Alameda Man Ordered To Pay Feds $113 Million Has Gone Missing
ALAMEDA (CBS SF) -- A 73-year-old Alameda man who owes the feds more than $100 million went missing the same day he was expected to appear in court.
John Beck was last seen in Oakland on Tuesday and his daughter, who lives in Cyprus, says the family is trying to retrace his steps and figure out where he went.
A surveillance photo posted on Facebook shows Beck at a BART station on Tuesday, the day he vanished. He appears to have boarded a train to San Francisco and then dropped off the map.
The Federal Trade Commission said Beck made a fortune running a get-rich-quick scheme.
Beck was the man behind infomercials that promised consumers how make tons of money buying homes at government tax sale auctions.
According to court records, the feds say that in a majority of states, it is almost impossible to walk into a government tax sale, pay a few hundred dollars in back taxes, and then walk out with a free and clear deed to a home.
Federal officials said Beck and several other defendants scammed hundreds of thousands of customers.
In 2012, a California district court ordered Beck to personally pay $113 million, and Beck appealed the case.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Beck's most recent hearing was scheduled for Tuesday, the same day he disappeared.
"All we know is that he was going to the meeting, it had to do with the court case, but he has a million of these meetings. This has been an ongoing thing for years and years and there were no new developments, nothing," Beck's daughter told KPIX5 via Skype Friday.
The family said they've hired a private investigator and that they're planning to search for Beck over the weekend.
