“Oh! What a tangled web we weave -- when first we practice to deceive” (Sir Walter Scott). And in the specific case of the Gulenists, deceptive practices have evolved into an art form – one easily embraced and practiced by the fraudster Gulenists.
The Daily Sabbah recently reported that a former employee (or a disgruntled employee as the Gulenists would say), exposed a very profitable scam happening in Turkey. To be exact, the whistleblower alleged that the Gulenists were keeping two sets of books at their Turkish private “prep” schools (like that’s a surprise) and falsely reporting only half of the school’s enrollment, and paying taxes on the lower attendance rates – a tax shortfall of TL 3.2 million – about 40% less than what they were supposed to pay in taxes.
With over a hundred of these schools scattered throughout Turkey, it’s quite a lucrative operation (especially with the tax fraud scam)– one that the Turkish government has ordered to be shut down by September 2015. Accordingly, it stands to reason that the deceiving Gulenists would try to stash away as much cash as possible – before their “training” schools get shuttered- up.
But what about the criminal activities that they are pulling out of their trickster bags here in America? It’s guaranteed that they are likewise keeping alternate sets of books here (case in point, the Tuzuk files). Further, as reported by Chicago Sun Times reporter Dan Mihalopoulos, the Gulenists are up to their eyeballs in cronyism – making tidy profits off of hand-shake deals between Gulenist-run companies and our American tax-funded and Gulenist administered -- charter schools.
Mihalopoulos cited $550,000 paid to Core Group for the purchases of computer and school polo shirts. Ertugrul Gurbuz the owner of both Core and Quality Builders of Midwest Inc., seemed to be double-dipping in company contracts with Concept Schools. Gurbuz was also named in the June 4, 2014 FBI search warrants. Core was started by one of Concept Schools’ founding board members (Mihalopoulous).
Ergun Koyuncu of Signature Maker Inc. received $112,000 and I’m not sure exactly what services his company supplied. Koyuncu seems to be a jack of all trades. Sometimes he’s the President of Signature, past President of Dimension Builders, and other times he’s employed at Concept Schools or sitting on one of their boards. And despite his many "hats," he still finds time to work with the Niagara Foundation (a Gulenist organization).
Other Turkish businessmen named in the warrants, Ozgur Balsoy and Erdal Aycicek of Advanced Solutions of Education (ASE) of Schuamburg were paid over $283,000 in tax funding through the federal E-rate project. ASE was also paid for other Concept Schools related consulting gigs. Balsoy was formerly employed as a Concept School administrator in Columbus, Ohio (Mihalopoulous).
With the pending closure of their Turkish schools, a monumental source of revenue, it’s a sure bet that the Gulenists will continue to find ways to exploit the American tax payers in order to continue to finance their Gulenists activities both here and abroad.
As a side note, notice how the former Gulenist prep school employee was not named in the article except to be identified by his initials. It makes one wonder what he is afraid of...
Below are the articles from the Daily Sabah and the Chicago Sun Times:
http://www.dailysabah.com/politics/2014/08/18/gulen-movements-prep-school-evade-taxes
GÜLEN MOVEMENT'S PREP SCHOOL EVADE TAXES Daily Sabah Updated : 18.08.2014 14:11:11 Published : 18.08.2014 01:33:0
STANBUL — A Gülenist prep school in the eastern province of Elazıg has allegedly been evading taxes by claiming they had 2,829 students enrolled despite having 4,173. It has been recorded that all branches of Gülenist FEM prep schools followed the same procedure.
One of the employees, M.K., who had been working there for seven years but was fired 45 days ago when they found out he voted for the AK Party in the March 30 elections, gave details in an interview with the Turkish newspaper Sabah. M.K. said that there were two separate folders at the prep school. "When inspectors came we would give the official version of the folder, however all taxes and revenue activities were carried out through the second folder," said M.K.
According to the former employee, during the 2013-2014 school year, the Gülenist FEM School gained TL 7.2 million ($3.3 million) in revenue from 4,173 students. However, the official numbers given to the taxes and revenue agency was TL 4 million for 2,829 students. The former employee added that they had forced them not to speak about this and to terminate previous years' files.
