Pearce v Rairdin

This is the seventh in what has turned out to be a series of articles. Here is the sixth, and here is the eighth.

Helen has been telling people not to pay attention to what they read on this website because I am “currently being investigated for cyberstalking/cyberbullying and court proceedings are being taken against” me. This statement is false. I am not the subject of any investigation. Helen filed a report with the Osceola County Sheriff’s office, which called Helen’s claims “unfounded”. Helen filed for protective orders against me and Doug, one of the commenters here. She won an injunction against Doug, but it only stops him from being within 500′ of her house. It doesn’t stop anything we’re doing on this website, and doesn’t have anything to do with the truth of what is posted here.

This afternoon I was served notice of a hearing on a petition for injunction for protection against stalking. The petitioner is Helen Pearce.

This hearing took place on April 14, 2015. Results are below.

Cyberstalking

First, let’s dispense with the obvious: The State of Florida defines cyberstalking as engaging “in a course of conduct to communicate, or to cause to be communicated, words, images, or language by or through the use of electronic mail or electronic communication, directed at a specific person, causing substantial emotional distress to that person and serving no legitimate purpose.”

I can’t control the emotional effect that anything I post on the internet will have on someone. But I can tell you what the legitimate purpose of these posts about Helen Pearce is: To inform the public about the actions of a person known to the State of Florida to be committing felonies that deprive her victims of money, homes, and peace of mind; to support the efforts of victims of said felon to bring her to justice; and to serve as a point of communication between interested and victimized parties to her crimes.

So I’m not “cyberstalking”.

Helen Confesses to Committing Felonies

Here’s a link to the pertinent section of Helen’s complaint: 2014-02-24 Pearce-v-Rairdin Complaint

In this complaint, Helen claims that she and I “first became acquainted with each other a year ago”. She says that she inquired about a home we had for sale, but did not make an offer.

Now, about a year ago I was contacted by one JJ Pierce of Flat Stone Capital LLC, not Helen Pearce. However, I’m willing to stipulate Helen’s assertion that she is, in fact, JJ Pierce who contacted me on behalf of Flat Stone Capital LLC.

Let’s pause for a moment and consider the implications of that statement: Helen is admitting in a sworn statement, under penalty of perjury, that she used the alias “JJ Pierce” to contact me on behalf of a company that she fraudulently established for the purpose of escaping detection and committing fraud. She did this just three years after having been arrested for doing the same thing. (She was arrested on fraud charges in 2011 for crimes committed in 2006.)

The night before I was served, Doug was served a similar notice. In the complaint he received, Helen states that her company site is FSCEHomes.com. The people we’re working with whose homes were listed on FSCEHomes.com have contracts with Ferin Caffrey, not Helen Pearce. Ferin Caffrey registered the company FSC Endeavors LLC with the State of Florida using a UPS Store as both its principal address and registered office. So by virtue of her sworn statement in the petition for an injunction against Doug, Helen confesses under penalty of perjury to being the fictitious person Ferin Caffrey, who registered FSC Endeavors LLC using false information, which is a third-class felony in Florida.

The website for FSC Endeavors LLC was registered using Matt’s name. Helen’s sworn statement thus implicates Matt in her felonies.

False and Confusing (But Still False) Statements

She goes on to cite “the incident that caused [her] to report it to the Sheriff Department”. She includes a screen shot of this “incident”. It appears someone posted a link to a video on some TV station website. That wasn’t me. Furthermore, it would be very easy to fake something like that. For example, [this is Helen and I just deleted Craig’s example of faking the identity of someone in a post on the Web]. See? Easy.

Helen introduces someone named “Doug” into a complaint presumably about me. Obviously, I know to which “Doug” she is referring. But Doug’s actions don’t have anything to do with whether or not I am cyberstalking her. She claims that Doug mentioned he found her Facebook page and says something about a DCF investigation. None of these claims are related to me. Anyone could have found Helen’s Facebook page (before she removed it), and if Doug, in fact, contacted DCF that was his doing and I had nothing to do with it. I report on Doug’s actions here; I don’t direct him to do things nor does he consult with me before he acts. Similarly, I report on what Helen does here; I don’t tell her what to do nor does she ask for my advice before she registers an LLC using an alias. I have never reported here that Doug contacted DCF.

Helen makes claims about what she’s seen on this blog:

How I track her
Where she frequently goes
Her and Matt’s names
Addresses
Pictures that are copywrited [sic]
Boasts of being related to different government branches
Encouragement for others to join in

She finds all of these to be malicious, slander, and libel and make her feel threatened, defamed, and fearful.

I have posted a description of how I tracked down information about Helen. I have never “tracked” her. I don’t know where she is or what she is doing right now and have no way of knowing that.

Similarly, I have never posted where she frequently goes.

I have posted some of her previous addresses that are part of public records in order to show connections between her multiple aliases. I have never posted her current address.

I believe the photos I have used are in the public domain, are used with permission, or are “fair use” under copyright law. I have never received an assertion of what Helen calls “copywrite” but I would’ve responded appropriately if I had. In fact, I’m removing photos from my site today to which I think she might be referring in order to avoid all question. The photos were never what the articles were about; they just added color to a bunch of text.

I have never claimed to have been employed by or “related to” different government branches.

So of these, I have explained some of how I have tracked information about her for the purpose of showing how JJ Pierce, Julie Bell, Neleha K. Dun, and all of her other aliases really are Helen Joanne Pearce. She has confirmed now that my conclusions were true. I have published Helen and Matt’s names for the purpose of warning others who might fall into their scam and to assist those who have cause to bring charges against her for fraud. I have encouraged others to help us find out more about her for the purpose of bringing her to justice. None of these things constitute “cyberstalking”. And furthermore, I have not published anything “too personal”, such as her home address, names of her children, etc. even if someone brought that information to my attention at my request.

Specifically, I do not wish harm on anyone nor do I incite others to do so. I have not written anything malicious. Similarly I haven’t threatened anyone with harm.

