I wish to submit a police report for Insurance purposes, and to report international scam / fraud / theft operations perpetrated by Anders B Johanson of Argon Navis Publishing & Travel (also Metatron) in Sweden, and currently relocating to India.
Anders B Johanson owes me a refund of tour fees to the value of US$2990 (AUD$4242.42). On the 30th October I paid a deposit of US$300 (AUD$456.94) via an international money transfer to his account in Sweden. On the 21st November I paid the rest of the tour fee, US$2690 (AUD$3785.48). The tour was scheduled from March 7th - 30th, and was cancelled suddenly on the 7th March due to an alleged car accident. It is now the 15th June and still he has not refunded my money.
Based on the sequence of events described below, I now have strong reason to believe that he has stolen this money from me and has no genuine intention of returning it to me because:-
1. The tour was cancelled because of an alleged car accident and I have now been told by an aquaintance of his in Sweden that there was NO car accident.
2. On March 26th I was told by Lillian Johanson that Anders B Johanson would be recovering from injuries until July and not working at all during this time, but then on April 15th there was an announcement published on his website that the business was closing in Sweden and relocating abroad (India).
3. I have been told by other people in Sweden / Denmark that he has successfully avoided refunding other people their money also.
I have all documentation and correspondence to substantiate the following sequence of events and communication between myself and Anders B Johanson, also his wife Lillian Johanson, and correspondence from his aquaintances substantiating my fear that he has stolen US$2990 from me with no genuine intent of refunding it to me.
On March 7th I was booked to commence a 3 week tour through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras, with the Argon Navis organisation in Sweden.
The tour was to be lead by Anders B Johanson, of the Argon Navis (Metatron) organisation in Sweden. Anders B Johanson promotes himself as an expert in world-wide sacred sites and archaeoastronomy, with a PhD in religion and metaphysics as well as Bachelor's degree in chemical process engoineering. The tour was a specialist tour of Mayan sites and Mayan spiritual traditions, including the Mayan calender. He advertises a comprehensive range of worldwide tours to sacred sites and lectures / educational workshops in this field on his websites www.metatron. Se (Sweden), www.metatron.De (Denmark), and most recently www.argonnavisindia.com (India).
I arrived in Mexico City on March 7th, at the Holiday Inn Zocalo where the tour group had been notified to meet for dinner and overnight accomodation.
Upon arrival, there was no record of the tour groups reservation, however due to my poor Spanish I assumed that I had not been able to communicate enough for them to locate the reservation.
I checked my email while waiting for other people to arrive. An email had arrived from Lillian Johanson, wife of Anders B Johanson. The email informed me that the tour had been cancelled as Anders B Johanson was in a car accident in Stockholm on this day, on his way to pick up other tour group members.
Based on this information I also concluded that perhaps the reason the hotel staff could not find a record of the reservation for dinner or accomodation was because the reservation had already been cancelled before I arrived at the hotel.
Lillian also stated in this email that she would 'come back to you with a new itinery and travel details after making new bookings...'. This indicated to me that the tour was at this stage only postponed. Hence, I awaited in Mexico City for a few days whilst waiting for confirmation of the new travel arrangements.
On the 9th March I emailed Lillian Johanson requesting information urgently because I could not plan my time in Mexico / Central America until I knew what the new tour dates would be. Lillian replied that day advising me that the tour would probably be postponed for 2-4 months or would refund me later.
On the 9th March I replied to Lillian that:-
A) I would not be able to participate in the tour in 2-4 months time, and therefore I needed to organise a refund quickly.
B) I also requested an email from her confirming that the Holiday Inn Zocalo was booked for the night of March 7th, but cancelled due to the tour being cancelled. I would not have stayed in a hotel that expensive but as it was so late in the day when I arrived in Mexico City after a long flight and given that Mexico City is not safe after dark, I decided to stay there for the night. I never received an email confirming this, but then Lilian had said she was extremely busy with cancelling and retrieving money paid to transport / accomodation service providers for the tour. Also, prior to payment for the tour I found replies to my emails to be somewhat unreliable also, and so this was consistent with my previous experience in dealing with Argon Navis / Anders B Johanson.
