'They used the right language': Texas couple to serve 40 years for duping 10,000 Black investors out of $30M. Here's how they exploited their faith

Instead, unwitting participants lost thousands of dollars each — widening the U.S. racial wealth gap when many could afford it least.

“This scheme deliberately targeted the African American community, exploiting cultural trust and community ties,” said IRS Special Agent in Charge Christopher J. Altemus Jr. when the couple was convicted in January. “[The] conviction sends a clear message: if you abuse trust and exploit communities for personal gain, you will face justice.”

Here’s how the couple defrauded 10,000 Americans — and what you can do to avoid similar schemes.

The couple used a shared background to defraud people

The Moores were running a chain-referral pyramid scheme, an illegal system where people make money by recruiting multiple new people into it.

The Moores’ scheme had people join one of many “playing boards.” Each playing board had four levels: eight people on the “fire” level on the bottom, four people on the “wind” level, two people on the “earth” level and one on the “water” level.

Once the fire level was filled, all eight participants on the fire level paid $1,400 to the one person on the water level, equalling $11,200. Then, they graduated to the wind level. From there, they would have to recruit eight fire-level participants to climb up the pyramid.

Of course, few people ever got to the top level. To make things worse, the Moores put themselves and their relatives on the water level for multiple boards, racking up payment from thousands of investors.

According to the Federal Trade Commission and the state of Arkansas, people paid as much as $62,700 to participate in the scheme.

The Moores used language with religious and cultural ties to pull investors in. They called payments “blessings” and modeled the scheme after a “sou sou,” a West African savings circle.

“They used the right language,” said Mica Scott, who joined BINT despite initial skepticism. She ended up turning over evidence of the scheme to authorities when she realized it was a scam. “They were talking about financial literacy and generational wealth, Black wealth, the Bible, religion, God, all those things. And then, fast money.”

Chain-referral pyramid schemes also exploit people’s personal ties to get new recruits. One BINT member, Jennifer Fergusen, says she was recruited by her church minister — a figure most people trust deeply. She ended up charging her credit card to put more than $34,000 into the pyramid scheme.

Her minister persuaded her by saying his daughter had already made money from the scheme.

They played to that, saying, ‘Hey, we’re doing this only with Black people, we’re trying to help the community,’” said Ty Thompson, who put $8,400 into the scheme. “‘They pushed that really heavily, and it was convincing.’”