2: Into the Lion’s Den

Smigle and Friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Creek to David Letterman

“help make you funnier this week, my guest. SNL's Mikey Day and Head Writer, Streader”

Side L helped an Occupella band with their "Between Songs Banner." Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Wasn't a humor me with Robert Smigle and Friends on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi listeners, I'm Michelle, host of the Kingdom of Fraud Podcast.

And I'm excited to share this incredible story with you.

I'm also excited to tell you that you can get access to all episodes of Kingdom of Fraud. 100% ad-free in one week early, through the iHeart True Crime Plus subscription, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Plus, you'll get access to other chart topping true crime shows you love, like the girlfriends, the trail, the godmother, paper goes, piked in massacre, murder homes, unrestorable, and more.

So don't wait, head to Apple Podcasts search for iHeart True Crime Plus and subscribe today. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place.

I'm a Keela Hughes, and Rebels Spirit Season 2 is about both of those things. As I was watching these statues come down, I was thinking about what it meant that I grew up in a majority black city in which there were more omages to enslave us than there were to enslave people. Listen to Rebels Spirit Season 2 on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. If you're seeking to try to understand the forensic science behind these cases

“that we hear about in the news, body bags is where you need to turn.”

There's no fluff we do a deep dive into the forensics. Listen to body bags with Joseph Scott Morgan on America's number one podcast network. iHeart open your free iHeart app and search body bags with Joseph Scott Morgan and start listening. The EDM is pounding, the champagne is flowing, waiters and all white are threading through the well-hilled crowd,

drinks in hand, the riding tipsy bodies on the dance floor are mostly topless, wrenched and sweat, their feet covered in sand, the whole place is bouncing. It's called Nicky Beach, and it's probably the most exclusive beach club in all of Miami. The pulsating base draws a glitzzy crowd desperate to be seen here. Lena Otto de Caprio and Paris Sultan are both regulars, but in March 2012,

a different clientele is partying it up behind the velvet rope. It was myself, Levon, and several other members of his family and his bodyguard team.

This is Katarina Patison's first time meeting Levon Tumenzian, the lion.

She's here in South Beach on his dime. It was a celebration of a new business relationship. They're here hashing out and celebrating an enormous new deal. A deal to conduct biofuel fraud worth millions of dollars. At just 26, Katarina has found herself deeply embedded in the renewable fuel industry.

She's the CEO of a biofuel company. We bought and sold B-99 Rhinless biodiesel. She can see Levon dancing and drinking. He's even taken a shirt off. He's the life of the party.

But her drinks earlier that night, Katarina saw a flash of another side to him. The waitress who was serving us, she had a bit of an attitude. She acted like she couldn't care to be there. And that made Levon very offended. He made a comment about how she should be treating him with respect

and Levon pulled out a series of $100 bills called the waitress over

“through them down on the table and looked at her and said next time you will remember me.”

Katarina has to pick her jar up off the floor.

I had never seen that type of behavior before I was shocked and impressed.

It was a very powerful move. This is how Levon rolls. He's shocking and impressive and irresistible.

But Jacob, he has no idea what he's in for.

“My name is Michelle McFee and from the teams at novel and iHard podcast,”

this is kingdom of fraud, episode two, into the lion's dead. Jacob Kingston is driving a rental card gown and industrial side street in commerce, a gritty L.A. neighborhood under the 405. Train tracks run along one side of the cracked road, where houses line the other.

Jacob is on his way to meet Levon Tremenzian for the very first time.

It's December 2011, three months before Nicky Beach. Just yesterday, Jacob was facing ruin. A buyer in India pulled out of a massive deal.

“Now, Jacob's fuel is stranded halfway across the world and he's staring down a multi-million-dollar barrel.”

He needs to figure something out in fast. If he doesn't, his company WRE could fold and Jacob would have to admit defeat to his family, the order, where they believe after you die, debt weighs on your soul forever.

But then, one of Jacob's guys gives him a lead for an Armenian oil and gas titan in Los Angeles.

