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In this episode of American Greed, the shadowy world of film financing where

fortunes can be stolen.

We are just dying to make this movie and we put so much into it and now

somebody's stolen it away from us.

And good names dragged through the mud.

Their reputations, in some cases, their careers were destroyed by this fraud.

Jason Van Eman and Ben McConaughey are up -and -coming players in Hollywood's

independent film scene, producing and financing movies through Weathervane

Productions. Van Eman is a former B -list actor who finds the deals.

He was the salesman. He was charismatic. He was smooth.

And McConaughey uses social media to show off his life as a wealth manager.

married to an Instagram model, and he uses his family's money to fund them.

He was all over social media.

Flashy lifestyle, drove Ferraris and Bentleys.

Ben McConaughey was all about his image.

In a few short years, the partners built a list of credits for financing films

starring A -list celebrities.

But the feds tell American Greed that these so -called financiers use other

people's millions to fund some films and steal the rest.

Every day you had a cancerous knot just wondering if this project is ever going

to be realized.

But what these bad actors haven't counted on is getting caught up in a

Hollywood storyline.

The revenge plot.

You mess with the wrong guys, I'm going to make it my life mission to put you in

jail. You know that the whole house of cards has now collapsed on itself.

And that's when I got the bright idea how to go after these guys.

In the spring of 2015, production is moving along on the independent feature

film Inside Game, the story of an infamous NBA betting scandal and the

project of venture capitalist -turned -filmmaker Paul Martino.

We've scouted locations.

We have a director.

We're ready to go.

Martino has put up $1 .25 million of his own.

and believes those funds have been matched by Jason Van Eman and Ben

Weathervane Productions.

We thought we had found a perfect partner to go fill in the other half of

financing to make the movie.

But before the cameras can roll, there's trouble.

The line producer calls me up and says, Paul, why is there no money in the

production account?

It's not just a mystery.

It's a crime that will take three years to solve.

leaving the cast, the crew, and Martino's $1 .25 million in the lurch.

They had found this sweet spot where they wanted to make the movie, and then

they were closing in on getting production started, that money was gone.

This is a Hollywood crime story that starts about as far from the movie biz

one can imagine in the Midwestern town of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, where a young

man named Jason Van Eman grows up in a solid middle -class family and appears

have a promising future, according to his attorney, Neil Carradville.

He was a good student. He was a good athlete.

He, early on, had an ambition to be a fighter pilot.

And he actually got into the Air Force Academy, which is no small

accomplishment. But after a year at the Air Force Academy, Van Eman decides it's

not for him.

There is another dream calling.

The kid really wants to be in pictures.

Like so many aspiring young actors before him, he heads to Hollywood.

He actually...

achieved some success as an actor by getting a number of roles and, in fact,

two starring roles in some smaller -budget films.

Billy, Billy, Billy. In 2005, Annieman lands a leading role in a low -budget

feature called Regarding Billy, the coming -out story of an Air Force pilot,

coincidentally, and his best friend.

Would you relax, Billy?

Get over here. Let's catch up.

But Van Eman is still waiting on his big break and struggles to make a living as

an actor.

By 2006, he leaves Los Angeles to get married and start a family in Oklahoma.

But one foot remains firmly in Hollywood.

He wanted to transition from acting into actually making movies.

Van Eman starts a company called Weathervane Productions.

and works as L .A. contact from Bartlesville trying to make movie deals.

Around 2011, Van Eman meets 29 -year -old Miami investor Ben McConley through

mutual business associate, a Hollywood producer who has worked with Van Eman on

film production and with McConley on film investing.

Ben McConley owns Forrest Capital Partners.

and claims to control an inherited portfolio of massive wealth run through

so -called family office.

He had the fancy clothes.

He had the fine jewelry.

He had all the Ferraris and Maseratis you would want to see. He was flying on

private jets, trips to Las Vegas. He appeared to be someone who could

finance film and other projects.

The high -flying Florida financier and the Oklahoma producer decide to partner

up with a business plan and a dream to become well -known players in the

indie film world.

Mr. Van Eman spoke the language of Hollywood, and he could assure the

and the producers who were, you know, looking for money that he was going to

able to match or finance about 50 % of the budget.

he told them that his financial partner, Ben McConley, was going to be the one

who actually put the assets into the deal.

The partnership produces a series of low -budget, straight -to -screaming

Christian faith -based projects with titles including The Sparrows and Fishes

and Loaves, Heaven Sent.

These get little traction, but serve an important purpose, to build Vanima's

reputation as a producer, as well as building producing credits.

The more projects, the more movies they made, the more reputable directors,

producers, and actors that they had on board, the more legitimacy they had. In

real way, their credibility was their IMDb pages.

What no one yet knows, however, is that Weathervane Productions' business model

is riddled with lies.

Jason Van Amen's background as an actor, and to a lesser extent as a movie

business veteran, really made him ideally suited to become a fraudster.

He was good at pretending. And that's ultimately what the success of the

depended on, was him pretending that he and his partner had the money to finance

these movies.

The only assets these so -called financiers really have is money brought

unsuspecting creative partners and investors.

The way it worked was the money first hit Ben McConley's account, and then Ben

McConley would decide arbitrarily and kind of on his own how much he was going

to pay himself and move into his other account, and then how much he was going

to send to Jason Van Eman. And it was Van Eman's responsibility then to decide

which movies got paid and which ones were left hanging.

For eight years, Van Eman and McConley are able to keep their scheme going.

while Weatherman Productions parlays its ever -growing reputation into more

deals. And they are meeting with producers from all over the world who

searching for funding deals for their indie films.

Saul Papadopoulos is a UK -based producer working on his latest indie

A Quiet Passion, a biopic about the life of poet Emily Dickinson, and the

passion project of writer and director Terence Davies, seen by many critics as

one of the greatest British filmmakers of his time.