M.K. said there were 97 more people fired for the same reason. He said that he had taken copies of all files prior to getting fired.
http://politics.suntimes.com/article/chicago/nearly-1-million-charters-went-firms-named-fbi-probe/mon-08182014-1201am
Nearly $1 million from charters went to firms named in FBI probe Mon, 08/18/2014 - 12:01am
Dan Mihalopoulos
Contractors facing scrutiny in an ongoing federal investigation of Concept Schools have been paid nearly $1 million over the past three years for work at three Chicago Public Schools-funded campuses run by the Des Plaines-based charter operator, records show.
In June, the FBI raided 19 Concept Schools locations in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio, including the group’s Des Plaines headquarters. Search warrants showed they were seeking records concerning Concept’s use of the federal “E-rate” program and companies hired under that program, which helps pay for high-tech upgrades.
The agents also were looking for records regarding top Concept officials, the Chicago Sun-Times reported last month.
No one has been charged. The FBI has said only that the investigation is a “white-collar criminal matter.”
The CPS-funded work done by the contractors named in the FBI search warrants has ranged from selling Concept computers and uniform polo shirts to organizing professional-development seminars.
Concept operates three schools in Chicago. All rely almost entirely on public funding.
Concept’s Chicago Math and Science Academy in Rogers Park — one of the schools the FBI raided June 4 — was approved by CPS officials 10 years ago.
The charter operator’s Horizon Science Academy McKinley Park at 2845 W. Pershing Rd. and Horizon Science Academy Belmont at 5035 W. North Ave. have been open for a year after being initially rejected by CPS because of questions regarding student performance at CMSA.
Concept appealed to the Illinois State Charter School Commission, which overrode CPS, ordering them to finance the two schools with tax dollars.
The three Chicago Concept schools have paid more than $283,000 since the start of 2011 to Advanced Solutions in Education of Schaumburg, records show. The company and its founder and former chief executive, Ozgur Balsoy, were named in FBI search warrants served at
Concept’s headquarters and at its schools in Rogers Park and Peoria.
ASE was a consultant for Concept on its applications for federal E-rate funding. The company also was hired to do other work for Concept, including organizing seminars for school administrators and teachers.
Balsoy previously was an administrator at a Concept school in Columbus, Ohio. He formed ASE in Ohio in 2009, expanding to Illinois in 2011. ASE listed him as “sole owner” until 2012. He’s now listed as vice president.
ASE’s president, Erdal Aycicek, formerly served was treasurer of the Niagara Foundation, based in downtown Chicago. Like Concept and many of its contractors, the foundation was founded and continues to be led by Turkish immigrants, many of them with ties to the global Gulenist movement led by Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, who now lives in Pennsylvania.
Two other ASE executives — Huseyin Alper Akyurek and Esat Albulut — also previously worked for Concept as administrators at schools in Ohio.
ASE executives did not return calls seeking comment.
Another company listed in the search warrants, Core Group Inc. of Mount Prospect, has been a major contractor for Concept’s schools in Chicago. The three schools have paid more than $550,000 to two Core subsidiaries for goods including computers and polo shirts with school logos on them.
Core’s president, Ertugrul Gurbuz, who was named in the search warrants, also founded Quality Builders of Midwest Inc., a Concept construction contractor whose work included building a gym addition at CMSA at 7212 N. Clark St.
Gurbuz referred questions to attorney Patrick Cotter, who said Friday the company is “in the process of complying” with a grand-jury subpoena it got as part of the FBI probe. Cotter declined to say what Core was asked to turn over.
A Core subsidiary was cited in a 2012 audit, done for Fulton County, Georgia, school officials, that questioned why a Gulen-affiliated charter school in that state bought polo shirts from Core Design & Production when “there were cheaper prices to be obtained.” The principal of the Georgia school told auditors he looked online for a polo shirt vendor and found Core — though the auditors said they found no mention of polo shirts on the company’s website.
Core was started in 2005 by Guclu Koseli, who was a founding board member for Concept in Illinois.
Another contractor named in the FBI search warrants — Signature Maker Inc. of Hoffman Estates — has been paid more than $112,000 by Concept’s Chicago schools, Concept records show.
Signature Maker owner Ergun Koyuncu, who was also named in the search warrants, would not comment.
Concept’s vice president, Salim Ucan, also declined to comment, citing the ongoing FBI investigation.
The federal E-rate program requires competitive bidding in hiring contractors in an effort to ensure taxpayer dollars are spent wisely. There’s no such requirement, though, imposed on charter schools by either CPS or the state charter commission, even though the privately run schools depend almost entirely on tax dollars and CPS requires competitive bidding for its own schools.
Nor do they require charter operators to report to officials who their vendors are or how much they are paid.
