A federal judge has issued a temporary injunction and frozen the assets of a group of online marketers the Federal Trade Commission claims used spam to sell weight-loss and human-growth-hormone anti-aging products that don’t work, the FTC announced Wednesday.
Judge Wayne Andersen of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division on Oct. 3 issued an order halting the e-mail marketing activities and freezing the assets of Wyoming-based Spear Systems and its proprietors Bruce Parker and Lisa Kimsey, and Xavier Ratelle, proprietor of EHealthyLife.com.
The FTC alleged the defendants used spammers to drive traffic to Web sites selling weight-loss pills HoodiaLife and HoodiaPlus, and human-growth-hormone anti-aging pills HGHLife and HGHPlus, none of which worked as advertised.
In addition, the FTC claimed the spamming operation was international in nature and that this is the first time the commission used the U.S. SAFE WEB Act to share information with foreign officials.
According to the FTC, the commission’s spam database received more than 175,000 spam messages sent on behalf of the defendants.
A hearing is scheduled for Thursday to determine whether or not to extend the injunction and asset freeze until the case is resolved.
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