The words slander, libel, and defamation all kind of mean the same thing. They all require that a statement be made that is provably false. I have not made any provably false statement about Helen or Matt, and more importantly, she has not cited any examples of provably false statements that would constitute slander. She makes the claim that she has been slandered and threatened, but she doesn’t explain how.

The sum of all this is that she has no reason to be fearful. She hasn’t given any examples of maliciousness, slander, or threats. Any fear she has does not come from anything I’ve said here or elsewhere. As proof of her lack of fearfulness, she did not request protection for her children nor did she provide information about where they go to school so that I could be barred from going there. She did not request any protection for Matt. When my lawyer asked to delay my hearing to give him time to prepare a defense, the judge asked Helen if she would agree to a six-week delay, and Helen answered in the affirmative. She clearly does not feel that I am an imminent threat. She is not acting like a person who is in fear.

She did ask that I be restricted from being near an address in Oklahoma and another address in Texas that is unfamiliar to me. I have never had contact with the people at the address in Oklahoma (though I know who they are) nor with whoever is at the address in Texas.

Helen states that the majority of my home page is now dedicated to Helen (suddenly speaking of herself in the third person, suggesting someone else actually wrote her statement). This is both false and irrelevant. Helen-related content as of the date of her complaint was slightly less than half according to the word count. The reason it’s there at all is that interest in Helen from law enforcement, the media, and victims has been heating up lately, and since the Helen-related content of the blog is minimal (only about 14% of the total articles as of the date of the complaint), it can be hard to find. [Furthermore, as of the date this post was written, all Helen-related content was categorized as “Miscellaneous” on this site, further adding to the difficulty locating that information. I’ve since moved her stuff into a “Real Estate” category.]

Helen complains that an entire page on my site is dedicated to sending “them” (i.e. me) reports of information anyone can find about her. She doesn’t say which page this is, but I suspect she refers to the victim report form that was placed here at the request of Osceola County law enforcement so that more people can report to the Sheriff the details of Helen’s crimes. That information does not go to me.

She complains about my Cockroach Tracker^™ app, which she claims “tracks all of us” (though she is the only petitioner so I don’t know who “us” is) so that I can find “more information … to share and use to twist to his harassing behavior”. As I described on the site, Cockroach Tracker examines public databases looking for patterns that will help us find her aliases and false companies, which can be difficult because she’s been committing felonies a lot longer than I’ve been researching her crimes. It doesn’t track anyone else in “us”, whoever “us” is and it doesn’t “track” as in telling me her physical location. It only tells me if she starts a new company and starts contacting other victims under a new alias.

She claims I contacted her through her “work website” on three occasions but doesn’t say what website that is. I have never posted those messages claiming to be Helen’s parents, sister, or Matthew’s parents. And as she implies here, it is very easy for someone to pretend to be someone else when posting messages through contact forms. It would be just as easy for her to pretend to be her parents, sister, or in-laws in order to frame someone else as it would be for that person to actually do it. But what I can say for sure is, that wasn’t me.

She claims I have publicly posted on craigslist about her. She cites no examples. She says I make deceitful and false claims but she does not say what those claims are or proving that they’re false. In any case, I have never posted anything about Helen, true or false, on craigslist.

I did “boast” of finding Matt’s running route. Matt posts it publicly on his public Twitter feed. He stopped posting it a little over two years ago, so what I have is a couple years old. It was interesting to find because it validated that the address we found for her — which was difficult to find since she forms her false companies under false addresses. I did not post a map of Matt’s running route. I’ve never threatened to find and harm Matt, nor have I ever suggested anyone else do likewise. In fact, I’ve suggested that people avoid him since he is a body builder and has a documented history of violence. I’m more afraid of Matt than he should be of me.

We do not have a “team that is working together to cyberstalk and cyberbully”. We do have a team that is working together to bring a known felon to justice.

She cites a particular hotmail.com email address as being mine. It is not.

She claims I “invite hate”. I do not. I do invite victims of Helen’s crimes to contact me so I can help them get involved in bringing her to justice.

She claims I have “made [her] family and [her] a target” but does not cite examples, nor does she say what I’ve made them a target for. Pies? Prayer? Injunctions?

She worries about others acting out of hate but cites no examples of my incitation to hate or malice.

The Version of Craig that Lives in Helen’s Mind is Not Me

I have never threatened Helen nor any member of her family with any harm.

I know a lot more than I have posted. I know where she lives. I know her children’s names. I know her parents names and where they live. I have a copy of a screenshot of Matt’s running route. I know Helen’s maiden name and where she went to school. I believe I could publish some of this information and it would still not be “cyberstalking” but I have never wanted to be close to that line. Posting that information isn’t relevant to my investigation.

I have never posted anything here that I did not believe was provably true. I have not posted anything that was not available from public sources. That is, I have never personally followed Helen around, hired an investigator to do the same, or snooped on her friends or family to develop information that could only be discovered by subterfuge.

I live some 1300 miles from Helen. But from January 2-10, 2015, I was vacationing with my family at Walt Disney World, just a few minutes from Helen’s home. I did not drive by her house. I didn’t try to contact her. I didn’t even stop by the UPS Store at 52 Riley Rd where she claims to have an office. If I was stalking someone, it sure seems like I would jump at the chance to look her up while I was in the neighborhood.

Summary

So it boils down to this: In her petition to the court, Helen confesses to committing multiple felonies and implicates her husband in the crimes. She does not cite any examples of anything on this site that she sees as threatening. The only accurate statements in her petition are these: (1) We first became acquainted about a year ago (when she was posing as JJ Pierce); (2) she inquired about but did not make an offer on my house; and (3) I have published her and her husband’s names.

It is true that I have “no dog in this race”. I do have an intense sense of justice, though, and it bothers me that criminals like Helen can walk around free, stealing money from innocent people, living in an upscale, gated community with a private health club, driving a nice car, and living high on the hog while the rest of us have to work hard for what we have. So I’ve donated my time and space both here on this site and at www.fsboscam.com to help those who are victims of Helen’s scam to organize and get some justice. And I’ve spent more than you want to know to defend myself against Helen’s specious claims and frivolous charge of “cyberstalking”.