Levon, who, Jacob Hoops, can fix this entire mess. Jacob sees his destination and pulls in. It's one of those trucker gas stations. To be honest, it looks a little rundown. It's called Noil. Lion's spelled backwards.

“On a thin strip of grass just by the sidewalk, there are two black lion statues.”

They're huge, bearing their teeth, stalking across the lawn and opposite directions like they're guarding a palace. Jacob drives past them and parks out back, outside a double-wide trailer. Hulking bodyguards stand around two black escalade SUVs, framing the entrance. This is the headquarters of the Lion's Operation. No one Jacob has ever done business with before has had bodyguards.

Lion Earth would the lion need them. Jacob steps out of the car and the lion greets him. He's a bulky 5-foot 7, but somehow, he still seems to tower over Jacob, who's 6 feet tall. These two men are from radically different backgrounds, and awkward engineer from a polygamous sect, and a commanding, multi-lingual Armenian businessman.

But they quickly find common ground. They sit down and Levant's well-appointed office inside the trailer, and they discuss Levant's business for a while. He dazzles Jacob with details of how much fuel he moves around. His network of gas stations and truck stops, and then they get to Jacob's problem.

Very quickly Levant offers Jacob a deal.

He'll buy all the fuel, Jacob has stranded in India, a deal worth $1.3 million dollars, a

godset for Jacob. Levant sends someone out to get a cashier's check for the first installment. When Jacob unfolds it, he's stunned. It's made out for $140,000. Handing over it, that much cash to a guy you've just met seems like a crazy move to me. But it all appears to be part of Levant's plan to pull Jacob in. It's a few weeks later, just after Christmas. Jacob and his wife Sally stand

shivering on the tarmac of a small airport outside Salt Lake City.

Jacob wants to make a good impression to please Levant on his first visit to Utah.

“He worries that his crappy old Toyota isn't good enough, so he rents two escalates identical to the”

ones he saw outside Levant's office. The lion lands and walks down the plain stairs, flanked by his body guards. They all agreed each other and get into the SUVs and drive through the remote scrubby flatlands to the WRE plant. They arrive and Jacob and Sally hand Levant a gift basket they've carefully prepared. It's filled with our minion fruits and topped with a cowboy hat.

It seems that Levant likes the presence, a sigh of relief for Jacob. Levant then tours the plant. His aura spreads through the carters along with the smell of his

expensive clone. There's a buzz among the workers. They've never seen a client bring an

entourage of body guards.

“When the tour is over, Levant has an idea. One that takes Jacob completely by surprise.”

Here's my producer, Jake, with Jacob Kingston's testimony. He invited us to go to dinner and Sally and I wanted to go with him and he said, well, we're going to Seattle, which I thought was kind of odd that we would fly to Seattle just for dinner, but we decided to go anyway. The old board has private jet in a couple hours later, land in Seattle.

Our friend of Levant is waiting for them on the tarmac with some flashy cars. Escalades, obviously, in the Maybach. They drive to Levant's friend's mansion. And then, they party, at least everyone who is in a Mormon.

“My producer, Jake and I are going through Jacob's testimony about this bash.”

The way Jacob describes it makes it sound like a really odd party. Jacob says, quote, "Levant hired a singer from Russia, and he had a lot of sushi there that night, and he sang, and we ate a lot of sushi. And you know, everyone around Jacob and Sally is drinking that night. I'm picturing fine Russian spirits, ice-cold vodka, caviar, the works. But Jacob and Sally can drink because they're Mormons."

Not only are they Mormons, but Jacob talked about his rat and snake-infested house, and now they're in a scene that must have felt straight-up Sodom and Gomorrah with all this opulence. It's actually clear in Jacob's testimony. They're so uncomfortable. Jacob says, quote, "We was there until three in the morning. I didn't know how to tell him that we needed to go to sleep." I mean, this is clearly well-passed there by time,

and it sounds like no one would have been sober enough to drive them back to the jet anyway. So, in the end, Jacob does tell Levant that they really need to go, so Levant sends them off to a nearby hotel. But the Seattle John isn't over yet. Because the next morning on their way to the airport, Levant makes them stop at a seafood store. And Jacob testifies, quote, "He bought everything." He asked if we like crab and lobster, and we said we did,

and he bought all of them. Yeah, I read in the testimony, 15 boxes brimming with crab and lobster. Now, that sounds like a party to me. Yeah, apparently Levant buys up the store's entire supply of seafood. When they return home after a whirlwind night of jet setting, to their tiny shitty house on the Waschiki ranch, Jacob and Sally must have been reeling. Not to mention, their fridge is now groaning with so much seafood. The whole order could eat it for a week.

