Fraudsters

On the first Fraudwire of Season 6, Seena and Ariel delve into World Cup shadiness, some creative basketball player fraud, and Ken Paxton's bold pro-mistress voting record. 00:01:20 — Seena announces the episode topics: FIFA, basketball, politics. Patreon plug. Season 6 is officially underway, Justin is missing in Detroit. 00:06:10 — FIFA segment begins in earnest. Trump gets a red card overturned...

Fraudsters is back with SEASON 6 - THE VILLAINS. We know, every season has villains, but this season will feel hit different: a crooked mayor, a deranged CEO, a children's show hellbent on hijacking YOUR kid's brain and a few more surprises. Seena, Justin, and Ariel are back! Expect deep dives mixed in with some Fraudwires so we can talk about the latest in what's frauding around the world. Instag...

For our very last bonus episode of Season 5, we have an interview with Tommy and Paris Chong. And for the kids listening to the show, Tommy Chong is a Canadian-American comedian, actor, and activist, mostly known for his weed humor with comedian Cheech Marin and their classic stoner movies like Up in Smoke and Nice Dreams. In this interview, you’ll hear how Tommy got into comedy, what it was like...

This week’s bonus episode is an interview with Marsha Levick, the co-founder and Chief Legal Officer of the Juvenile Law Center. We dive into the infamous Kids for Cash scandal—how it was exposed, the fight for justice, and the larger patterns of corruption that allow people to profit from locking up kids. We also explore the devastating impact of the War on Drugs on juvenile incarceration, the de...

Blume Professor of Law and Director of the Juvenile Justice Clinic and Initiative at Georgetown Law, Kris Henning, sat down with us over Zoom in the summer of 2024 to talk about the War on Drugs. She spoke about what led to her writing her book, “The Rage of Innocence: How America Criminalizes Black Youth,” how drug policies have affected kids in juvenile court and detention centers, the importanc...

In this week’s bonus interview, we sit down with Yasmin Cader, Deputy Director of the ACLU and Director of the Trone Center for Justice and Equality, to explore the lasting impact of the War on Drugs on the U.S. criminal justice system. Yasmin shares what led her to become a public defender and her experiences practicing in D.C., NYC, and L.A. at the height of mass incarceration. We dive into the...

This week, we’re talking all things drug policy, harm reduction, and the lingering effects of the War on Drugs with our special guest, Dr. Sheila Vakharia. Dr. Vakharia is the Deputy Director of Research and Academic Engagement at the Drug Policy Alliance, which is a fantastic organization that addresses the harms of drug use and drug criminalization through policy solutions, organizing, and publi...

Welcome to the land of bonus episodes, where we release long-form interviews with a variety of guests about the war on drugs that we recorded in the summer of 2024. Here is our interview with Montel Williams. Now the host of Let’s Be Blunt, the number one rated Cannabis podcast in 2023, Montel Williams was a Marine and Navy officer where he undertook rescue missions and earned multiple medals of d...

In the final episode of our series on the war on drugs, we take a look at the present and future of this crisis with some help from Montel Williams and Dr. Sheila Vakharia. Yasmin Cader (ACLU) and Kris Henning (Georgetown Law) return for a roundtable discussion to offer their insight on the current state of the war on drugs and offer a hopeful outlook. From policy failures to glimmers of reform, w...

What, you thought we were done talking about The War on Drugs?! Well, think again! We’re back with a special epilogue and we're diving into Operation Pipe Dreams, the infamous federal investigation that led to the arrest of Tommy Chong. Join us as we explore how this operation led by John Ashcroft and Mary Beth Buchanon targeted businesses selling drug paraphernalia across the country. We sit down...

It’s the season finale of Fraudsters, and we’re reluctantly exploring the grim origins of America’s opioid crisis. From the Sackler family’s OxyContin empire, built on shameless marketing, fake science, and philanthropy-as-image-laundering, to John Kapoor’s Insys Pharmaceuticals, a scrappy underdog peddling fentanyl sprays, we unravel the fraud that fueled this epidemic. With half a million deaths...

Get ready for one of the most sinister and heartbreaking frauds this week – the Kids for Cash scandal. Judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan turned Pennsylvania’s juvenile justice system into their very own cash cow, sentencing kids to private detention centers they secretly profited from. How else are you gonna clear $330,000 of credit card debt…? From denying legal representation to forcing...