And now it looks like I’ll get to make another trip to Florida. Helen has never shown up in court for any of the other cases she has instigated, so I don’t suppose I’ll get to meet her.

Updates

March 3, 2015

I decided to send my High Priced Lawyer in my place because I can’t afford to lose the 3-5 days of work it would cost me to go to Florida and defend myself against this frivolous abuse of the legal system. He was able to get the hearing reset to April 14. The only bad thing about that is that it’s the day I normally meet with my tax accountant to get started on my tax return. Darn!

I take some solace in the fact that the judge doesn’t think delaying the hearing for six weeks will put Helen at any more risk of immediate danger, and she’s right. Since I’ve never threatened Helen or her family, nor have I even met any of them or talked to anyone in her extended family, she’s in no more danger from me today or six weeks from now than she was when she filed a false complaint with the Sheriff and perjured herself in her petition for an injunction last month.

April 14, 2015

I participated in the hearing today via telephone. My lawyer had previously filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, and the hearing for that motion was scheduled to take place before the hearing on Helen’s petition.

Helen and I were sworn in. Judge Diana Tennis asked me where I live. I said, “Marion, Iowa”. She asked how long I had lived in Iowa, and I said “All my life.” She asked if I had ever been a resident of Florida, and I said, “No”.

The judge pointed out to Helen that I had filed a motion to dismiss based on a lack of personal jurisdiction. That is, we claimed that the court did not have any authority over me, since I’m not a resident of Florida. She asked Helen if she had any legal basis for asking the court to exercise long-arm jurisdiction. Helen wasn’t represented by counsel and apparently hadn’t even read the Wikipedia article on “jurisdiction”, or she would’ve known that she couldn’t answer that question. Long-arm jurisdiction would’ve required her to show that I had some kind of minimal connection to Florida (such as a time-share, vacation home, business office, bank account, etc.), but I don’t. She could have also argued that there was some compelling interest for the state to bypass its normal relationship with other states and usurp Iowa’s authority, but there isn’t. Instead, Helen said it was pretty much like her case against Doug in February; that I had been cyberstalking and cyberbullying her online.

The judge asked my attorney if he had anything to add. He said the court had “absolutely no basis for personal jurisdiction” and furthermore had no subject matter jurisdiction in this case, explaining that I live in Iowa, that none of the alleged acts took place in Florida, and that I had been served in Iowa. He told the court that I had been in Florida recently, but that there was no allegation that I had acted on any of these matters while there. He explained that Helen had the option to charge me in Iowa, where a court would have jurisdiction.

The judge said that many professional lawyers don’t understand the difference between subject matter and personal jurisdiction. This worried me at first because I thought she was talking to my attorney. But she went on to say that, given this fact, she couldn’t expect Helen to understand it. She explained that even if the court could legally deal with the subject matter, that it did not have the power to drag someone from another state into court unless they were served while in Florida. As a result, she simply didn’t have the power to issue the injunction.

Helen asked if she could ask a question, and the judge said yes. Helen explained that the case involved her children and threats against them, just like her case against Doug Hill. She said that DCF was called and implied that I was involved in that. She asked if that made any difference.

The judge said it didn’t matter. First, the injunction was not sought on behalf of the children. In her complaint, Helen claimed that I was threatening her children. But as the judge reminded her, when given the opportunity to name her children in the petition and seek an injunction on their behalf, she chose not to. So no injunction had been sought on behalf of her children. Second, without personal jurisdiction or an argument for long-arm jurisdiction, the judge simply did not have the power to issue the injunction. She advised Helen that if she wanted to, she could file for an injunction in Iowa.

That was it. The judge thanked us for coming and the line went dead.

My lawyer called me later and said he thought we could’ve won on the merits. He said he had read the articles on the website from beginning to end and there was nothing there that constituted any kind of threat that a reasonable person would be afraid of. He had some other suggestions about how to handle this investigation going forward, and I’ll be taking his advice under consideration.

Helen could bring her case here to Iowa, but our laws are different. It’s more difficult to prove cyberstalking because the law is more specific. Florida’s law is very vague. But more importantly, jurisdiction isn’t her problem so coming to Iowa doesn’t make it easier for her. Her problem is that she doesn’t have any evidence of any wrongdoing on my part. She perceives that I’m involved in her troubles a lot more than I am.

Furthermore, a protective order doesn’t affect the free speech being exercised on this site. It only keeps me from coming near her house, which I’ve never done and never threatened to do.

I’m happy to have this behind me. Now we can focus our attention on getting information into the hands of law enforcement that will eventually get her arrested. I heard from another victim just a couple days ago. I’m convinced there is no shortage of victims; we just need to find them and get them to file reports with the appropriate agencies.

Osceola County Victim Report Form

This is the sixth in what turned into a series of articles. Here is the fifth and here is the seventh.

In the course of talking to law enforcement, I think I have an idea of the steps a person should take if they are a victim of Helen’s scam.

First, a report needs to be filed with local law enforcement (where your house is located). Your local police or sheriff can help you put that together. It’s just a statement of what happened and how much money you are out. When filing with them you can tell them there is already an open investigation in Osceola County, Florida. They may refer your report to Osceola County.

Second, you should file a report with law enforcement in the city where Helen was operating. We’ve been sending people to the county sheriff in Osceola County (if Helen gave you a mailing address in Orlando, Kissimmee, Celebration or other Osceola County location), Hillsborough County (Tampa), or Duval County (Jacksonville). Again, if you’re not filing with Osceola, you can mention that there is an open investigation there. The goal is to get the majority of the investigation happening under one roof.

Finally, you’ll need to talk to an attorney about getting clear title to your home and dealing with your tenants. You may have to formally “evict” Helen, even though she’s not living there. You will have to evict the people occupying your house unless you want to enter into a rental agreement with them and allow them to stay. Again, your attorney can help you with that.

Feel free to mention this website to law enforcement. The simplest way to do that is to use www.fsboscam.com. That site is essentially a “wrapper” around this one and brings everything related to Helen’s scam in one place. I am also happy to talk personally to law enforcement if there’s any information I can provide. I can provide my phone number and other contact info to you. Contact me through the comments here. When you post a comment it does not get uploaded to the website — it gets sent to me by email. I will respond by email and will not post your comments here if you do not wish them to be posted.