A surreal reminder of their first night out with the lion, one of many more to come.

At the end of 2011, WRE officially enters into contract with Neuel USA, Levant's company. As part of the deal, Levant will buy Jacob's fuels stranded in India. To keep track of business, Jacob starts flying down to California to visit Levant and his office nearly every week. Their talking business, logistics, or invoicing, whatever. When Levant asks Jacob the question that starts at all. You know there are fuel from India? Could we claim subsidies

on it? Jacob, evaluating Levant in that moment wonders whether the lion is suggesting what he thinks

So, he's cautious. I told him that it was not produced by us. It was produced somewhere else. In order to claim the subsidy, we had to run it through the facility in Utah. He asked,

"Well, why don't we do that?" and I told him that first of all, that would be illegal.

It would be illegal because WRI didn't produce this biofuel. It would provide exposure to my employees. They would be liable for that. If Jacob and Levant ran the fuel through the WRI plant, pretending they produced it there, every one of their workers could be co-conspirators in a federal

“crime. For Jacob, this is the pivotal moment. Is he going to put his faith in the lion?”

Just think, there's been $140,000 advance, private jets and bodyguards, the Seattle sushi adventure, the box is the lobster. I mean, even if Jacob feels uneasy about it, the world the lion has shown him is kind of irresistible. Coming up next,

Jacob takes his first step towards the lion's den.

Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guide, not quite on humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Kirk to David Letterman help make you funnier this week, my guest. SNL's Mikey Day and Headwriters Streeter Side L helped an Occupel a band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes,

“those people are starving for banter. Wasn't a humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the”

I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Imagine an Olympics where doping is not only legal but encouraged. It's the enhanced games, some call it grotesque, others say it's unleashing human potential. Either way, the podcast superhuman documented it all, embedded in the games and with the athletes for a full year. Within probably 10 days I'd put on 10 pounds. I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth.

Listen to superhuman on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist tattoo removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is.

“Getting a new one, put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America,”

there's going to be a politics of remembering the civil war. To get to school, I had to go down Robbyty Lee Boulevard, get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're in a store in and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not taking a job. I'm Achila Hughes, in rebel spirits season two goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State

House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies, we contain essence, we contain a spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to rebel spirits season two. On the I-Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi listeners, I'm Michelle, host of the Kingdom of Fraud Podcast.

And I'm excited to share this incredible story with you. I'm also excited to tell you that you

can get access to all episodes of Kingdom of Fraud. 100% ad-free, and one week early, through the I-Heart True Crime Plus subscription, available exclusively on Apple podcasts. Plus, you'll get access to other chart topping true crime shows you love, like the Girl Friends, the trail, the godmother, paper goes, piked in massacre, murder homes, unrestorable, and more. So don't wait, head to Apple podcasts, search for I-Heart True Crime Plus, and subscribe today.

It's amazing to me that these two men, Jacob and Levine, weren't only becoming fast friends, but were also building a rapid fire, criminal conspiracy. I've become fascinated with the CD underbelly at the biofuel world, how it brings people like Levine and Jacob together. How common this kind of fraud is, and the sophisticated nature of these sorts of schemes. What I really need is a biofuel fraud for dummy's book, but no one has written that yet.

So I call someone who knows this intricate world very well.

Doug Parker understands biofuel fraud inside and out, because for many years, it was his job to stop it.

