Arraignment Set for Irvine Telemarketer

SANTA ANA — An Irvine telemarketer is scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday on criminal contempt of court charges for allegedly disobeying a court order stemming from a previous telemarketing fraud case.

Lonny Remmers, 36, faces at least 41 months in prison if he is convicted on four counts of violating the 1996 order issued by U.S. District Judge Linda H. McLaughlin.

The FTC charges that Remmers disobeyed the order by operating Dimension Capital Group in Santa Ana, which took in $761,000 for investments in promissory notes supposedly backed by U.S. Treasury bills and guaranteed to pay 12% interest. The Federal Trade Commission contends that there are no Treasury bills to back up the investments.

Remmers also worked as a consultant for Neighborhood Acceptance Corp., anther telemarketing company. In both instances, the FTC asserts, Remmers also failed to pay a $150,000 bond that the previous court order required if he went back in business. The prior court order against Remmers stemmed from an FTC civil lawsuit accusing him of selling more than $3 million in bogus investments in satellite television programming through companies called PAL Financial Services Inc. and Media Management Inc., both in Santa Ana.

In settling the case in 1996, Remmers consented to a court order that required him to obey telemarketing laws and to post the $150,000 bond if he went back into business.

On Monday, Remmers appeared 20 minutes late and without a lawyer for his arraignment in federal court in Santa Ana. McLaughlin rescheduled the hearing for Wednesday.

The contempt charges are the result of an FTC initiative called Project Scofflaw, which is aimed at seeking criminal penalties against telemarketers who are repeat offenders.