The information below was published here at request of the Osceola County Sheriff. You can use it as a guideline for reporting to other law enforcement agencies.

These reports do not need to come to me. However, I’m interested in details like phone numbers, email addresses, mailing addresses, and other specific contact points you may have had with Helen. I’m also interested in the alias she was using and which of her fake companies she claimed to be representing. Having this information allows us to connect her aliases to each other and back to Helen Joanne Pearce. But again, I’m only an interested third party. It’s up to you how much of your private information you want to disclose to me.

If you need help preparing this statement or would like someone to review what you’ve prepared to send to the sheriff, I’d be happy to help. Contact me through the comments.

This link will take you to a PDF of the instructions for completing a statement: Out of County Reports Osceola Florida

Here are the instructions in case you have trouble viewing the PDF:

OSCEOLA COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE

2601 East Irlo Bronson Memorial Hwy.

Kissimmee,FL34744

Out of County Victim Report Process

Crimes that occurred in Osceola County may be reported via email, fax or mail for victims who do not live in Osceola County, Florida. No matter which procedure is used to initially file the report, an original, sworn notarized statement must be received before criminal charges can be filed. Please include the below listed information in the statement. After the statement is received, the victim will be contacted with an incident number and further contact information.

Date of Statement
Victim name, age, date of birth, race and sex
Complete home and business addresses
Contact telephone number(s)
Contact email, if available
Driver license state and number
Complete chronological details of the incident. If credit card or bank accounts are involved, include the bank name, address and account number.
Total amount of monetary loss, if any.
A statement as to whether the victim is willing or not willing to testify in court
A statement as to whether the victim does or does not desire to pursue criminal prosecution

Email Reporting. Send all information to [email protected]

Include the above listed statement information in the body of the email or as a Word or PDF attachment and email to [email protected].
Print the statement and have it notarized.
Mail the signed, notarized statement to the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office, Economic Crimes Unit, 2601 East Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway, Kissimmee, Florida 34744

Fax Reporting. Fax all information to 321-697-4319

Complete a statement with the above information and fax to the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office, Economic Crimes Unit.
Mail the statement after it has been signed and notarized to the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office, Economic Crimes Unit, 2601 East Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway, Kissimmee, Florida 34744

US Mail Reporting.

Complete a statement with the above information and mail to the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office Economic Crimes Unit after it has been signed and notarized.
Mail to: Osceola County Sheriff’s Office, Economic Crimes Unit, 2601 East Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway, Kissimmee, Florida 34744

What’s Wrong With Christian Music?

We recently sang a song during our Sunday morning worship service that prompted me to do some research. Here’s the song:

Friend of God
© Israel Houghton, 2003

Verse 1
Who am I that You are mindful of me
That You hear me when I call
Is it true that You are thinking of me
How You love me it’s amazing

Verse 1 Again
Who am I that You are mindful of me
That You hear me when I call
Is it true that You are thinking of me
How You love me it’s amazing

Chorus
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
He calls me friend

Verse 1 AGAIN
Who am I that You are mindful of me
That You hear me when I call
Is it true that You are thinking of me
How You love me it’s amazing

So amazing, it’s amazing

Chorus
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
He calls me friend

Random Repeated Phrases Similar to Chorus
God Almighty, Lord of Glory
You have called me friend
You have called me friend
You have called me friend

I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
He calls me friend
He calls me friend
He calls me friend…

Granted, we also did some traditional hymns, and I appreciate that, but this one encapsulates so many of the issues I have with the music we’re singing in church. There are three verses, but they’re all the same. The chorus is just the same phrase over and over.

Compare to the same message as expressed in these classic hymns:

Christ a Redeemer and Friend
John Newton, 1799

Poor, weak and worthless though I am
I have a rich almighty Friend;
Jesus, the Savior, is His Name;
He freely loves, and without end.

He ransomed me from hell with blood,
And by His power my foes controlled;
He found me wandering far from God,
And brought me to His chosen fold.

But, ah! my inmost spirit mourns;
And well my eyes with tears may swim,
To think of my perverse returns:
I’ve been a faithless friend to Him.

Often my gracious Friend I grieve,
Neglect, distrust, and disobey;
And often Satan’s lies believe
Sooner than all my Friend can say.

Sure, were I not most vile and base,
I could not thus my Friend requite!
And were not He the God of grace,
He’d frown and spurn me from my sight.

He cheers my heart, my needs supplies,
And says that I shall shortly be,
Enthroned with Him above the skies;
O what a Friend is Christ to me!

And this one:

What a Friend We Have in Jesus
Joseph Medlicott Scriven, circa 1885.

What a Friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.

Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged; take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness; take it to the Lord in prayer.

Are we weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge, take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do your friends despise, forsake you? Take it to the Lord in prayer!
In His arms He’ll take and shield you; you will find a solace there.

Blessed Savior, Thou hast promised Thou wilt all our burdens bear
May we ever, Lord, be bringing all to Thee in earnest prayer.
Soon in glory bright unclouded there will be no need for prayer
Rapture, praise and endless worship will be our sweet portion there.

There are important differences. First is the density of doctrinal content, yet without taking away from the poetry. Second is that Jesus, rather than the writer is the object of adoration. That is, in Friend of God, I am a friend of God. In What a Friend We Have In Jesus, it is Jesus who is my friend. The former is name dropping; the latter is praise. The former lifts me up, the latter lifts Jesus up.

We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. (Heb 5:11-14)

Why I Don’t Care About Swift

Swift is a new programming language created by Apple for use on OS X and iOS devices. The programming world is agog. Apple’s fantastic new language apparently solves all their problems, as evidenced, they say, by the fact that some programmer ported Flappy Birds to it in a few hours.

I’ve been around long enough to see languages come and go. Each claimed to solve all the problems introduced by its predecessors, yet each was replaced by a language that solved all its problems. In some cases, the new language surpassed the success of the language it replaced (C++ and Java); in other cases, the new language faded into obscurity (Modula-2 and Ada).

