Dave Goggin, member of Veterans for Peace at that group’s weekly vigil on the Plaza. KLH | Union
Note: Viad Corp. has responded to this piece. See letter appended to this opinion column, below. – Ed.
It has now been more than 15 years since I first found myself on the receiving end of one specific abuse of the Patriot Act type powers, where Federal agents can invade the phones and computers of U.S. citizens.
My experience with abuse of government and corporate trust first occurred in the late Clinton/Gore Administration. It was a situation that I stumbled into in the form of a major corporate rip-off that enjoyed government protection in their antics against private citizens.
The particular offending corporation I am referencing is Travelers Express, a money order division of the VIAD Corporation. I came to learn of other such rip-off companies. But the VIAD Corporation was clearly among them. They were regularly making large contributions to both the Democratic and Republican political parties. These contributions continue to play a clear part in how such corrupt corporations are able to scam the people without accountability from government officials or agencies at all levels.
The VIAD (Travelers Express) Corporation put together a rather elaborate scheme in which they are able to steal up to $500 from unsuspecting purchasers of one of their money orders, plus added fees for a phony stop-pay order. It is quite an elaborate scheme. I will attempt to detail how they were able to perpetrate their fraud so successfully.
I personally found myself hustled when I purchased one of their top value money orders in the amount of $500. I purchased the $500 money order at a special window in a supermarket in Fairfield, Calif. I was caused to believe the money order had been placed in an envelope, which was then put in my grocery bag with other items by the clerk. Shortly after leaving that window, however, I discovered no such envelope or money order, so I promptly returned to the window where I had purchased it. The clerk would be quick to sell me a Stop Pay Order, explaining that if anyone found my money order, it could not be paid, and that the full amount would be reimbursed to me at a later date.
That was my introduction to their well rehearsed “routine.” In phone contacts with their home office, I would be told that particular Stop Pay Order supposedly could not be implemented, for reasons that could not be made clear to me. The company next reported that someone had managed to cash the money order and Travelers Express only provided a poor quality photo-copy of a money order with no recognizable numbers, or transfer codes, and no record of where the money order was paid or to whom.
At this point, Travelers Express could simply pocket the money and act like this was everyday business, the normal routine, and nothing could be done. The local police saw no irregularities. The poor quality photocopy provided them no leads. Nobody seemed to understand anything about electronic transfer codes or how easily traceable a money order should have been. I should simply accept that I was out $525.
I tried to elicit elected officials and government agencies to look into this scam wherever I could, but to no avail. I sent extensive mailings to elected officials at every city, county, state and federal level that I could, only to confirm this con-game was permitted without interference from government agencies and officials at all levels.
The political contributions were such that all would turn their heads and look the other way. During these efforts I stumbled into another pertinent fact; Travelers Express did business in cities and countries throughout much of the world; to other world governments that were not made up of members of a couple of bought off political parties.
I began acquiring email addresses of members of parliament and government officials in cities in countries all over the globe, and began a mass mailing on the internet. I informed these elected officials about how Travelers Express might also be doing business in their countries, and about how Travelers Express apparently was getting away with their scam in the United States. These officials had been paid off to look the other way. Many, in response to my email message, began calling for investigations.
Some of these overseas officials sent requests to the FBI, to consumer affairs agencies and even to the office of the U.S. Secretary of State. Many of these other nation officials provided me with letters of appreciation and copies of their efforts to get these charges investigated.
It is not an exaggeration to report that I have never been alone on any computer connected to the Internet since. I am not any kind of terrorist and have committed no internet crime, but federal agents have been able to take control of my computer and phone 24/7, from that time through the present.
At least one of the federal agents assigned to me has made little effort to conceal his presence. It has long been my practice to follow progressive radio talk shows and often become a regular in their chat rooms. These chat rooms would soon be visited by other personalities that might appear totally out of place in such a setting.
Initially, I was a regular on Mark Levine’s RADIO INSIDE SCOOP. Certain new members in that chat room appeared to be in considerable disharmony. A couple of them appeared quite angry with me; one was prone to making threats.