C) I also requested a copy of the tour itinery so that I could plan my own trip based on that itinery. I never received the itinery I requested either. Again, this was not inconsistent with my previous expereince in dealing with Anders B Johanson.
On the 17th March I emailed Lillian & Anders Johanson with an email titled 'URGENT' and requesting confirmation of what date they expected to refund me. I also gave them my bank account details and international money transfer details they would need. I did not receive a reply to my email despite it's obvious urgency, and so emailed them again 1 week later on 26th March. I knew that Anders was emailing people again as I had received an email rom him sent to everyone on his email list.
On the 26th March Lillian Johanson did promptly reply to this last email, informing me that Anders was still recovering and would be off work for another month, with 'no consultations or any work at all'. She indicated that she had sent the group email and was running the office during his abscence.in this email she restated that Anders would not be resuming work until his expected recovery by July, and that all tours had been cancelled up until August. Lillian was re-scheduling all classes and programs until this time also. She assured me that she would talk to me again as soon as refunds were processed, and that she would then process my refund quickly.
Only 20 days later, company announcement on website re closure of offices in Sweden on 15th April - I only discovered this on 5th June, see below.
On 15th May I emailed both Lillian and Anders Johanson again requesting an up date on the progress towards arranging the refunds, telling them again that I desperately needed the money. I received no reply to this email and so I emailed them again 3 weeks later on the 4th June.
On 5th June, in response to this email to their email address met@algonet. Se, I received an email from the internet servivce provider advising me that 'Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender'. My email could not be delivered to their email address which by all accounts seemed to have been closed. I had never had a problem sending them an email previously.
I immediately checked their swedish website www.metatron. Se and discovered an announcement on the Tour page advising that 'The company does not do tours any more and is relocating abroad, closing in Sweden from April 15th'.
I was alarmed by this information because when Lillian Johanson last replied to my email on 26th April she informed me that Anders was still recovering and would be off work for another month, with 'no consultations or any work at all' She had neglected to mention that they were relocating abroad, to India. Also, I had not been advised of their plans to relocate or new contact details via email.in hindsite, it would seem Anders B Johanson was off work busy organsiing his move to India!
I searched through old emails - on the 9th April & 26th April I had received group emails sent in Swedish which I had therefore been unable to read, however when I checked them found an email address for India, and immediately emailed Anders B Johanson at the new email address of [email protected] demanding an explanation and informing him I was now particularly concerned about whether he in fact ever intended to refund my money and asking him when he was going to notify me about his relocation to India. I then also checked an old group email sent 8th May that I had also kept but not read because it was written in Swedish, and discovered that the new website and address details in India were included on the bottom of an email.
On 10th June, Anders had still not replied to me even from his new email address at [email protected] this time I was highly suspicious and so I decided to email everyone (160 people approximately) on his group email list requesting information. I emailed approximately 160 people in english and also sent a swedish translation of my letter using a web based translation service.
I received an email from Peter Karlsson from Sweden, stating that there was NO car accident.
On 11th June, I finally received an email rom Anders B Johanson. Asa, one of the people I had emailed, sent my email letter to Anders at [email protected] Anders told me he had seen the letter I had sent to everyone, claimed he had not responded to my emails because of a computer virus that affected them since the 1st May, and that he would send me US$700 per week as of the 19th June. I did not reply that day. His excuse of a virus did not explain why he had not replied to the emails I sent him at his new email address, [email protected] or why he had not notified me of an alternative email address to use.
On 12th June, Ditte Anderson of Denmark emailed me stating she was afraid I had lost my money and informing me of 3 other incidents where people she knows have lost money.
On the 13th June Peter Karlsson again emailed me with further details, informing me that he knows that other people have had problems getting some or all of their money refunded by Anders B Johanson. Also, he states that ' I know he's collecting money from people and promise them this and that etc etc. When he has got payment from them he travels to India/China and other places around the world.'