Lately the motivations for new languages have been dubious. There is a big emphasis on making a language easy to learn and having it hide nasty issues related to memory management and type safety. One review of Swift I read stated, “Apple hopes to make the language more approachable, and hence encourage a new group of self-taught programmers”. While that sounds great, it means that those of us who have mastered our craft after 30 years or more of practice are saddled with the training wheels and water wings that are written into these languages for the noobs.

A classic example is the lack of unsigned integers in Java. The motivation for this was to simplify the language for “new and self-taught programmers” by avoiding errors caused by a lack of understanding of sign-extension. However, for those of us who showed up for class the day that sign extension was taught (that would be day two), we’re left with a language that unnecessarily limits the range of positive integers and requires us to actually have mastered sign extension in order to understand what is happening when we directly manipulate the bits in our integer variables.

Explicit vs. Implicit Typing

One of the simplifications Swift makes is that it infers the types of variables from the values assigned to them rather than requiring the programmer to explicitly type variables. If this was true “weak typing” like I’m familiar with in VBScript, it would be great (though it would come with its own set of problems). But all Swift does is infer the type of the variable from the first value you assign to it.

This actually introduces problems, because it’s not always possible to unequivocally determine the type of a literal value. So Swift gives you ways to force it to interpret a literal value as a given type. Rather than removing the necessity of the programmer understanding types, Swift thus requires “new and self-taught” programmers to have a mastery of types so that they can understand how Swift is working behind the scenes and make sure that their variables have the desired type.

Strings

Swift is said to improve string-handling over Objective-C (the current language used on OS X and iOS). There is certainly room for improvement there. When I first started programming in Objective-C, one of the first things I did was bring over my own C++ string class, as I found NSString to be overly complicated and muddled. Over the years I’ve gotten better with NSString.

I would argue, however, that some of the so-called “improvements” in Swift with respect to strings are differences without a distinction. So instead of this in Objective-C:

[NSString stringWithFormat:@"The value of num is %d", num]

you say this in Swift:

"The value of num is \(num)"

The Swift version is obviously more concise, but it is also less powerful. To add more complex format specifications to Swift you actually have to invoke the functionality of the underlying NSString class, which means the “new and self-taught” programmer, again, needs to understand the details of the implementation in order to do anything beyond the simplest strings.

One of the stated benefits of string handling in Swift is that “all strings are mutable”. One need not worry about whether the string is declared as an NSString (immutable) or NSMutableString (mutable). Well, you don’t have to worry unless you do have to worry — strings assigned to constants are immutable in Swift. So:

var myString1 = "Mutable string"
let myString2 = "Immutable string"
myString1 += myString2    // perfectly legal
myString2 += myString1    // compile-time error

Switch Statements

Swift eliminates the “fall-through” behavior of switch statements, which is said to eliminate bugs caused by omitting the break at the end of each case block. But, oops, sometimes the fall-through behavior is exactly what you want. So Swift adds the fallthrough keyword. It could be argued that Swift eliminates a line of code (the break) while giving the behavior one normally desires. But at the same time, it adds a keyword (fallthrough) that does the opposite. This requires “new and self-taught” programmers to have the same thorough understanding of switch behavior that Objective-C and C++ programmers do.

Single-line Blocks

The Swift compiler will warn you if you omit the braces in any block (such as after an if) and does not allow single-line blocks, thus avoiding this error:

if (x < 0)
    goto fail;
    goto fail;

The code above will always execute one or the other of the goto statements in Objective-C or C++. Even though the second goto is indented, it is not part of the if-block and will be executed if the condition is false.

Swift will warn you about the missing braces and force you to write this:

if (x < 0)
    {
    goto fail;
    }
goto fail;

Or, for those of you who don’t do your braces the right way, this…

if (x < 0) {
   goto fail;
}
goto fail;

This is fine, and hard to argue with. The supposition is that the programmer will immediately recognize the flaw or won’t make the mistake in the first place. On the other hand, I would argue that the same C++ programmer who wrote the erroneous code will write this in Swift:

if (x < 0) {
    goto fail; }
    goto fail;

I always put braces around my blocks, even if they are one-line, so this doesn’t affect me. It’s ironic, however, that while Swift prides itself in eliminating the unnecessary break statement at the end of a case block, it requires two to four additional lines (braces) in if, for, and while statements, which are more numerous.

PocketBible and Swift

I will be more than happy to learn and use Swift for programming on iOS and OS X. I just don’t believe the hype and won’t convert just for the sake of doing something new.

I am a strong proponent of platform-independent languages like C, C++, Java, and, to a lesser extent, Objective-C (the latter is primarily an Apple language, though it has its origins outside of Apple). Such languages allow me to develop code on one platform and re-use it on another. One of the promises of C++ and Java was that you could develop the code for one platform and use it on many others. Swift is an Apple language (the same way C# is a Microsoft language). It only works on Apple devices. While those are numerous, they’re not the only devices out there. So rather than moving toward the “write once, read everywhere” model promised by Java, we’re back to “write everywhere” as each platform requires its own language.

I don’t mind learning a new language. I already jump from C++ to C# to Java to VBScript to Javascript to MS-SQL on a daily basis. For those of us who write code for a living, being multilingual is a job requirement. This is precisely why I care so very little about the supposed advantages of Swift; this isn’t a religious war for me, it’s just a tool. When someone comes out with a new kind of screwdriver, I may or may not buy it until I need it. And then I’ll just buy one and use it — I won’t try to convert all my screwdriver-toting friends.

So will PocketBible for OS X and/or iOS be re-written in Swift? Probably not today, and probably not until Apple requires it. But Swift depends on Objective-C under the hood, so my guess is that Apple will continue to support Objective-C apps for a long time.

Helen Joanne Pearce Companies and Aliases

This is the fifth in what turned into a series of articles. Here is the fourth and here is the next.

I’m going to use this post to keep an up-to-date list of the company names, aliases, and addresses Helen and Matt are using.

If you have been doing business with any one of these people or businesses, they are all Helen Joanne Pearce operating under a different name. If you do a Google search for any of these, you’ll mostly find the blog articles and online comments that Helen herself has created to make it appear that her company is legit.

