Life In the Philippines e-Magazine SCAM

In late 2003 Arthur Hawk emailed me via one of the many Yahoo Groups I 'own' relating to living in the Philippines. He offered me the job of being his editor for a new, exciting eMagazine he was developing called 'Life In The Philippines'. He stated he was currently in Costa Rica where he ran a publishing business that was very successful. He sent me a draft of the 'Panama Owners Manual' (I still have it on file) which he alleged he wrote and sold and so forth.

He came to Cebu in March 2004 and I resigned from Bigfoot Inc on the basis of his enticement, a written employment contract and the promise of US$1500 per month, more than my salary from Bigfoot. I wrote three issues of the magazine, often using pen names to give the impression we had a stable of expat writers. He was supposed to find the advertising, sell the subscriptions and manage the publishing end.

He borrowed ads and photos and assured me he owned copyright or had permission. He had a program called 'Flip Book' he alleged was licensed just to him, he had the rights to video emails and many other special things nobody else had. The first salary payment of half a month was paid. But then Easter hit and his money was halted in transit between Costa Rica, Panama and New York due to the war on terror, new security rules for transferring money and so on.

This dragged on from plausible excuse to plausible excuse but I smelt a rat. I had a limited amount of money left and needed to work and be paid. I had to decide whether to hang in there another 6 weeks or pull the pin, use my emergency stash to get back to Australia and then get a job and send money to my wife and two kids etc. I did this and we parted on amicable terms, Arthur even drove me to the airport in his rented car and driver. I later met the driver after Hawk left town and was told he was owed a lot of money by Hawk for chauffeuring him around.
After four months in Australia working on a road crew in freezing winds, or selling cars and so on, I returned to Cebu. I tracked Hawk down in a hotel (not the Marriott, his usual haunt). He said he was selling listings for hotels on his website and also dental vacations and so on. He owed me US$3200. I finally received US$700 from him later when we met at the Marriott when he was back in funds and staying there again.

By this time a young Filipino IT man contacted me telling me how Hawk had conned him into setting up a business and connecting the internet and phones at great expense, then never paid him for his work and so on. The poor bloke was broke and broken. He had borrowed from family and friends to set up the business based on promises of work from Hawk. Then left with long leases and no work! Hawk threatened serious legal action and scared him off.

I feel sorry for Hawk's wife. Hopefully she is back home in Cebu. Hawk was forever saving her from drive by gun men and so on. He credited her with ringing up his army buddies to rescue him when he was kidnapped in Costa Rica. He claimed he was the past president of the Canadian Vietnam Veteran's Association, they have never heard of him. He claimed to own two car dealerships in Calgary... nope. He claimed one of his salesmen was murdered by a disgruntled husband in the identical way another car salesman was killed in the USA... but that was a myth according to www.snopes.com.

He was running Opaline Press when I knew him. Including taking my eBook, retitling it 'Alive and Kicking' and then selling it online. He failed to supply the file and one buyer contacted me and was understandably irate. I tried to stop his PayPal and Checkout accounts going through, I reported him to the FBI and RCMP and so on, all to no avail.

I am real, I am me. I hope I am being transparent here. I can send you copies of emails and I have exchanged, from when he first conned me to recent threats to sue me when I sent a few emails to people he was involved with online. Lastly, what's in this for me? The satisfaction that I have hopefully stopped HawkHawk from scamming another trusting soul.