Federal Trade Commission v. Affordable Media, LLC

Denyse and Michael Anderson (defendants) ran Financial Growth Consultants, a Ponzi scheme that used later investors' money to pay earlier investors promised returns on media units, retaining $6.3 million in commissions of the $13 million raised. The FTC (plaintiff) obtained an injunction requiring the Andersons to repatriate assets held in a Cook Islands asset-protection trust they had created. When the Andersons asked their co-trustee to repatriate the assets, the co-trustee refused, invoking the trust's "duress" provision and removing the Andersons as co-trustees -- but under the trust's own terms, the Andersons served as "protectors" with power to certify whether an event of duress had actually occurred, which would have let them overrule the co-trustee's refusal. The district court, after a hearing, found the Andersons retained control over the trust and held them in civil contempt for noncompliance.