The most recent is the popular, Top Dot Mortgage, while less than a year ago, 1st Republic Mortgage Bankers and Lavette M. Bills/MTC Real Estate were in the spotlight.

Two months after Howard F. Pitkin, Banking Commissioner for Connecticut issued a ‘Notice of Intent’ to revoke its license, 1st Republic and its principal Scott Sisskind were slapped with several lawsuits to recover some $16 millions for breach of contract and fraudulent conveyance in violation of New York debtor and creditor laws. The bank was  later forced to cease operation.
In April of 2009, the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s New York Field Division, filed fraud charges against the self-styled “foreclosure specialist” and a regular guest on WVIP Radio 93.5 FM, Lavette M. Bills. She was arrested and is now facing several counts of bank fraud, wire fraud, and false statements.

1st Republic, Bills and Top Dot were major sponsor of Linkup programmes on 93.5 FM and were personally endorsed by the owner of Linkup Media, David “Squeeze” Annakie.

During his daily radio programs, Annakie always appealed to his fellow Caribbean and African American audience to do business with the companies as according to him “I have done my research and they are the best.”

An excellent radio communicator with youthful exuberance, Annakie was well paid to promote 1st Republic Mortgage, Bills and more recently Top Dot.

However, these companies from all reports were not the best and are now hurting people. The radio listeners and members of the Caribbean communities are now confused as another “Linkup Radio” endorsed bank is in trouble.

As a shrewd businessman, Annakie appears to be well focus on meeting the needs of his high paying clients, but he needs to be more selective of the companies or individuals he is endorsing.

It is the responsibility of all radio personalities to help protect the listening public from dishonest and corrupt people who use the media to attract innocent customers.

However, Internal Revenue Service records show the group has a lackluster history of accounting for its finances, and that the organization has paid the performer and his business partner at least $410,000 for rent, production services, and Jean’s appearance at a benefit concert.

Though the Wyclef Jean Foundation, which does business as Yele Haiti Foundation, was incorporated 12 years ago–and has been active since that time–the group only first filed tax returns in August 2009.

That month, the foundation provided the IRS with returns covering calendar years 2005, 2006, and 2007–the only periods for which it has publicly provided a glimpse at its financial affairs.

In 2006, Jean’s charity reported contributions of $1 million, the bulk of which came from People’s Magazine in exchange for the first photos of a pregnant Angelina Jolie (the actress reportedly directed that the publication’s payment go to Jean’s charity, not her personally).

The foundation’s 2006 tax return, the group paid $31,200 in rent to Platinum Sound, a Manhattan recording studio owned by Jean and Jerry Duplessis, who, like Jean, is a foundation board member. A $31,200 rent payment was also made in 2007 to Platinum Sound. The rent, tax returns assure, “is priced below market value.” The recording studio also was paid $100,000 in 2006 for the “musical performance services of Wyclef Jean at a benefit concert.”

Jean denounced charges that he misappropriated funds from his charity, Yele Haiti, and defended the foundation and his commitment to Haiti relief efforts.

“Let me be clear: I denounce any allegation that I have ever profited personally through my work with Yele Haiti,” Jean said in a statement released Saturday. “These baseless attacks are simply not true.” Jean vigorously defended himself in a YouTube video posted Saturday.

“After digging kids up and finding cemeteries for them … this is what I come back to, an attack on my integrity and my foundation,” Jean said in the video.

He went on to explain that the charges were business expenses for Yele Haiti’s fundraising efforts. “You can’t put a show together without a production. You need lights, you need a stage … All of these things have to be accounted for,” he said.

That six-figure payout, the tax return noted, “was substantially less than market value.” The return, of course, does not address why Jean needed to be paid to perform at his own charity’s fundraiser. But the largest 2006 payout–a whopping $250,000–went to Telemax, S.A., a for-profit Haiti company in which Jean and Duplessis were said to “own a controlling interest.”