Just for reference, in 2014 the address on Helen’s drivers license was 52 Riley Rd #231, Kissimmee, FL, which is a UPS Store. I wouldn’t normally publish a person’s home address here, but this is not her home address.

Company	Aliases	Connections
KACW Investments, Inc. (2004-06) Originally 2855 SE 50th St, Ocala, FL (single-family home) Changed to 12472 Lake Underhill Rd #143, Orlando, FL (UPS Store) in 2005	Registered to Helen J Pearce and Matthew E Pearce Online comments: Helen Joanne Pearce	Obvious. Court documents in 2006 mention Joanne Pearce at KACW Investments, 3854 SW 168 Circle, Ocala, FL (mobile home)
Way Home Investments, Inc. (2005-06) Originally 967 Lilac Trace Ln, Orlando, FL (single family home; see this YouTube video) Changed in 2006 to 1969 S. Alafaya Tr #125, Orlando, FL 32828 (UPS Store)	Registered to Matthew E Pearce and Helen Pearce	Obvious.
In Faith Properties, Inc. (2007) 1969 S. Alafaya Tr #125, Orlando, FL (UPS Store)	Registered to Matthew E Pearce and Helen J Pearce	Obvious. 2007 court case names “Matt and Helen (Joanne) Pearce”. Another names “Helen J. Pearce” at this same address.
Dun and King Investments (2008) 1926 N. John Young Pkwy #128, Kissimmee, FL (Convenience store? with mailboxes)	Registered to Neleha K. Dun, Tracy L. King, Morgan P. Jones, Katy B. Dery. Online comments mention sending checks to Joanne Pearce.	“Neleha” is (a)Helen backwards. Neleha’s website biography says she has a law degree from Oklahoma City University and to have attended the University of Central Oklahoma. Helen’s Facebook profile says she went to Oklahoma University, and Matt’s says he went to Oklahoma State. Matt and Helen are both from Oklahoma. I haven’t tried hard to locate her “partners” in this company, but note she has a very close relative with the same first name and middle initial as one of them.
Jubilee Property Ventures (2009) 2224 W Columbia Ave #109, Kissimmee, FL (FedEx/Western Union)	Registered to Jules Scott and Novak Leeann (suspect it shoud be Leeann Novak) Online comments: Joanne Helen Pearce	2009 court case names Jules Scott and Joanne Helen Pearce.
Mary Jones Projects LLC (2010-11) 14900 E Orange Lake Blvd #348, Kissimmee FL (PakMail store)	Registered to Mary Jones and Julie Bell Online comments: Helen Joanne Pearce whose husband is Matthew	Website FAQ as quoted in online comments is virtually identical to Flat Stone Capital; uses same awkward grammar to describe Mary Jones’ qualifications as Flat Stone Capital uses to describe JJ Pierce.
JEP Genesis LLC (2010-11)52 Riley Rd #231, Kissimmee, FL (UPS Store)	Owners are Joanne and Eric Pearce Online comments: Joanne Pearce says Eric is an “investor”	Same address as on Helen’s Florida driver’s license. 2009 court case names Joanne Pearce at this address.
Redfield Holdings LLC (2012-14) 3050 Dyer Blvd #185, Kissimmee, FL (UPS Store) 8/1/12	Owner JJ Pearce	Website at the time was virtually identical to Flat Stone Capital LLC website. FSC Endeavors LLC website registered to Eric Pearce using redfieldholdings@ in email address. Helen Pearce admitted in sworn documents to Osceola County Court that she is Ferin Caffrey (owner of FSC Endeavors LLC).
Flat Stone Capital LLC (2013-14) 52 Riley Rd #172, Kissimmee, FL (UPS Store) 12/20/13	Owner JJ Pierce	Helen Pearce admitted in a sworn statement to the Osceola County Court that she is JJ Pierce of Flat Stone Capital LLC.
FS Capital LLC (2014) 14900 E Orange Lake Blvd, Kissimmee, FL (PakMail store) 2/14/14	Owner Faith Stuart	Website at the time was virtually identical to Flat Stone Capital LLC website.
RF Holdings, FL Corp (2014-15) 503 E Jackson St, Tampa, FL 33602 (UPS Store) 4/18/14	Owner Rose Hill	Victims on Zillow describe similar experiences.
RFH, FL, Inc. (2014-15)701 S Howard Ave, Tampa, FL (UPS Store) 8/11/14	Owner Reagan Fields	Reagan Fields tells victims she has taken owners of this website to court; can only be Helen Joanne Pearce. Phone (813) 423-1876
FSC Endeavors LLC (2014-15) 221 N Hogan St, Jacksonville, FL (UPS Store) 9/28/14	Owner Ferin Caffrey Website domain name registered to Eric Pearce with redfieldholdings@ in email address. Victims mention Ferin Carrey and Erin Cafferty	Helen Pearce admitted in a sworn statement to the Osceola County Court that she is Ferin Caffrey of FSC Endeavors LLC and FSCE Homes. Website FAQ, contracts virtually identical to Flat Stone Capital LLC.
River Financial Horizons LLC (registered as River F Horizons LLC) (2014-15) 369 Lexington Ave, New York, NY	Karen River	Website FAQ, contracts virtually identical to Flat Stone Capital LLC
FSCE Homes (2015) Not a registered LLC in Florida	Ferin Caffrey, Ferin Carrey, Erin Cafferty	Helen Pearce admitted in a sworn statement to the Osceola County Court that she is Ferin Caffrey.
Tabitha’s House and Pack Fund (2015) Not registered in Florida	Helen Peace, Matt Pear, Matt Peace	Helen and Matt changed their names on Facebook, but they are the same Facebook accounts as before. Operating a GoFundMe project and a Facebook page Luke 6:30, ostensibly to raise funds for a homeless shelter and to hand out necessities to the homeless in Orlando. Location of “homeless” photos.
At this point, Helen began advertising website design and search engine optimization (SEO) services along with real estate investing. I’m not making any claims about her website design and SEO services; they may be entirely legit. My only comment as a person who has done Internet marketing for twenty years is that generally, anyone who tells you they can get your legitimate company listed on the first page of Google using organic means (i.e. not paid placement) is pulling your leg.
Ezra FL LLC (7/1/2015) 7862 W. Irlo Bronson Hwy, Kissimmee, FL 34747 (UPS Store)	Jo Ezra, Mary Jo Ezra, Eric Pearce	Same rent-to-own scam as before. Also operating a website design and SEO company called Ezra Agency using the same Jo Ezra alias. Videos produced by Ezra Agency feature Helen: Jo Ezra Intro, SEO Alachua FL, Liposuction Altamonte Springs, Interior Design Alachua FL. Website: www.ezrainc.com Phone: 407-288-7782.
Amazon Invest Inc (11/3/2015) 13790 Bridgewater Crossing Blvd., Windermere, FL 34786 There is a shared office and meeting space at this address that offers mailboxes. I have confirmed she does not have a relationship with that company. Not incorporated in Florida	Jennifer Henderson	Same rent-to-own scam and website design company as before. Clients pictured on home page at www.amazoninvestinc.com are stock images. Phone: (321) 402-7732.
Pruaz Properties, Inc (12/14/2015) 101 S Main St, Wichita KS 67202 or 110 S Main St. 101 S Main St is an invalid address according to USPS. It appears on her website and, along with 110 S Main St, in the Kansas Secretary of State’s corporation database. 110 S Main is an office building. Pruaz Properties was incorporated in Kansas on 11/5/2015.	Amanda Gibson	Same rent-to-own scam as before. www.pruazproperties.com is registered at GoDaddy using Domains by Proxy. Phone: (316) 200-1629 is a cellular phone.
Home Run Capital, LLC (1/26/16) 201 S. College Street, Charlotte, NC 28211 Address is an office building with suites available to lease.	Amy Davis, Annie Pearce	Same rent-to-own scam as before. homeruncapllc.com is registered at GoDaddy using Domains by Proxy. Phone: (980) 226-0955 is a cellular phone. Not registered in Florida or North Carolina. North Carolina requires foreign companies (companies from out of state) to register to do business in the state. It does not appear that Home Run Capital is registered to do business in NC. Testimonials claim they’ve been in business since at least April 2015, but the domain was not registered until November 15, 2015.
Seek Easy Online Marketing (2009? 2013? 2016? Found 12/30/17) Phone 1-800-553-9734	Annie Pearce Annie Tate-Pearce	Registered 5/20/16 using Domains by Proxy to hide her identity. LinkedIn profile claims she has been working there since March 2009 or March 2013 but the domain wasn’t registered until 2016. Claims a Marketing degree from the University of Central Florida from 2007. Her recommendations on LinkedIn come in clumps all on the same day and all from people claiming to be in her industry, not from customers. The “Easy Seek” company LinkedIn page here claims it started in 2007 and that the company (?) has a degree from UCF in English Literature from 2012.

