Buyers of 'Weight Loss Cure' would get $11 checks under refund plan; receiver seeks missing millions
A federal judge in Chicago gave tentative approval on Tuesday to a plan to send $11 refund checks to buyers of a book called The Weight Loss Cure ‘They’ Don’t Want You to Know About.
U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman said he would give lawyers for TV pitchman Kevin Trudeau a chance to weigh in on the plan before making a final decision, report the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times and ABC7Chicago. Trudeau had claimed the diet described in the book offered easy weight loss techniques when it actually restricted followers to 500 calories a day.
The refunds would be funded with $8 million recovered by a court-appointed receiver after Trudeau was fined $37.6 million, according to the plan by the Federal Trade Commission. A report by the receiver found that Trudeau’s business operations collected more than $500 million over a 14-year period, and at least $30 million is still unaccounted for, the stories say.
The receiver alleged that Trudeau hid his money in overseas banks and shell companies in a complicated “asset protection plan.” An FTC lawyer said documents had been forwarded to Illinois ethics authorities concerning the possible role of Trudeau’s lawyer, Marc Lane, in the asset plan.
Gettleman said the receiver’s report showed Trudeau wasn’t telling the truth when he claimed to be penniless in 2013. Trudeau is currently serving a 10-year criminal contempt sentence for violating a consent order to stop making misleading claims about the book.