Picture this: it’s the mid-'90s. Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise dominates the airwaves, and America’s crime hysteria is peaking. It’s the perfect time for a new villain to emerge: the “superpredator.” Tune in as we unravel the fear-mongering myth born from flawed statistics, Ivy League arrogance, and moral panic—spearheaded by Princeton professor John DiIulio. We explore how this theory intersected w...

In the summer of 1989, President George H.W. Bush’s War on Drugs needs a dramatic touch for his first national address: a bag of crack cocaine bought steps from the White House. The DEA zeroes in on Keith Jackson, an unsuspecting young dealer, luring him into a dangerous setup to secure the president’s controversial prop. As Bush’s speech electrifies the nation, Keith faces life-altering consequen...

This week we’re taking a step back to Miami, 1987. South Beach is buzzing, and the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) looks like any other bank—until you take a closer look. BCCI was no ordinary financial institution. It was a global hub for money laundering, arms deals, and shady alliances with everyone from Columbian drug lords to CIA operatives. In this episode, we unravel the ris...

Get ready for a deep dive into America’s anti-drug propaganda! This week, we’re tackling everything from Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” crusade to McGruff the Crime Dog and the DARE program. We’re digging up the roots of these campaigns, exploring how they reshaped public perception and exposing the contradictions of Nancy’s White House role. From the scare tactics of Harry Anslinger to those unforg...

We're not done with Reagan just yet! This week, we’re honing in on the crack epidemic and its devastating impact on Black communities. We unpack the 1980s shift in American politics, where Reagan's policies expanded Nixon's "War on Drugs" and utilized racially coded language to criminalize Black Americans. We’ve got expert guests, Yasmin Cader, Dr. Sheila Vakharia, and Professor Anne Foster on the...

This week, we’re finally taking on Reagan and his starring role in the War on Drugs—there’s so much to unpack, we had to make it a two-parter. Reagan tackled the drug problem with the subtlety of a sledgehammer, ramping up incarcerations for nonviolent offenses and turning the fight against drugs into a military operation. In part one, we dive into Iran-Contra, Regan’s "October Surprise," Oliver N...

In this episode, we’re diving deep into the art of linguistic manipulation with a profile on one of America’s most racist presidents: Richard Nixon. Last week, we covered how the war on drugs helped fuel a system of police corruption. This week, we’re looking at how Nixon used clever rhetoric and dog-whistle politics to push forward an agenda that has left a lasting impact in the US. We’re talking...

This week we’re diving deep into the sick and twisted and well, corrupt underbelly of the NYPD during the 1960s and 70s. It was a simpler time when cops and criminals were one and the same. And the best part? Everyone knew about it and almost no one cared! That is until Frank Serpico came around. He was an idealistic young officer who refused to play along and take part in petty bribes, payoffs, a...

In this week’s episode, we bring to life a 1970 panel discussion hosted by Playboy magazine, where key figures from law enforcement, academia, medicine, and counterculture clash over cannabis. The debate features Harry Anslinger (J-L Cauvin), William Burroughs (Jim Taylor), Baba Ram Dass (Grant Gordon), John Finlator (Holden McNeely), Joel Fort (Greg Carere), Alan Watts (Ryan Feyk), Joseph Oteri (...

God Bless the Child that tunes into Fraudsters this week! In this episode, we’re diving deep into the story of Billie Holiday. Using three pivotal arrests from her life, we explore how systemic racism and unjust drug enforcement left Billie Holiday as a public target amidst Harry Anslinger and George Hunter White’s war on drugs. From her traumatic childhood to struggles with addiction, Billie’s fi...

In this week’s episode, we dive deeper into the sick and twisted mind of George Hunter White. We’re talking Operation Midnight Climax and everything that led up to the CIA’s most disturbing experiments. And of course, this includes a primer on “Poisoner in Chief” Sidney Gottlieb, who also enjoyed conducting LSD experiments on unsuspecting patients. They sprayed harmful chemicals over San Francisco...

In this week’s episode, we’re talking all things George Hunter White – an agent at the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and a monster! Maybe the two are synonymous… He infiltrated drug syndicates, tested truth serums, and eventually found his passion venturing into mind control and interrogation techniques for the government. We’ll get into the twists and turns of George Hunter White’s life – from bein...

We’re wrapping up the story on Harry Anslinger with the help of some incredible guests this week. We’ve got the voices of Harry Anslinger (J-L Cauvin), Dr. Woodward (Ryan Feyk), Representative McCormack (Marcus Parks), and Dr. Munch (Henry Zebrowski) to help us get across the absurdity that was the Marijuana Tax Act hearing. Let’s just say it involved a lot of talk about injecting weed into the br...