“On the former director of EPA's Criminal Investigation Division,”

the EPA stands for the Environmental Protection Agency, and they have criminal investigators with guns, badges, and the same authority as FBI agents. Only they investigate environmental crimes. Doug says that the problem with biofuel fraud began after George W. Bush signed two different acts passed by Congress, one in 2005, and another in 2007, which introduced a whole host of tax subsidies for companies producing renewable fuels. So the purpose was to encourage production of renewable

fuel. They thought it's going to be better for the environment and make us less dependent on Middle Eastern oil. We were involved in and dealing with the Iraq War, and there was a movement to lessen our demand on foreign oil, because they felt like it made us more vulnerable. The intentions may have been sound, but the regulations themselves not so much. Some folks who wrote them would admit that they weren't written with enough eye towards enforcement.

They were written more with an eye towards encouraging the production. Unlike fossil fuels, you can make renewable fuels out of ingredients you can grow, like soybean, or out of use materials, like cooking oil, but the new regulations to encourage renewable fuel production would too lacks. The government threw a lot of money at biofuel without keeping

tabs on whether it was even going to the right people. So first of all, I want to understand

how biofuel fraud actually works. How do you make money? Well, there are two major subsidies. The first one works like this. The government gave big refineries a yearly target of how much renewable fuel they had to produce. But the refineries didn't necessarily want to have to retrofit all their equipment to all of sudden produce renewable fuels. And so they developed a tradable credit system. So, company A would refine and produce biodiesel, and then an

exon mobile would essentially buy the credit. So a biofuel company, like Jacobs, would produce a gallon of biofuel. That gallon then gets issued with a unique number called an RIN. I know, it's incredibly abstract. So instead, imagine the biofuel is stamped with, I don't know, a gold star. That instead of a refinery having to produce a gallon of biofuel themselves, they just buy a

gold star from Jacob at WR-E. So, I've always found this very confusing because this would be

the equivalent of me going to my friend who owns a Tesla and saying, "Hey, let me buy one of those smog emissions tests from you and I can still drive her on in my, you know, shitty shitty bang bang car and admit a lot of pollution into the air." So, does it in any way affect the environment if you're buying these credits? Ultimately, it is better for the environment. If it operates in a

“transparent, authentic, compliant way, this is ultimately an environmental benefit. That's how it's”

designed. Whether biofuel is substantially better for the environment than fossil fuels is debatable, but we'll dig into all that later in the series. What this means in terms of fraud, though, is that if a biofuel company is lying about making hundreds of thousands of gallons of biofuel,

these gold stars could be worth millions of dollars. But that's not all. There's a second subsidy

available. Here's Doug to explain that one too. Basically, if you produce a certain amount of biofuel, the government wants to emerge it, you prove that you've produced it, you get paid for that. It's like the government cutting you a check. That check is worth $1 per gallon you produce, or pretend to produce. Those are paid out by the IRS. If you tell the tax man, you've produced

“100,000 gallons of biofuel, they'll just send you a check for $100,000. That's why this is such a”

killer fraud. You buy biofuel and pretend you're the one who made it. Then, on that same batch of fuel, you get to make money over and over again with these subsidies for just faking paperwork. First, you sell the gold stars on the open market. Second, you claim the dollar per gallon tax credit,

How much money do you think is lost to our money? To be very clear, this is our money. How much is lost to these fraudsters? When you look at all the fraud that took place, it was billions of dollars. You can see why this became a gigantic issue inside the environmental protection agency.

Doug first realized how much of a shit show it was when one day a colleague pulled him aside.

He literally came up to be coming out of a briefing and he said, "You guys really need to focus

“on fraud in the renewable fuel space." That's what we're seeing popping up everywhere.”

This guy worked in the EPA's civil enforcement team. Unlike Doug's agents, the civil guys can't arrest anyone. Instead, they do inspections, and if needed, they can issue fines or sue for damages. And more and more often, the civil guys saw companies like Jacobs routinely exploiting loopholes. In fact, at the start of 2011, before Jacob even met Levant, the EPA zeros in on WRE. They issue them a notice of violation, which is a problem for Jacob. It means the EPA knows

he's been scamming. But the civil division is powerless to really stop him. The notice is basically

just a public slap on the wrists with the potential for a big fine. Some companies viewed it as a cost of doing business. I'll write to the check. One thing was for certain for many inside the EPA.

