Jammin’ Java’s announcement of the financing agreement and other company announcements – together with coordinated trading by entities connected to the scheme – caused the stock price to rise. To boost the stock price and provide cash to Jammin’ Java, Whittle, Weaver, Sun, and Berlinger orchestrated a sham financing arrangement designed to create the false appearance of legitimate third-party interest and investment in the company. In anticipation of the promotion, Whittle distributed some of the nominee stock to offshore entities controlled by Weaver, Sun, and Berlinger. Using his access and control of Jammin’ Java and its stock, Whittle and others coordinated an illegal offering and the fraudulent promotion of Jammin’ Java’s stock in a pump-and-dump scheme that culminated in the middle of 2011. In connection with the reverse merger, Whittle secretly gained control of millions of shares that previously had been issued to foreign nominees. He executed a reverse merger between GERC and Marley Coffee, which later became Jammin’ Java and trades under the ticker symbol JAMN. (GERC), which was a purported waste management business in Los Angeles. To raise capital for the Marley venture, Whittle identified publicly-traded shell company Global Electronic Recovery Corp. After learning of Marley’s purchase of a small Jamaican coffee farm, Whittle proposed the creation of a large-scale coffee distribution business built on the Marley name. Whittle, a stock promoter, befriended the son of Bob Marley in Los Angeles. District Court for the Central District of California: “As alleged in our complaint, the defendants made millions of dollars in illicit profits at the expense of the investing public and attempted to conceal their misconduct through complex offshore networks that were revealed in our investigation,” said David Glockner, Director of the SEC’s Chicago Regional Office.Īccording to the SEC’s complaint filed in U.S. Others charged in the SEC’s complaint with facilitating the illegal offering through their offshore entities are UK citizens Stephen Wheatley and Kevin Miller and Oman resident Mohammed Al-Barwani. The shares were later dumped on the unsuspecting public after the stock price soared following fraudulent promotional campaigns.Ĭharged with fraudulently promoting Jammin’ Java stock to investors are British twin brothers Alexander Hunter and Thomas Hunter, who were previously charged in a separate SEC case for touting multiple penny stocks using a fake stock picking robot. Whittle utilized a reverse merger to secretly gain control of millions of Jammin Java shares, and he spread the stock to the offshore entities controlled by Wayne Weaver of the UK and Canada, Michael Sun of India, and René Berlinger of Switzerland. The SEC alleges that Jammin Java’s former CEO Shane Whittle orchestrated the scheme with three others who live abroad and operate entities offshore. The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced fraud charges against several alleged perpetrators behind a $78 million pump-and-dump scheme involving the stock of Jammin’ Java, a company that operates as Marley Coffee and uses trademarks of late reggae artist Bob Marley to sell coffee products.
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