On the 14th June Anders B Johanson again emailed me - I had not yet replied to his last email on the 11th June. Clearly by his email he is worried about the impact my email to everyone will have on his business. He said that 'the only way we can talk about a refund for you right now' is if I send a disclaimer to everyone that I emailed, stating that my letter was caused by a virus. He also stated he would not be back in the office before June 20th.interestingly he claimed that a computer virus was the reason he had not replied to my emails sent to his usual email address met@algonet. Se
Upon reviewing the information on both websites (see attached copies of webpages), Anders B Johanson:-
1. On the Swedish website www.metatron. Se he advertised international course / lecture dates in Europe throughout March - corresponding to the exact same time as he was supposed to be on tour in Mexico.international course / lectures were also advertised throughout April, May and June when he originally had advertised other tours in other countries, and when he was allegedly recovering from the car accident. I was informed by Lillian that he cancelled all other tours through April, May and June.
2. On the India website www.argonnavisindia.com he ALSO advertised that there would be 8 Sirius Mystery seminars commencing in India on April 8th at is new business address - again when he was supposedly in Sweden recovering from his injuries.
3. On the Swedish website the announcement stated that they would no longer be running any tours, however on the new India website that commenced February (see attachment), all tours previously on the Swedish website are listed with dates updated to reflect that these tours will be available throughout the rest of 2004 and also during 2005. Eg the Mexico tour that was cancelled is now readvertised 19-30 March. This again is odd because the tour literature states the tour is for 21 days and I was told the tour was a 3 week tour and would commence from 7th March and not the 19th March, however despite that Anders B Johanson has changed the year from 2004 to he has otherwise failed to rectify the actual dates of the tour.
4. Anders B Johanson has advertised for lectures to be held regularly throughout the rest of 2004 in India (see attachment), therefore he is clearly not insolvent and has not ceased operating his business.
5. Contact details in Sweden and India are attached also.
I do not really know if Anders B Joahnson has genuinely intended to refund my money. I had to date attributed his apparent failure to maintain pro-active communication and lack of reliability in responding to my emails, to the reasoning that he is an academic and overloaded with too much to do, consequently quite disorganised. However...
A) It is odd that he did in fact leave the 160 email addresses of other people disclosed on group emails. Maybe he is just not very smart.
B) Also, he has in fact indirectly notified me of his relocation to India and provided new contact details as per emails sent in Swedish 9/4,26/4 & 8/5/04. However, he made no effort to directly / personally communicate to me his plans to relocate to India despite that only 20 days after I was told by Lillian on the 26th March that Anders B Johanson would be recovering from his injuries for the next month, Anders B Johanson placed announcement on his website that they were closing their offices in Sweden on 15th April and relocating abroad.
Maybe he is leading me up the garden path in an insidious attempt to 'lose' me.
C) Nevertheless, of my 4 contacts in Sweden acquired from his email list, 2 tell me they know other people also owed money, 1 told me there was NO car accident (twice), 1 felt suspicious about him, and 1 knew nothing and forwarded my email letter to Anders B Joahnson asking him what this was all about.
D) Furthermore, throughout my dealings with Anders B Johanson, not once has he initiated contact with me about the refund he owes me. I believe it is probable that he would not have maintained communcation with me if I did not pursue him and probably he would not have contacted me at all during this time.
E) Anders B Johanson has also promoted and encouraged me to contact Dan Winter, a fugitive of the law - see www.danwinter.com where this is clearly explained - the website has been transferred to the Plaintiffs, Stanley and Cynthia Tenen and Meru Foundation, by order of Hon. Judge Charles J. Siragusa, of the US Federal District Court for the Western District of New York in Rochester
At this time, Anders B Johanson continues to conduct his business from India and has advertised an updated list of international lectures and lectures based in India (along with his contact details), for 2004 and hence he is clearly not insolvent. Please find copies of future lecture dates attached, or refer to www.argonnavisindia.com.
His new contact details in India are (also attached):-
Argon Navis India
c/o NBC Press (Narendra Bhatia & Co.)
76/2 Ghari Road. Iscon Temple Road
East of Kailesh
NEW DELHI
India 110065
Phone:- 96-115.169.0690
Mobile:- 96-98.100.08.195
Email:- [email protected] ; [email protected] ; [email protected]
Websites: www.argonnavisindia.com ; www.metatron. Se ; www.metatron.De
Phone (Sweden):- 46-8.590.88916
Mobile (Sweden):- 46-7.074.86329
Email (Sweden):- met@algonet. Se
Erika
Endeavour Hills
Australia
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