One day a particular chatter was blatantly posting statements about how much he hated being assigned to me and that he could speak for others who shared his anger. Some of us entered into a chat with the talk show host (Mark Levine), about this abusive fellow, and Mark shared our concerns. Mark had the ability to trace a chatter back to his ISP location, and found that this particular ISP was located in the J. Edgar Hoover building. Other suspect visitors to the chat room would use fictitious email addresses.
Soon thereafter, that same hot headed fellow in question posted a very blatant threat to my person, informing me that I would soon suffer a horrible death at his hands. (This on a national public blog). I was able to highlight and copy that particular post and promptly included it in an email to then-Vice President Al Gore, who I learned would then go visit the FBI. That would end the direct threats and, as I recall, Mark banned him from that chat room, though I believe he returned with a different identity.
Since then, when using any computer, anywhere, I found the federal hackers to be there. I understand they have their high-tech methods of finding and following most any person’s location. One or more of these hackers is a religious fanatic and another is obsessed with pornography. Most all of them make it quite obvious that they are monitoring, and largely controlling my computer and email. I believe they were assigned to ensure that I might never again make contact with any elected government officials in any other country at any time, by blocking my mail.
The federal hackers assigned to me largely found their task to be a boring job. They still join me daily in the Thom Hartmann chat room. Some reveal good common sense and some let it be known that they are not in harmony with those retaining their services, but many topics are still taboo to them. Whether they like their duties or not, it appears they are well paid, and clearly they don’t want a corrupt FBI all over them as well should they stand up to them. A couple of them, the Fed Hackers just remain angry and abusive by nature, and appear to enjoy finding ways to invade and disrupt at any opportunity.
I am of an earlier generation and have never been all that skillful in my computer literacy. Now, attempting to reconstruct much of their daily activities on my computers all these many years would soon prove to be insurmountable.
Still, they have not found me to be one who gets easily discouraged or intimidated. I had learned that all government police agencies that might be contacted were also counted on to look away and play their part in this wide scale con-game. This particular, rather massive fraud is being perpetrated against private citizens, most of whom find themselves hopelessly ill equipped to deal with the sting they would find themselves caught up in.
Most often I am only able to share this particular story in bits and pieces. Some find it hard to believe, asking why would federal agencies tie up so many agents for so long, just to hassle one harmless senior citizen on the North Coast of California, which I would normally consider to be a fair question to ask.
The whistleblowing efforts by Ed Snowden has proved somewhat consistent with my predicament, but many choose not to believe his reports regarding how the Patriot Act allows our government to misuse and abuse their technological powers. A most serious matter.
Others report similar experiences and at least one friend has asked me to sit down at an old manual, and to attempt to reconstruct this story. So here I sit at a 70-year-old Olympia portable typewriter without wi-fi or modems. Hopefully we will some day convert it to some sort of word processor.
I conclude this chapter of my life by sharing an observation: Many of our elected and appointed government officials are not in the business of fighting crime, but are rather in the business of committing crimes; invading all of our electronic devices for all the wrong reasons. They can clearly become accomplices to frauds directed against the people.
For those still with me, might I suggest that they take a second look at electronic voting with modems, which allows easy access to many of these same folks which I have come to observe rather directly. I find myself often posing the question of how, in a democracy, a fraction of one percent manages, regularly, to acquire some 51 percent of elected offices.
It remains my hope that some surviving members of a once free press will find time to explore a real part of what is happening in and to our country.
Dave Goggin is an Arcata resident and member of Veterans for Peace.
Note: we contacted the company formerly known as Travelers Express, now called MoneyGram, but didn’t hear back before press time. The company admitted complicity in money laundering and fraud in 2012, and is under a five-year corporate monitoring program involving regular reports to the U.S. Department of Justice. –Ed.
Viad Corp responds
Note: According to its self-published history, Viad Corp. sold MoneyGram on June 30, 2004 – four years after Goggin claims the fraud occurred. – Ed.