“Civil and criminal needed to join forces, and people needed to start getting locked up.”

So in 2011, that's exactly what Doug did. He spearheaded a criminal task force to go after these green energy crux. My job was to build a team with people a whole lot smarter than I was, and so I gathered a number of really top-notch senior investigators. We got in a room and I said, here's the problem. Doug went all in. He pulled in agents from the IRS to seek for service to FBI. This was going to be a national takedown. What are the stakes of this fraud? Who are the

losers? Why is it so dangerous? Well, the taxpayer gets ripped off, and the environment is worse off as a result. If the system is being undermined, then more greenhouse gas emissions are going up into the atmosphere. Back in 2011, the task force set its sights on his first case.

“This one doesn't take a genius. There was no biodiesel plant. The address was actually a self-storage”

unit, but this individual was crafty enough to say that's my address, a creating biofuels, and made a bunch of money until he was caught. It was basic. It was easy fraud. A lot of the early cases alike this. It's like shooting fish in the barrel, but then it gets more complex. It's not just I have a storage site, and I'm just making up these numbers. It's tracking trucks with bogus loads going from Indiana to whatever state and back, and offshore transactions, money laundering. They were

getting smarter. They were adapting. The kinds of fraudsters who are attracted to biofuels games also start changing. In some cases, these were people who stumbled into fraud. Other instances, there were bad guys. Folks were really bad tough for reputations. By the time Jacob and Levant

connect in 2012, green energy criminals are extremely sophisticated, and they always seem to be

one step ahead of the task force. These are not quick hits. Like if they're complex puzzles, you're putting together. Sometimes it's surveillance. A lot of times it's interviewing. It's a month-month month-long process. Years often. Doug's team has his hands full. In despite Jacob's slap on the wrist at the start of 2011, he's still not on their radar as a big player. Not yet, at least. But he and Levant will go on to become the Fed's toughest challenge. They're most

elusive targets. Jacob and Levant are at the very beginning of a scheme that will blow everything Doug's team has dealt with out of the water. This was the biggest one. This was the big Kahuna. After the break, their big Kahuna fraud kicks off. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guide, not quite on humor me with Robert Smygo and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Oden Kirk to David Letterman help make you

funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and Headwriters Streeter Side L helped an occupile band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Imagine an Olympics where

“doping is not only legal but encouraged. It's the enhanced games. Some call it grotesque.”

Others say it's unleashing human potential. Either way, the podcast's superhuman documented it all, embedded in the games and with the athletes for a full year. Within probably 10 days I'd put on 10 pounds. I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth. Listen to superhuman on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist tattoo removed. And here's something that should be

a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one, put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robbyty Lee Boulevard, get to the grocery store I had to go down Jefferson

“Davis Parkway. If you're in a story in and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not”

doing a job. I'm a Keely Hughes, in rebel spirits, season two, goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to rebel spirits, season two. On the I-Heart Radio

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi listeners, I'm Michelle, host of the Kingdom of Frog Podcasts. And I'm excited to share this

incredible story with you. I'm also excited to tell you that you can get access to all episodes

of Kingdom of Frog. 100% ad-free in one week early through the I-Heart True Crime Plus subscription available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Plus, you'll get access to other chart-topping True Crime shows you love like the girlfriends, the trail, the godmother, paper goes, piked in massacre, murder homes, unrestorable, and more. So don't wait, head to Apple Podcasts, search for I-Heart True Crime Plus, and subscribe today.

Back at Noil, Jacob has just agreed to Levon's proposal. They will fraudulently claim subsidies on the biofuel Jacob is selling to Levon. I mean, Jacob's done this before, he knows it's easy, and theoretically so, for me at least. So they shake hands and it's on. Jacob flies back to Utah, and somewhere in the WRE offices, he and his mom Rachel start faking paperwork. And soon, Levon and Jacob split a big fact government check 50-50.

