Pennsylvania investigation into PKI doubted

Friday, July 18, 2008

© AgMedia Inc.

by SUSAN MANN

Nils Frederiksen, deputy press secretary at Attorney General Tom Corbett’s office says their office received promotional materials from PKI from consumers this spring. “They were concerned citizens who came forward with some information about the way that this was being marketed in Pennsylvania.” Their office has not received any consumer complaints.

The material was reviewed and forwarded to the state’s securities commission “because it appeared that this might have been marketed as an investment product” and did not appear to be governed by consumer protection law, he says.

The Pennsylvania Securities Commission doesn’t have an active investigation at this point, says Lew Levin, director of the Commission’s enforcement, litigation and compliance division. “I don’t know whether we will.”

No Canadian authorities have found anything wrong with the now- insolvent pigeon breeding scheme. Nevertheless, before owner Arlan Galbraith declared PKI’s bankruptcy in June, the company’s business activity fell under the scrutiny of jurisdictions in the United States with one of these calling the venture a “‘Ponzi’ type of investment scheme” and another alleging false statements or omissions of fact had taken place.

Last December when Iowa’s attorney general Tom Miller became one of four attorneys generals to achieve a ban on further pigeon sales in their states he issued a statement saying he could not find a “legitimate purpose for PKI pigeons “other than providing inventory for new growers in furtherance of a ‘Ponzi’ type of investment scheme.”

In June, the State of Maryland also issued a formal cease and desist order concerning PKI, citing violations of its business opportunities act in the form of failing to register with the state, failing to give prospective buyers disclosure details as required by the state and making false statements or “omissions of fact” about the venture. BF