None of the deals that Concept’s Chicago schools made with Core or ASE was awarded via competitive bidding.
The Daily Sabbah recently reported that a former employee (or a disgruntled employee as the Gulenists would say), exposed a very profitable scam happening in Turkey. To be exact, the whistleblower alleged that the Gulenists were keeping two sets of books at their Turkish private “prep” schools (like that’s a surprise) and falsely reporting only half of the school’s enrollment, and paying taxes on the lower attendance rates – a tax shortfall of TL 3.2 million – about 40% less than what they were supposed to pay in taxes.
With over a hundred of these schools scattered throughout Turkey, it’s quite a lucrative operation (especially with the tax fraud scam)– one that the Turkish government has ordered to be shut down by September 2015. Accordingly, it stands to reason that the deceiving Gulenists would try to stash away as much cash as possible – before their “training” schools get shuttered- up.
But what about the criminal activities that they are pulling out of their trickster bags here in America? It’s guaranteed that they are likewise keeping alternate sets of books here (case in point, the Tuzuk files). Further, as reported by Chicago Sun Times reporter Dan Mihalopoulos, the Gulenists are up to their eyeballs in cronyism – making tidy profits off of hand-shake deals between Gulenist-run companies and our American tax-funded and Gulenist administered -- charter schools.
Mihalopoulos cited $550,000 paid to Core Group for the purchases of computer and school polo shirts. Ertugrul Gurbuz the owner of both Core and Quality Builders of Midwest Inc., seemed to be double-dipping in company contracts with Concept Schools. Gurbuz was also named in the June 4, 2014 FBI search warrants. Core was started by one of Concept Schools’ founding board members (Mihalopoulous).
Ergun Koyuncu of Signature Maker Inc. received $112,000 and I’m not sure exactly what services his company supplied. Koyuncu seems to be a jack of all trades. Sometimes he’s the President of Signature, past President of Dimension Builders, and other times he’s employed at Concept Schools or sitting on one of their boards. And despite his many "hats," he still finds time to work with the Niagara Foundation (a Gulenist organization).
Other Turkish businessmen named in the warrants, Ozgur Balsoy and Erdal Aycicek of Advanced Solutions of Education (ASE) of Schuamburg were paid over $283,000 in tax funding through the federal E-rate project. ASE was also paid for other Concept Schools related consulting gigs. Balsoy was formerly employed as a Concept School administrator in Columbus, Ohio (Mihalopoulous).
With the pending closure of their Turkish schools, a monumental source of revenue, it’s a sure bet that the Gulenists will continue to find ways to exploit the American tax payers in order to continue to finance their Gulenists activities both here and abroad.
As a side note, notice how the former Gulenist prep school employee was not named in the article except to be identified by his initials. It makes one wonder what he is afraid of...
Below are the articles from the Daily Sabah and the Chicago Sun Times:
http://www.dailysabah.com/politics/2014/08/18/gulen-movements-prep-school-evade-taxes
GÜLEN MOVEMENT'S PREP SCHOOL EVADE TAXES Daily Sabah Updated : 18.08.2014 14:11:11 Published : 18.08.2014 01:33:0
STANBUL — A Gülenist prep school in the eastern province of Elazıg has allegedly been evading taxes by claiming they had 2,829 students enrolled despite having 4,173. It has been recorded that all branches of Gülenist FEM prep schools followed the same procedure.
One of the employees, M.K., who had been working there for seven years but was fired 45 days ago when they found out he voted for the AK Party in the March 30 elections, gave details in an interview with the Turkish newspaper Sabah. M.K. said that there were two separate folders at the prep school. "When inspectors came we would give the official version of the folder, however all taxes and revenue activities were carried out through the second folder," said M.K.
According to the former employee, during the 2013-2014 school year, the Gülenist FEM School gained TL 7.2 million ($3.3 million) in revenue from 4,173 students. However, the official numbers given to the taxes and revenue agency was TL 4 million for 2,829 students. The former employee added that they had forced them not to speak about this and to terminate previous years' files.
M.K. said there were 97 more people fired for the same reason. He said that he had taken copies of all files prior to getting fired.
http://politics.suntimes.com/article/chicago/nearly-1-million-charters-went-firms-named-fbi-probe/mon-08182014-1201am
Nearly $1 million from charters went to firms named in FBI probe Mon, 08/18/2014 - 12:01am
Dan Mihalopoulos
Contractors facing scrutiny in an ongoing federal investigation of Concept Schools have been paid nearly $1 million over the past three years for work at three Chicago Public Schools-funded campuses run by the Des Plaines-based charter operator, records show.