It's hundreds of thousands of dollars, which knowing what's to come, now seems pretty small time. It went so smoothly once, and so. Levon asked if we could do it again. I'm sitting down with my producer, Jake, to talk about this game changing moment in the prod. So Jake, this is the moment this game goes big, and worldwide. Yeah, so when Levon suggests doing it all again, this time it doesn't sound like Jacob is taking

the back or uncomfortable at all. It seems that after that first deal, he now trusts Levon,

but they have to come up with a cheaper, quicker solution than having fuel go all the way to India and back. The fuel moving around internationally creates a lot of legitimate paperwork. They just need to find a cheaper way to do it. Exactly. So Levon suggests that they just run the fuel through Panama this time. This is how the Panama scheme is born.

“This deal is important in several ways. First, it essentially summends Jacob and Levon as a duo,”

like the Al Capone and Bozi Siegel of Biofuel. And second, Panama becomes their prototype. In some ways, the Panama deal is like a Hollywood movie. There's the sleek, polished narrative, Jacob is feeding the government. And then, there's the behind-the-scenes, Hollywood production that props it all up. Let's start with the story, Jacob tells the government. His script is that he's bought vegetable oil from a supplier in Florida that he's transported it

through the Panama Canal. Then, he will say, he moves it all the Utah. What WRE turns the oil

Now, here's the below-the-lines scam. Choose a music. Step 1. Jacob buys 100 containers of biofuel in

“Florida. Step 2. Jacob doctors the paperwork to say he's bought vegetable oil, not biofuel.”

Step 3. He loads all 100 containers onto cargo ships in Florida and sails them down to Panama. Step 4. In Panama, he loads the fuel onto a fleet of 18 wheelers. Step 5. They drive the fuel across Panama to the west coast, whereas loaded onto container ships again. Step 6. The biofuel, which Jacob still pretends his vegetable oil, arrives in LA. Step 7. He pretends to ship a

to Utah to turn the oil into biofuel, but that never happens. Step 8. Levon buys the biofuel.

And then, the big twist. Jacob claims the subsidies. It's all planes, trains, and automobiles, but in reality, this is just a bullshit dirty money paper

“trail. If it all sounds extremely complicated and difficult to follow, don't worry. It's not you.”

It's meant to be complicated. That's the whole fucking point. These guys want to confuse you in the government, with a trailaboga's paperwork. They've actually pulled off, making all of it, look like a legitimate, all be a complicated, logistical operation. The idea is that if anyone, like Doug Parker's big-time federal task force, investigates, there are real dog workers, real truck drivers who can attest to handling barrels. The whole cycle takes just a few weeks in

the spring of 2012. And despite the fact that Jacob has definitely done all the hard work, and more importantly has the most exposure. He splits the proceeds in half with Levon.

“The only time Levon and his company, Neul, appear on any of the paperwork is as a buyer”

of the biofuel. Levon's fingerprints are nowhere near the fraud. But Jacob is okay with this.

It might be because he realizes that if he keeps doing business with Levon, it could finally make

WRE profitable. And earn him the respect he's so desperate to obtain in the order. Do you know Jacob Kingston? I do. When did you first meet him? I first met Jacob Kingston at the National Bio Diesel Board Conference in Orlando, Florida, in February of 2012. This is Catarina Patterson again. The woman you heard partying with Levon at the very start of this episode. I've been able to get my hands on the recording of Catarina's deposition,

where she's being thrilled about Levon under oath. And can you please give a little background on where you're living and what you're doing now? Yes, I currently live in Missouri. I am self-employed and I work out for my parents on their ranch and we wear these cattle and goats. How many goats do you have? A lot. Estimate. Over 700. Aside from our current life as a goat rancher, Catarina is talking

about how she first closes the deal with Levon in WRE to commit fraud. It all stars after she meets

Jacob at a biofuel conference, which is probably as boring as it sounds. But in the darker corners of the hall, the scammers are making connections. Catarina being one of them. For her and others, this is Fraudster's B dating. She's looking around the room and spots Jacob. There had been some rumors that had gone around in the industry that was shocking might be a possible match for us. Catarina finds a quiet spot and pulls Jacob over for a chat. It was a hey, how are you? What are you

doing? Who are your customers? What type of needs do you have? Just feeling him out. At some point, did Jacob Kingston tell you that you needed to talk to Levon from engine? Yes, he did. This is the answer the prosecutor has been trying to get to. Catarina first meets Jacob around the same time the Panama deal is in full swing. In already at that early stage, Jacob is sending people to Levon to handle his new business.