I am writing out of concern regarding an article published on your site that mentions Viad Corp: “Dave Goggin: Surveilled for life after a $500 ripoff”. In a few places (highlighted below), the article directly accuses Viad of the alleged ripoff/fraud. Viad Corp is not affiliated with Travelers Express (now MoneyGram International). And as Viad Corp is a publicly traded company, I am highly concerned about the potential impact this article may have for our company and its shareholders. I respectfully request that you either take the article down from your site or retract and re-issue without any references to Viad Corp.
Thank you for your time and attention to this matter,
Carrie Long
Executive Director, Finance & IR
Viad Corp.
Article excerpts:
The particular offending corporation I am referencing is Travelers Express, a money order division of the VIAD Corporation. I came to learn of other such rip-off companies. But the VIAD Corporation was clearly among them. They were regularly making large contributions to both the Democratic and Republican political parties. These contributions continue to play a clear part in how such corrupt corporations are able to scam the people without accountability from government officials or agencies at all levels.
The VIAD (Travelers Express) Corporation put together a rather elaborate scheme in which they are able to steal up to $500 from unsuspecting purchasers of one of their money orders, plus added fees for a phony stop-pay order. It is quite an elaborate scheme. I will attempt to detail how they were able to perpetrate their fraud so successfully.
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3 COMMENTS
Pingback: Letters to the Editor through August, 2015 | Mad River Union
anomous – August 2, 2015 said:
Sounds like MonyGram (Travelers Express – VIAD) long able to get away w/ so much. Are they able to pay someone some 70 Mil and alowed to go on doing busness as usual?
Willliam Wallace – August 1, 2015 said:
Was Norcalguy101 one of the many stalking harassers assigned to you?
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Dave Goggin, member of Veterans for Peace at that group's weekly vigil on the Plaza. KLH | Union
Note: Viad Corp. has responded to this piece. See letter appended to this opinion ... More >>
david goggin August 4, 2018 1:06 pm
Dave Goggin, member of Veterans for Peace at that group’s weekly vigil on the Plaza. KLH | Union
Note: Viad Corp. has responded to this piece. See letter appended to this opinion column, below. – Ed.
It has now been more than 15 years since I first found myself on the receiving end of one specific abuse of the Patriot Act type powers, where Federal agents can invade the phones and computers of U.S. citizens.
My experience with abuse of government and corporate trust first occurred in the late Clinton/Gore Administration. It was a situation that I stumbled into in the form of a major corporate rip-off that enjoyed government protection in their antics against private citizens.
The particular offending corporation I am referencing is Travelers Express, a money order division of the VIAD Corporation. I came to learn of other such rip-off companies. But the VIAD Corporation was clearly among them. They were regularly making large contributions to both the Democratic and Republican political parties. These contributions continue to play a clear part in how such corrupt corporations are able to scam the people without accountability from government officials or agencies at all levels.
The VIAD (Travelers Express) Corporation put together a rather elaborate scheme in which they are able to steal up to $500 from unsuspecting purchasers of one of their money orders, plus added fees for a phony stop-pay order. It is quite an elaborate scheme. I will attempt to detail how they were able to perpetrate their fraud so successfully.
I personally found myself hustled when I purchased one of their top value money orders in the amount of $500. I purchased the $500 money order at a special window in a supermarket in Fairfield, Calif. I was caused to believe the money order had been placed in an envelope, which was then put in my grocery bag with other items by the clerk. Shortly after leaving that window, however, I discovered no such envelope or money order, so I promptly returned to the window where I had purchased it. The clerk would be quick to sell me a Stop Pay Order, explaining that if anyone found my money order, it could not be paid, and that the full amount would be reimbursed to me at a later date.
That was my introduction to their well rehearsed “routine.” In phone contacts with their home office, I would be told that particular Stop Pay Order supposedly could not be implemented, for reasons that could not be made clear to me. The company next reported that someone had managed to cash the money order and Travelers Express only provided a poor quality photo-copy of a money order with no recognizable numbers, or transfer codes, and no record of where the money order was paid or to whom.