In June, the FBI raided 19 Concept Schools locations in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio, including the group’s Des Plaines headquarters. Search warrants showed they were seeking records concerning Concept’s use of the federal “E-rate” program and companies hired under that program, which helps pay for high-tech upgrades.
The agents also were looking for records regarding top Concept officials, the Chicago Sun-Times reported last month.
No one has been charged. The FBI has said only that the investigation is a “white-collar criminal matter.”
The CPS-funded work done by the contractors named in the FBI search warrants has ranged from selling Concept computers and uniform polo shirts to organizing professional-development seminars.
Concept operates three schools in Chicago. All rely almost entirely on public funding.
Concept’s Chicago Math and Science Academy in Rogers Park — one of the schools the FBI raided June 4 — was approved by CPS officials 10 years ago.
The charter operator’s Horizon Science Academy McKinley Park at 2845 W. Pershing Rd. and Horizon Science Academy Belmont at 5035 W. North Ave. have been open for a year after being initially rejected by CPS because of questions regarding student performance at CMSA.
Concept appealed to the Illinois State Charter School Commission, which overrode CPS, ordering them to finance the two schools with tax dollars.
The three Chicago Concept schools have paid more than $283,000 since the start of 2011 to Advanced Solutions in Education of Schaumburg, records show. The company and its founder and former chief executive, Ozgur Balsoy, were named in FBI search warrants served at
Concept’s headquarters and at its schools in Rogers Park and Peoria.
ASE was a consultant for Concept on its applications for federal E-rate funding. The company also was hired to do other work for Concept, including organizing seminars for school administrators and teachers.
Balsoy previously was an administrator at a Concept school in Columbus, Ohio. He formed ASE in Ohio in 2009, expanding to Illinois in 2011. ASE listed him as “sole owner” until 2012. He’s now listed as vice president.
ASE’s president, Erdal Aycicek, formerly served was treasurer of the Niagara Foundation, based in downtown Chicago. Like Concept and many of its contractors, the foundation was founded and continues to be led by Turkish immigrants, many of them with ties to the global Gulenist movement led by Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, who now lives in Pennsylvania.
Two other ASE executives — Huseyin Alper Akyurek and Esat Albulut — also previously worked for Concept as administrators at schools in Ohio.
ASE executives did not return calls seeking comment.
Another company listed in the search warrants, Core Group Inc. of Mount Prospect, has been a major contractor for Concept’s schools in Chicago. The three schools have paid more than $550,000 to two Core subsidiaries for goods including computers and polo shirts with school logos on them.
Core’s president, Ertugrul Gurbuz, who was named in the search warrants, also founded Quality Builders of Midwest Inc., a Concept construction contractor whose work included building a gym addition at CMSA at 7212 N. Clark St.
Gurbuz referred questions to attorney Patrick Cotter, who said Friday the company is “in the process of complying” with a grand-jury subpoena it got as part of the FBI probe. Cotter declined to say what Core was asked to turn over.
A Core subsidiary was cited in a 2012 audit, done for Fulton County, Georgia, school officials, that questioned why a Gulen-affiliated charter school in that state bought polo shirts from Core Design & Production when “there were cheaper prices to be obtained.” The principal of the Georgia school told auditors he looked online for a polo shirt vendor and found Core — though the auditors said they found no mention of polo shirts on the company’s website.
Core was started in 2005 by Guclu Koseli, who was a founding board member for Concept in Illinois.
Another contractor named in the FBI search warrants — Signature Maker Inc. of Hoffman Estates — has been paid more than $112,000 by Concept’s Chicago schools, Concept records show.
Signature Maker owner Ergun Koyuncu, who was also named in the search warrants, would not comment.
Concept’s vice president, Salim Ucan, also declined to comment, citing the ongoing FBI investigation.
The federal E-rate program requires competitive bidding in hiring contractors in an effort to ensure taxpayer dollars are spent wisely. There’s no such requirement, though, imposed on charter schools by either CPS or the state charter commission, even though the privately run schools depend almost entirely on tax dollars and CPS requires competitive bidding for its own schools.
Nor do they require charter operators to report to officials who their vendors are or how much they are paid.
None of the deals that Concept’s Chicago schools made with Core or ASE was awarded via competitive bidding.