five star hotel, fancy cocktails, and that VIP party at Mickey Beach. Catarina has a proposal

full of on. She has bio-fueled to sell and she suggests WWE could pull this game, claim the subsidies on her fuel and they'd all split the money. Only this time, the deal won't be for hundreds of thousands, like with Panama. But millions. Levon likes the sound of that. So he invites everyone to LA to finalize the deal. We were picked up at the airport by Levon's son,

“George, and I believe it was his nephew, also named George. He had some very nice cars. It was”

a Bentley and a Rolls Royce. The two George's are not involved in the fraud, but they drive

Catarina and her business partner from LAX to the East Side to Levon's office. It's a trailer, just not very impressive. I expected something more. Catarina is underwhelmed. Until she walks inside Levon's inner sanctum. That's where I saw Levon and his personality come to life. The furniture in the office was Lamborghini furniture. It was in blazing with the logos. There was a tremendous spread of food laid out on the table. Lots of fruit. There was also a

bottle of tequila there. There are a few different people squeezed in there, discussing business. Jacob's tucked away in the corner, like he's sitting at the kids table. Then seemingly in the middle of negotiations, Levon does something Catarina thinks is wild. Levon had gone outside,

“and he had a, I believe it was a GT500. A GT500 is a premium Mustang. So pimped out, it looks like a”

transformer and started doing donuts in the parking lot. All this time, Catarina is getting incessant calls and texts from her business partner, asking for updates on the deal. She gets fed up so she picks up the phone and says to him, "If you, talk to Levon yourself." Levon and Catarina go outside with her business partner on speakerphone. The three of them discussed the deal. The deal between Catarina's company and Jacob's company.

Where was Jacob Kingston in this phone call? He was not present.

“Was there explicit discussion that Jacob Kingston would fraudulently claim the tax credits and the”

runs? Yes. Was it odd to you that Jacob Kingston wasn't present? No. Because it was my belief that it did not matter what Jacob thought that as long as Levon was okay with it, everything was fine. We're only three months in, and Levon is already calling the shots. While Jacob sits in the background. Levon pulled Jacob out of a serious hole when the India deal collapsed. Now, Jacob is indebted to him and tagging along for the ride. But there's one other reason Jacob is happy to

keep his mulls shut in these negotiations. Around the time the Panama scheme is in full swing, Jacob received some bad news. It's a notice from the IRS. As Jacob reads the first few lines, he must be panicking. The IRS is going to audit, WRE. Go through all of their accounts and their tax subsidy claims. Jacob is in deep, deep, shit. He can only think of one possible solution. His new friend, Levon, the guy with the bodyguards and the big black SUVs,

and as it turns out, a slew of connections.

Next time on Kingdom of Fraud, Jacob finds himself in Levon's protective and powerful fold.

Kingdom of Fraud is produced by novel from iHear podcast. For more from novel visit novel.odio. The show is hosted by me, Michelle McFee, and produced by Jake Otayovich. It's reported by me and Jake Otayovich. Our system produces our Megan Dean and Amalia Sortland. With additional

from Cherie Houston, Joe Savage, and Charlotte Wolf. Our fact chapter is Fendell Fulton.

“Sound designed and mixing by Mark Pitom, original music composed and performed by Nicholas Alexander”

and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision from Jake Otayovich, Sandra Schmoulli, and Max O'Brien. Willard Foxen is creative director at novel. Our executive producers are me, Michelle McFee,

Max O'Brien, and Craig Straken for novel, and Stephanie Lenn. Katrina Norvel and Nikki E. Twar

are the executive producers for iHear podcast, and the marketing lead is Alice and Kinter. Special thanks to Carrie Lieberman, Will Pearson and the whole team at WME.

“Help an Ocapella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform?”

We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert's Michael and friends on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi listeners, I'm Michelle, host of the Kingdom of Fraud podcast, and I'm excited to share this

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