all of this feeling like I was alive.

doing like the right thing, like doing all of the right things. And ultimately, like, not only is this all of my savings, but I only have like a few months worth of money now, like to get me by like a little bit of time during a time that is flow season. So like, that's just not a good situation for my day to day life either. We'll be right back.

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Cilicia's had her entire life savings, $35,000, wiped out, stolen by a financial advisor who was supposed to be helping her invest for her future. And it's complicated for her because she does want justice. But what is justice?

This system is actually focused on punishment. It's focused on retribution, which is so the opposite of healing, especially in the ways that we see it show up in the U.S. criminal justice system because it is so racialized and gendered and like it has all of these oppressive elements to it that create way more harm. I feel like I want justice.

him to pay for what he did. I don't care if he like rots in jail. And then at the same time, I was thinking like, okay, but like, I still want to be somebody who believes in this idea of abolition because abolition isn't even just about

getting rid of these systems. It's not just about getting rid of like the police or prisons. It's about creating like an entirely new world. Like it's believing in a society that could actually support people's needs. And if we were to actually try something different, like maybe we could just see what would happen. If we like know for sure that this isn't working, like why wouldn't we want to try something different? And so I

I knew I still like wanted to believe in that because I didn't, it's not like I abandoned that. I still felt like there's so much supports that people need. Prison still doesn't help people, all of that. And at the same time,

And simultaneously being like, yeah, but this man can rot in prison. So I'm like, okay, so that's some dissonance. Like I have to kind of compartmentalize those beliefs in order to have them simultaneously. And so I was kind of thinking like, since this has happened, so many good things have happened to me. Not so much so that I'm like, I'm glad that this happened. Like I would do it again. And I was thinking about all of those things.

Like, you know, the fact that my family and friends have been so supportive, the fact that communities online have like been so supportive and even like sent me monetary contributions. I'm like, you know, mutual aid, even just getting to like talk to you for this episode, things like that.

All of those things that are positive, none of them came from the government. None of them came from this system that I'm a part of right now. And yet the system I'm part of right now is supposed to be the thing that's supposed to be helping me. Yeah, none of these have anything to do with his punishments. Like they exist independent of it. Yeah, and not even just about his punishment. It was like they didn't even facilitate any of this. Right.

literally the FBI sent me a pamphlet in the mail and it is so ridiculous. It is a pamphlet for victims of crime. And on the back, they have a list of their tips for how to deal with crime. And I think the first one is literally make a list of all of the responsibilities that you have and see which ones you can cross off for the time being. I'm like, okay, that's,

what you have to offer me. Like, this is my option. And I'm like in a position where I have like a really good support system and things like that. Like, but I'm like with all of the money and influence and power that the government has, does our government who supposedly cares so much about victims, I feel like it should maybe provide a little something more. So-

What they can offer is what exists within this system, which is prosecution and a trial, or in this case, a sentencing, which took place in June 2021. I got a text from Cilicia saying the sentencing is happening. I was on summer break. I was on a road trip. I happened to be in Minnesota, but I was quote unquote not working. LOL. Yes, I was. But I did not bring my recording kit

So unfortunately, here is some bad audio I recorded on my phone. Okay, it's June 29th. I'm standing outside the federal courthouse. Isaiah is going to be sentenced today. I got here early. It's a damp day here in Minneapolis. It is damp. It rained last night. The streets are wet. And today's the day. Cilicia! Yeah!

Today's the day. Yeah, I know. Oh my goodness. How are you? I just, I didn't bring a kit, so I'm just recording on a phone like a real professional, like a public radio professional. So, Marcel, you and I are both at the sentencing, but you slipped in a little later. You were sitting at the back. I remember turning around and, like, we were both wearing masks and we're trying to communicate everything with our eyeballs. Yeah, it was a heavy room. I didn't realize exactly...

His side of the courtroom was really sparse. It was awkwardly sparse.

There weren't a lot of people. And, you know, it looked like his family. And, you know, one thing like in terms of energy, it was like I didn't think that his family was much different than the victim side.

Like everybody in there had a little bit of anxiety, frustration, anger, and not being sure about what the outcome was going to be. Yeah, it was a very strange atmosphere. This is also my first federal sentencing. And the sentencing was a lot. He ended up being sentenced to seven years. His attorney was asking for virtual prison time.

Yeah. Yeah. Nah. Nah, man. Yeah. He was asking for virtual prison time over five years so that he could work. And their reasoning was basically like, well, the faster he gets back to work, not in financial advising or financial planning, which he will never be able to do again. He'll never again be able to invest someone else's money. But the faster he gets back to any kind of work,

the faster he'll be able to pay people back. But he was sentenced to seven years in a federal corrections facility. So the sentencing ends. We sit with Celicia in this corner of the courtroom and again, recorded the conversation on my phone. So it is not the greatest sound quality.

