Court Rules 750 Ponzi Scheme Victims May Proceed As A Class Against First Merit Bank
Cleveland, Ohio, March 2, 2010 - 750 victims of Joanne Schneider's notorious Ponzi scheme finally got some good news this Tuesday. Cuyahoga Common Pleas Court Judge John P. O'Donnell agreed to allow Schneiders' victims to band together in a class action lawsuit against First Merit Bank to recover about $60.5 million in savings they had collectively invested-and lost-in Schneider's fraudulent and illegal promissory note scheme. According to Plaintiffs' complaint, Schneider used a checking account at the Strongsville branch of First Merit Bank to "launder" the millions of dollars she stole from her victims. The complaint charges that there were many indicators or "red-flags" that Schneider might be using the checking account at First Merit for illegal purposes which the bank failed to follow-up and investigate. John Chapman, one of the attorneys for the defrauded victims, commented Tuesday " First Merit furnished Joanne Schneider with the infrastructure needed to operate her Ponzi scheme, and chose to ignore that she was scamming the public and breaking the law, on a massive scale, every day, for many years.
A link to the Court's Order could be found here: www.johnschapman.com/docs/Young_v_FirstMerit.pdf