At this point, Travelers Express could simply pocket the money and act like this was everyday business, the normal routine, and nothing could be done. The local police saw no irregularities. The poor quality photocopy provided them no leads. Nobody seemed to understand anything about electronic transfer codes or how easily traceable a money order should have been. I should simply accept that I was out $525.
I tried to elicit elected officials and government agencies to look into this scam wherever I could, but to no avail. I sent extensive mailings to elected officials at every city, county, state and federal level that I could, only to confirm this con-game was permitted without interference from government agencies and officials at all levels.
The political contributions were such that all would turn their heads and look the other way. During these efforts I stumbled into another pertinent fact; Travelers Express did business in cities and countries throughout much of the world; to other world governments that were not made up of members of a couple of bought off political parties.
I began acquiring email addresses of members of parliament and government officials in cities in countries all over the globe, and began a mass mailing on the internet. I informed these elected officials about how Travelers Express might also be doing business in their countries, and about how Travelers Express apparently was getting away with their scam in the United States. These officials had been paid off to look the other way. Many, in response to my email message, began calling for investigations.
Some of these overseas officials sent requests to the FBI, to consumer affairs agencies and even to the office of the U.S. Secretary of State. Many of these other nation officials provided me with letters of appreciation and copies of their efforts to get these charges investigated.
It is not an exaggeration to report that I have never been alone on any computer connected to the Internet since. I am not any kind of terrorist and have committed no internet crime, but federal agents have been able to take control of my computer and phone 24/7, from that time through the present.
At least one of the federal agents assigned to me has made little effort to conceal his presence. It has long been my practice to follow progressive radio talk shows and often become a regular in their chat rooms. These chat rooms would soon be visited by other personalities that might appear totally out of place in such a setting.
Initially, I was a regular on Mark Levine’s RADIO INSIDE SCOOP. Certain new members in that chat room appeared to be in considerable disharmony. A couple of them appeared quite angry with me; one was prone to making threats.
One day a particular chatter was blatantly posting statements about how much he hated being assigned to me and that he could speak for others who shared his anger. Some of us entered into a chat with the talk show host (Mark Levine), about this abusive fellow, and Mark shared our concerns. Mark had the ability to trace a chatter back to his ISP location, and found that this particular ISP was located in the J. Edgar Hoover building. Other suspect visitors to the chat room would use fictitious email addresses.
Soon thereafter, that same hot headed fellow in question posted a very blatant threat to my person, informing me that I would soon suffer a horrible death at his hands. (This on a national public blog). I was able to highlight and copy that particular post and promptly included it in an email to then-Vice President Al Gore, who I learned would then go visit the FBI. That would end the direct threats and, as I recall, Mark banned him from that chat room, though I believe he returned with a different identity.
Since then, when using any computer, anywhere, I found the federal hackers to be there. I understand they have their high-tech methods of finding and following most any person’s location. One or more of these hackers is a religious fanatic and another is obsessed with pornography. Most all of them make it quite obvious that they are monitoring, and largely controlling my computer and email. I believe they were assigned to ensure that I might never again make contact with any elected government officials in any other country at any time, by blocking my mail.
The federal hackers assigned to me largely found their task to be a boring job. They still join me daily in the Thom Hartmann chat room. Some reveal good common sense and some let it be known that they are not in harmony with those retaining their services, but many topics are still taboo to them. Whether they like their duties or not, it appears they are well paid, and clearly they don’t want a corrupt FBI all over them as well should they stand up to them. A couple of them, the Fed Hackers just remain angry and abusive by nature, and appear to enjoy finding ways to invade and disrupt at any opportunity.
I am of an earlier generation and have never been all that skillful in my computer literacy. Now, attempting to reconstruct much of their daily activities on my computers all these many years would soon prove to be insurmountable.
Still, they have not found me to be one who gets easily discouraged or intimidated. I had learned that all government police agencies that might be contacted were also counted on to look away and play their part in this wide scale con-game. This particular, rather massive fraud is being perpetrated against private citizens, most of whom find themselves hopelessly ill equipped to deal with the sting they would find themselves caught up in.