Helen Chooses the Wrong Guy to Scam

This is the fourth in what turned into a series of articles. Here is the third, and here is the next.

I am updating this article as the subject matter develops. Updates are at the bottom of this article!

It’s been about a year since I first reported on a phone call I received from “JJ Pierce” from Flat Stone Capital. Since then, I’ve received comments and emails from a couple dozen people who have been taken in or nearly taken in by her scam.

If you don’t know how the scam works, I’ve written more about it here. In the last year we’ve learned that “JJ” is Helen Joanne Pearce of Kissimmee, FL.

A couple weeks ago I heard from yet another victim of one of Helen’s scams, who introduced himself as “Doug” in the comments here on my blog. I’ve heard from a lot of victims and they all discover the same thing: You can’t find Helen to serve any papers to her. The best you’re going to do is get a small claims judgment, which will never be enforced. You’ll just be out more money and you’ll have no satisfaction.

That didn’t sit well with Doug.

Doug is a retired criminal investigator who has worked for various branches of government. He has taken the information I’ve posted here and developed a more detailed picture of Helen’s activities and associates.

Helen is currently operating two companies: FSC Endeavors LLC, where she is known as Ferin Caffrey, and RFH FL, Inc., where she goes by Reagan Fields. FSC Endeavors LLC claims to be in Jacksonville, FL, but they don’t publish an address at their website. The Florida Department of State lists the address of FSC Endeavors LLC as 221 N Hogan St, which is a UPS Store. Their website domain name is registered to Eric Pearce (Helen’s husband), who lists the address of another UPS Store as his address. Eric’s email address is listed as “redfieldholdings@…” in his whois record. Redfield Holdings is one of the companies I’ve mentioned before. The State of Florida lists Redfield Holdings LLC as being owned by JJ Pearce at an address that is a UPS Store.

RFH FL, Inc. is said to be located in Tampa. The State of Florida has their address as 701 S Howard Ave, which is a UPS Store. They got smart and registered their domain name using GoDaddy’s “Domains By Proxy” service, which hides the owner. But the website itself shares a lot of content with Helen’s past sites.

Doug is out several thousand dollars in promised payments from Helen (aka Ferin Caffrey). While many people have sued (unsuccessfully) to get their money, Doug is taking a different approach. Helen is committing fraud, so Doug is going for the criminal charges, not unenforceable small claims actions.

Doug started by filing a report with his local police for theft by fraud. This establishes a number of facts and is the beginning of a paper trail that will be important to finding Matt and Helen and getting a conviction.

Doug has contacted a number of government and law enforcement agencies to make them aware of Helen’s activities. He has also contacted various companies that Helen uses in her scam. I believe his goal is to make it more difficult for Helen to scam others in the same way.

Doug has been collecting documentation from court cases in Florida, Texas, and anywhere else that these lead. This will be useful in convincing investigators for various government agencies and private companies that this scam is for real. I have contacted everyone who posted comments here on my blog to get their permission to provide contact information to Doug so he can collect any details they can add.

Update: February 2, 2015

It’s been a busy week for Doug. He and I have exchanged a lot of email and spoken on the phone a couple times. Doug has a lot of experience chasing people like Helen and Matt. Like cockroaches, when the lights come on, they will scatter. They will either run to family and friends to hide or they will double down and try to raise more money from their scams.

