Wilmington city councilman Vash Turner is running for treasurer.
His involvement in the Karatbars Ponzi scheme has raised questions among his constituents.
Turner (right), aka Va’Shun Turner, has been a Wilmington city councilman for four years. Wilmington is a city of ~70,000 in Delaware.
According to copy used to promote Karatbars in late 2019, Turner joined the then pyramid scheme in 2014.
GOLD IS FREEDOM GUYS
I was introduced to KaratBars from my hospital bed in 2014 and if it wasn’t for KaratBars International & me going through some of the trials and tribulations that I had to go through I wouldn’t be here talking to you about it today!
Ever since I found out about KaratBars I’ve been hitting it hard!
The most exciting thing about KaratBars is the amount of lives I am able to save‼️
Turner credits his involvement with Karatbars with his “being a city councilman”.
Circa 2014 Karatbars was a pyramid scheme, operating under the ruse of “saving gold”.
The gold pyramid scheme model began to collapse in 2017, promoting Karatbars, and Turner, to jump on the MLM crypto fraud bandwagon.
This began with a Karatbank Coin ICO in February 2018.
When Karatbank Coin ICO failed Karatbars tried again with KaratGold Coin.
Through KaratGold Coin, Karatbars managed to dupe a bunch of affiliates to invest in their worthless KBC shitcoin.
By mid 2019 the hype machine was in full-effect, with many expecting promised riches on Karatbars’ “Independence Day” event.
At the center of the marketing pitch was owner Harald Seiz’s promise that 100 KBC could be converted into 1 gram of gold.
The July 4th Independence Day came and went, KBC dumped 62% and the 1 gram of gold promise was predictably exposed as a lie.
Wholly abandoned, KBC today has a public trading value of 0.2 cents.
Karatbars recently announced it was rebooting with a new Ponzi token as Freebay.
Vash Turner was very much active in the promotion of KBC in the US throughout 2019.
Worryingly, Turner has been accused of promoting Karatbars to his constituents.
Some in his district, particularly in the Cool Spring neighborhood, are raising questions.
Thomas Natoli and others said Turner personally sent them messages promoting the gold coin product.
As per a report from Delaware Online, Turner’s involvement in Karatbars caused a stir at a recent September 3rd virtual council meeting.
“My concern is that you’re my voice in the city, and you’re using your elected position to sell what I thought was a pyramid scheme,” said Natoli, who supported Turner’s election as councilman.
Greg Luna said he found the promotions “cryptic.”
“As an elected official, he brings credibility to any product or service he represents and in that regard there should be full disclosure that this is an investment and with every investment there is a risk,” Luna said.
Turner has yet to publicly comment on his involvement in Karatbars, citing recent “oral surgery”.
On Facebook Turner appears to be dismissing questions about Karatbars as “smear campaigns”.
Turner’s last Karatbars promo on Facebook was in May 2020.
Whether he’s involved in the recently announced Freebay reboot is unclear.
Turner is running for a position that would put him in charge of taxpayer funds, including overseeing the city’s bank accounts, payments and investments.
He also would play a role in the city’s decisions to borrow money on the bond market.
What I do know is instead of posting boomer memes to Facebook (ex. right), as a voter I’d be far more interested in the following:
- how much has Vash Turner made in Karatbars since joining in 2014?
- specifically, how much did Turner make shilling KBC last year?
- how much KBC did Turner sell during the July 2019 pump?
- how much KBC, if any, Turner still holds?
- has Turner invested in or has he acquired any V999 tokens by any other means?
- why does Turner think it’s appropriate for an elected official to be promoting a pyramid scheme cum crypto Ponzi scheme?
- does Turner think it’s appropriate for a treasury candidate to have engaged in securities fraud?
At all times during its reboot as an MLM crypto Ponzi scheme, Karatbars has not been registered with Delaware’s Investor Protection Unit. At a federal level neither Karatbars or Turner are registered with the SEC.
As a Wilmington councilman, Turner is currently the subject of an ethics complaint.
Late last year Turner, on multiple occasions, threatened to reduce the salary of a city auditor to $1 unless his demands were met.
Having been delayed by COVID-19, the outcome of the complaint remains pending. Wilmington’s city treasurer election is scheduled for September 15th.
Update 17th September 2020 – As reported by Delaware Public, Vash Turner lost his run for Treasurer to Dawayne Sims.
As per figures provided by Turner on his Facebook page, he lost the vote 6067 votes to Sim’s 7055. Turner is also no longer a City Councilman.