Most often I am only able to share this particular story in bits and pieces. Some find it hard to believe, asking why would federal agencies tie up so many agents for so long, just to hassle one harmless senior citizen on the North Coast of California, which I would normally consider to be a fair question to ask.
The whistleblowing efforts by Ed Snowden has proved somewhat consistent with my predicament, but many choose not to believe his reports regarding how the Patriot Act allows our government to misuse and abuse their technological powers. A most serious matter.
Others report similar experiences and at least one friend has asked me to sit down at an old manual, and to attempt to reconstruct this story. So here I sit at a 70-year-old Olympia portable typewriter without wi-fi or modems. Hopefully we will some day convert it to some sort of word processor.
I conclude this chapter of my life by sharing an observation: Many of our elected and appointed government officials are not in the business of fighting crime, but are rather in the business of committing crimes; invading all of our electronic devices for all the wrong reasons. They can clearly become accomplices to frauds directed against the people.
For those still with me, might I suggest that they take a second look at electronic voting with modems, which allows easy access to many of these same folks which I have come to observe rather directly. I find myself often posing the question of how, in a democracy, a fraction of one percent manages, regularly, to acquire some 51 percent of elected offices.
It remains my hope that some surviving members of a once free press will find time to explore a real part of what is happening in and to our country.
Dave Goggin is an Arcata resident and member of Veterans for Peace.
Note: we contacted the company formerly known as Travelers Express, now called MoneyGram, but didn’t hear back before press time. The company admitted complicity in money laundering and fraud in 2012, and is under a five-year corporate monitoring program involving regular reports to the U.S. Department of Justice. –Ed.
Viad Corp responds
Note: According to its self-published history, Viad Corp. sold MoneyGram on June 30, 2004 – four years after Goggin claims the fraud occurred. – Ed.
I am writing out of concern regarding an article published on your site that mentions Viad Corp: “Dave Goggin: Surveilled for life after a $500 ripoff”. In a few places (highlighted below), the article directly accuses Viad of the alleged ripoff/fraud. Viad Corp is not affiliated with Travelers Express (now MoneyGram International). And as Viad Corp is a publicly traded company, I am highly concerned about the potential impact this article may have for our company and its shareholders. I respectfully request that you either take the article down from your site or retract and re-issue without any references to Viad Corp.
Thank you for your time and attention to this matter,
Carrie Long
Executive Director, Finance & IR
Viad Corp.
Article excerpts:
The particular offending corporation I am referencing is Travelers Express, a money order division of the VIAD Corporation. I came to learn of other such rip-off companies. But the VIAD Corporation was clearly among them. They were regularly making large contributions to both the Democratic and Republican political parties. These contributions continue to play a clear part in how such corrupt corporations are able to scam the people without accountability from government officials or agencies at all levels.
The VIAD (Travelers Express) Corporation put together a rather elaborate scheme in which they are able to steal up to $500 from unsuspecting purchasers of one of their money orders, plus added fees for a phony stop-pay order. It is quite an elaborate scheme. I will attempt to detail how they were able to perpetrate their fraud so successfully.
Share this:
Twitter
Sharing
Twitter0
Facebook0
Google +0
Linkedin0
Email this article
Print this article
Authors
Kevin Hoover
Tags
Thom Hartmann, Travelers Express
3 COMMENTS
Pingback: Letters to the Editor through August, 2015 | Mad River Union
anomous – August 2, 2015 said:
Sounds like MonyGram (Travelers Express – VIAD) long able to get away w/ so much. Are they able to pay someone some 70 Mil and alowed to go on doing busness as usual?
Willliam Wallace – August 1, 2015 said:
Was Norcalguy101 one of the many stalking harassers assigned to you?
Comments are closed.
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RECENT POSTS
HSU vice president demands newspaper retract employee’s allegations
Streets and mixers aswarm with Arcata City Council candidates
Kirsten’s Kitchen: Grilled Escarole with Caesar Dressing and Sungold Tomatoes
At The Market: Farmers’ Market merch is so Arcata
KHSU crisis deepens as visioning