It was much longer than I thought it was going to be, but each side got to kind of make their case about what sentence is deserved or correct. And to me, it was interesting that the judge said at the end, like,

you know, I can't repair the harm that's been done to the victims, but you know, I can serve justice. And I thought that was sort of like interesting because I was like, what exactly, what are we getting out of this? Like, I feel like it really came through the whole sentencing. The primary thing everyone was concerned with was like, I want my money back. I want my, my dreams, my aspirations back. And literally the sentence was like, here's how you're not going to get that. And I think,

there's that feeling of like, yes, retribution and also, but like that doesn't last. Robin said it wasn't long enough. I tend to agree with that from the one side of it, you know, looking at it. The other side of it though, is I tell people all the time that there are things that are worse than death.

So he is now in a place where he has some twins that will basically have no recollection of their father. You know, I'm not sure of how, you know, the visitation and everything will work, but they'll just see him in a room and his older children will do the same thing and his wife will do the same thing. So,

Now, if I was going to ask him one question, I would ask him, was it worth it? The devastation of like his actions and then our criminal justice system, criminal legal system, it just like ripples out so far beyond just like...

you know, what you immediately think of these big impacts to victims. And then it's also like, there's all these other things and these impacts are really long and ongoing. And that's like, the other thing too, is like people think of financial crimes as nonviolent, but like, what is like, how do you define violence? And like, how is it not violent to like, not be able to pursue the dreams that you've been working on for decades? I remember, you know, Robin asked me if I have feelings

forgiving him. And I said, yes. I said, but forgiveness is not for him. Forgiveness is for me. Because if I carry this bitterness and keep going, then how is that going to change the quality of my life? Now, do I have my bad days? Yes, because I'm being perfectly honest with you. I have not been a reverend all my life. No.

But the fact is that I have to move on. I have to because with me, I have more days behind me than I do in front of me. Even if I live a long life, I have more days behind me than I do in front of me. So what am I going to do with these days in front of me?

Am I going to focus on that bitterness and keep that up? Or am I going to try to help someone else to better their life? You could have helped so many people. And instead of doing that, you killed us. You stabbed us in the back. And by you stabbing us in the back like that, you know, I think a lot of people that were, you know, going to be jaded.

But we looked, you know, there was business owners and everything. There was a PhD. So it wasn't just me. And I take it personal, but I said, but it wasn't just me. It was this whole community of people that were let down by this man wanting to do what I call dumb stuff. And he sat in his office and bragged about it.

Yeah, you know, we're going to take this trip. And he came back and he had pictures and everything. Showed it to us. Oh, hey, man, you know, that's great. But little did we know that he did it all for our money. There's one thing. We make money and we do different things. But you can never get your time back. I tell my, you know, grandson, talk to him a lot. I say, grandson, whatever you're out here doing,

Be careful, because you can never get your time back. You can never get your time back. This episode, this story, there's so many tentacles to it. I feel like we are still only just kind of scratching the surface of it. Yeah. This is our last episode for a while, but I do have a call to action for our listeners. Yeah.

And it's kind of an unusual one. This is not something that we've done before, and I doubt we'll ever do it again. But the story of Mr. Gonzalez really affected us. The story of Mr. Gonzalez is, it's tough to listen to. I'm sure it's even tougher to live through. Cilicia, who you've heard from, she's also a victim of Isaiah, actually set up a GoFundMe for Mr. Gonzalez, for his wife, for his sister-in-law.

to get back that money, the money that the government is, you know, hoping to sort of squeeze from a stone in the coming years after he gets out of prison in seven years. Mr. Gonzalez, seven years is a long time at the end of your life.

I want to get him his money back or I want to do the best we can. And I did a little mental math, Marcel. And if everybody who listens to this episode gave $2, he would have all his money back. So that's my hope for this episode is that our community can show up and do our best to make money.

This right. I don't know. Does this sound corny? Does this sound stupid? Am I saying this correctly? No, it sounds it sounds good. You know, if anyone who has any extra money or can forfeit, you know, half of a latte, right?

Um, it'd be helpful. I mean, it's not corny that the what's corny is, and more than corny, what's corny, evil, sick is stealing money from a bunch of people that put their trust in you, especially elderly people, um, people of color that are, you know, from your same community. That's what's corny.

Well, so we're going to do it. I'm going to get it started. So we'll link to the GoFundMe in our bio. We'll post it online. I'm going to make a contribution. My family's going to make a contribution. And that's our hope for this episode. There will be more about this story on TTFAPremium.com.

In the coming weeks, we are going on a little bit of a break for a few weeks, but we are still digging. We're still talking to a bunch of people. And we talked to Isaiah. I felt like on one side, I had these issues that I was trying to deal with. And on the other side, I was trying to make up for it with optimism, with charisma, with just kind of longing to be successful.

And so eventually we know, you know, at a fault line, they're going to give and there's going to be an earthquake. And I think once I started lying to myself, that's when it just became inevitable. I kept going deeper and deeper down the down the wrong path.

This has been Terrible Thanks for Asking. Our team is me, Nora McInerney, Marcel Malekibu, Jacob Maldonado-Medina, Jordan Turgeon, and sometimes Megan Palmer. Terrible Thanks for Asking is a production of APM Studios at American Public Media, executive producer and editor Beth Perlman, executives in charge Lily Kim, Alex Sheffert, and Joanne Griffith.

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