Houston, Texas – Invest $1400, get back $11,200. Within just a matter of weeks.
It’s a promised return better than the stock market, but law enforcement officials warn it’s also illegal.
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Blessing looms, or “gifting circles” as they are referred to, are illegal, according to law enforcement.
“If you think you’re going to be a blessing to someone and ‘get blessed with’ all of this money due to the fact a lot of people are just so gullible or just so motivated on making fast, quick money,” says Eric Carr, Senior Officer of the Houston Police Department.
He says these gifting circles are nothing more than Ponzi or pyramid schemes.
Anatomy of a blessing circle
“The business model is a model that’s been around for decades and the difference between a scam and the actual true business model is the way you actually make money,” Carr said.
“The old saying goes, if it sounds too good to be true, most of the time it is. So this particular scheme is just motivating people to pay (for example) $100, and then that person gets someone else to pay $100, then that person gets someone else to pay, and it kind of goes on and on,” Carr said.
But for some people, recruiting those two additional people becomes a problem. And until you recruit more people, you don’t move closer into the “blessing circle,” which gets you closer to the center to get paid the money promised.
“And then the people at the top will profit from it, leaving the people at the bottom out of their money,” Carr said.
Pandemic puts new twist on old “blessing” scam
Just as schools, workplaces, courts, and even fitness classes went virtual because of the pandemic, so did the people recruiting others into their blessing looms and gifting circles.
On Monday night, KPRC 2 Investigates is hot on the trail of a local woman accused of holding virtual gifting circles. We’ll also hear from the woman she is accused of duping out of $8,000, for a blessing circle. Find out what the accused had to say about the accusations being made against her that she has stolen thousands from people who paid into her gifting circles.