So Doug’s first step has been to poison Matt and Helen’s hiding places. Doug has contacted Matt and Helen’s families and has told them everything that is going on. He doesn’t want the family to inadvertently aid and abet Helen if she is looking for a place to hide from authorities. Instead, he wants family and friends to be encouraging Helen to turn herself in. In order for that to happen, they had to know what was going on, even if it was painful.

In order to help us find any new companies and aliases Helen might create in the future, I’ve written a program I call Cockroach Tracker that monitors certain publicly available data and alerts me of suspicious activity.

Update: February 4, 2015

Last night I was contacted by an anonymous victim of Helen’s scam who pointed me to www.fscehomes.com. When I went to the website I found that Helen had listed homes she had for rent/sale in five or six cities around the US, including Berea, KY and Peoria, AZ. I notified Doug and simultaneously replied to the victim to get more information.

Doug began calling the homeowners who were listed at the site. He talked to the first homeowner (who was very disappointed to hear the truth about Helen, whom she knows as “Ferin”), and within minutes we noticed that the website had been updated to remove the list of addresses. Not, however, before we captured all of them. Doug is working his way down this list this morning.

The anonymous victim said that “Ferin” wanted him to pay by PayPal. This might sound like a good idea to Helen but PayPal can be nasty when you involve them in fraud. They can lock down your account so you can’t get any money. And if you’ve connected PayPal to your bank account, they can reach into your account and take back anything they think you may have received fraudulently without so much as a how-do-you-do. We noticed after Doug started calling victims that the PayPal link was gone, too.

Update: February 5, 2015

As Doug contacts Helen’s victims he finds that not everyone believes they’ve been had. They may have had their lawyer look at the contract, and he told them it was solid. What their lawyer didn’t know was that the person signing (in this case, Ferin Caffrey) does not exist. “Ferin Caffrey” is a made-up name used by Helen Joanne Pearce. Do a people-search on a site like intelius.com or peoplesmart.com: There is no person in the United States of America named “Ferin Caffrey”.

Was your down-payment late? Have you had late rent payments, or no rent payments? Did someone move into your home before you knew they were coming? Are you getting paid in Western Union money orders printed at Publix supermarkets? Is “Ferin” hard to get ahold of, or has she said it’s better to contact her by email? Is the company she claims to be with registered with the Florida Department of State using an address that Google says is a UPS Store?

If your answer to most of these questions is “yes”, you’re a victim of Helen’s scam. Your contract is probably invalid and you have squatters in your home. They’re victims, too. If you need someone to talk to about this, contact me through the comments. Comments are moderated so they won’t be posted to the site if you ask me not to.

Update: February 13, 2015

A lot has been happening in the last two weeks. We have finally found a home address for Matt and Helen that wasn’t a UPS Store. Doug now has a sequence of addresses for Helen over time that lead from her home in Chickasha, OK to her present address in central Florida. Our researcher Tristan discovered Matt’s Twitter feed, where we found uploads of his jogging route from a couple years ago, which often begins and ends right at the front door of their house. The same feed has a picture of Matt standing in front of the house, which matches the appearance of the house on Google Street View. Doug has talked to people who know Helen, and who confirm that Matt and Helen do live at that address.

In the process of all this we’ve uncovered some serious flaws in the way the Florida Department of State validates the identity and addresses of registered agents of new LLCs and corporations. That is, they don’t validate them. You can literally form a corporation in Florida using a completely made-up name and address, and they will take your registration fee and issue a Certificate of Existence. Instant validity. It’s like they’re in the business of printing fake ID’s. In the process, they become, in my opinion, accessories to any felonies committed by those corporations, especially when establishing credibility and trust is an important part of their crimes. We’ve found both sympathetic ears and obstinate denial in the Division of Corporations. We’re hoping that shining a light on these flaws will get them repaired and reduce the ease with which this kind of scam can be operated in Florida.

I believe Helen is operating a new company out of New York: River Financial Horizons, which is registered as River F Horizons LLC, 369 Lexington Ave, NY, NY. Her new name there is Karen River. Needless to say, there is no known human being in the country with the name “Karen River”. Rivers? Yes. Rivera? Yes. River? No.

Doug has been contacted by local media in Orlando. We may see something about Helen on TV in the future.

Update: February 23, 2015

Helen has stepped in it now. She’s filed for some kind of injunction against Doug on the basis of “cyber-stalking” and “slander”. Of course the judge found no basis for any kind of injunction in the complaint, so she’s set a hearing, which Helen will not show up for, and will thus lose.

The important thing in all this has nothing to do with Helen’s charges and the upcoming hearing. It has everything to do with Helen’s sworn statement in filing this document. In it, she claims that FSCEHomes.com is her website. She further explains that Doug is undermining her business by convincing certain others to break their contracts with her.

But FSCEHomes.com is Ferin Caffrey’s website. The people cited in Helen’s complaint have have contracts with Ferin Caffrey, not Helen Pearce. Helen has thus confessed to the court that she is operating under the alias of Ferin Caffrey. Furthermore, the non-existent person Ferin Caffrey registered the company FSC Endeavors LLC with the State of Florida using a UPS Store as both its principal address and registered office. Helen has confessed to the court that she illegally registered an LLC in Florida using both a false name and an improper address. Matt’s name was on the domain registration for FSC Endeavors LLC until he put it under Go Daddy’s Domains by Proxy protection to hide it. Thus Matt and Helen are both implicated in this felonious activity.

Update: July 14, 2015

The Better Business Bureau changed FSC Endeavors’ rating to F and issued a fraud alert. You can read the page here. If you click on the customer reviews you’ll see a fake one written by Helen where she calls herself “Joan H” and my actual review, which has been heavily redacted by the BBB to remove personal names. It gets the point across, though.

We have been fairly quiet here online lately but don’t take that to mean that nothing is happening. Cockroach Tracker™ continues to run quietly in the background. We have had significant contacts with more victims and with people who know Helen personally. So far nobody has come forward in her defense. 🙂