A dozen complaints from people who felt they had been cheated after believing they were investing in real estate in the United States through a company on the French Riviera were received at the public prosecutor's office in Grasse (Alpes-Maritimes), which investigation of a possible large-scale scam.
More than ten complaints have been filed and more could be filed soon, said the prosecutor of Grasse Fabienne Atzori, who opened a preliminary investigation for " scam, breach of trust ". In this case, revealed earlier by the information site Mediapart, customers have invested in recent years sums that can be around 50 to 70,000 dollars (46,000 to 64,000 euros) per unit in what they thought were goods real estate for rent in Detroit (Michigan).
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The investments were offered to them by a company from Sophia Antipolis (Alpes-Maritimes), which " put them in touch with a third party, " said the prosecutor. Customers were promised goods " not very expensive, profitable, with a very advantageous financing solution and very few went to see " the buildings on the spot. However, financial difficulties appeared at the beginning of January, making certain customers doubt the reality of their investment. " Some tried to get an explanation, " and ended up filing a complaint in the spring.
The investigation promises to be complex: it covers facts committed in part abroad, will have to determine the organized nature or not of a possible scam and " the existence or not of previous complaints, " said the prosecutor. Among the hypotheses that the investigators will have to examine, those of a Ponzi scheme, one of the most classic scams: a victim buys property and receives rents which are in fact financed by the recruitment of a second victim, fraud can thus flourish to take on considerable proportions.
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