He reads Emily Dickinson every month, and he says it's almost like his

Davies has written the script about Dickinson's life.

And Sex and the City star Cynthia Nixon has signed on to play the lead.

So he said he wrote it sort of with me in mind a bit, and then he sent me the

completed script, and I signed on immediately.

Now it's up to producer Saul Papadopoulos to finance the film.

He travels to the American film market in L .A. and takes a meeting with Jason

Van Eman of Weathervane Productions.

He was a handsome chap.

who talked the talk, came across as really caring about the project, and he

laid on the charm.

Van Eman's financing structure is unlike any the filmmaker has encountered

before, and he is intrigued.

The structure was you put a dollar into their account, in 90 days you get $2

back as an investment, 50 -50 with your money and theirs into the film

production. No one was doing that structure. I mean, it was just

In other words, Weathervane is getting 50 % ownership of the future profits and

only makes money if the film makes money.

The producers are sceptical, but references on other completed films are

positive, and the agreement appears to be legit.

That's when you think, OK, well, should we dip our toes in this water?

remembering, of course, that we've got an independent film production about an

American poet. It's not hugely commercial.

We took those tentative steps and put $1 .8 million into their account.

In hindsight, of course, that was a massive risk.

Next on American Greed, more producers think their money is safe in a protected

bank account, but they couldn't be more wrong.

It haunts me to this day what he said to me.

Unless they have somebody inside the bank, there's no way you can lose your

money.

In late 2014, UK -based producer Saul Papadopoulos is working on his latest

independent film, A Quiet Passion.

90 days after signing a financing agreement with Jason Van Eman and

Productions, he expects to have access to a $4 million production account.

But the account is empty.

So we give him a day, and then we get on the phone to Jason Van Eman, and he

said, well, it's on its way. The banking, you know, there's some

issues, and we've got a man on the inside of the bank who's telling me

everything's fine.

On day 100, it's definitely not fine.

65 crew members are now building out sets in Belgium and need to get paid.

The producers are forced to take out a bridge loan to cover salaries.

Two weeks later...

Van Eman transfers a tiny portion of the funds.

We get a drip feed of $10 ,000.

And then three days later, we get another $10 ,000.

And we're like, Jason, what's going on?

He doesn't think there's a problem. He's getting us the money, even though it's

just drip, drip, drip.

A week before shooting is scheduled to start with the cast, Papadopoulos has no

idea if he will be able to pay his starring actress, Cynthia Nixon.

No agent in America puts their...

cast on a plane without seeing the money in an account.

So this is the big test. Then we call Jason Van Eman and say, right, we need

several hundred thousand dollars tomorrow or the film's off.

In the nick of time, Van Eman sends enough for Papadopoulos to keep the

production going.

But the troubles with Weathervane don't end there.

It was possibly one of the most unpleasant experiences of my producing

because Every day you had a cancerous knot, just wondering if this project is

ever going to be realized.

Even though the producer is forced to hound Van Eman every day for months to

his funding, Papadopoulos is able to keep the cast and crew unaware of the

financial nightmare happening behind the scenes, and they are able to pull off a

successful shoot and edit.

We got away by the skin of our teeth, and it was a really frightening

realization.

that it could have all gone so wrong.

In February of 2016, A Quiet Passion premieres at the Berlin Film Festival

to critical acclaim.

Papadopoulos believes the film's high profile is the only reason the money

finally came through.

We can only surmise that it was because we had a really credible project that

they perhaps were using our project, our feature film, as a proof of concept.

to then convince others, look, we're 50 % investors in this film, why don't you

invest in the next one? And I can only guess that that's why we got away with

and so many others lost their money.

But those losses are still in the future, for now.

With another executive producer credit under his belt, Jason Van Eman continues

to level up.

He travels to Cannes and other European film festivals and wines and dines in

Monte Carlo.

He was holding himself out as a film financier, so it was important for him

be seen aboard mega yachts and partying with film industry types because it

helped him portray himself as legitimate.

Within a few years, Weathervane has a growing list of titles with A -list

attached.

including Jane Got a Gun, starring Natalie Portman, Urge, with Pierce

and film festival darling The Tale, starring Laura Dern.

Filmmakers from near and far are taking note.

Paul Martino is a self -described silly kid.

Born and bred about 3 ,000 miles from Hollywood and a world away.

He started as a total accident getting into the movie business.

My day jobs are in a venture capital firm, and I am an entrepreneur.

He's also a family guy who happens to have a cousin with an unbelievable life

story. My cousin, Tommy Martino, was involved in one of the largest scandals

sports history.

Him and his buddy, Tim Donaghy, were involved in rigging a bunch of NBA games

when Tim was a referee.

Tommy Martino served time for his part in the scandal, and when he gets out,

prospects are limited, except for offers he's fielding from producers trying to

nab his so -called life rights or ownership of his story.

And he called me up. He said, Paulie, will you read this contract?

He sends me this contract, and it was the most awful one -sided contract I'd

ever read in my life. He said, Tommy, you can't sign this. He's like, look, I

just got out of jail. I need some money.

And so I bought his life rights really just as a favor to my cousin to get him

back on his feet after he got out of jail.

I never in a million years ever thought that we would make a film, let alone be

talking about what happened en route to making the film.

Six months later, Martino happens to meet Hollywood screenwriter Andy

also a big basketball fan from Philly.

When Callahan hears the story, he asks to write it and turns out a screenplay

for a film called Inside Game.

It is the true story of Tommy Martino, who's my cousin, Tim Donahue, who's the

referee, and Jimmy Batista, who's the gambler.

Basically, the three of them hatched the scandal that was all based on the fact

that Tim knew how certain games were going to get called. And it's a pretty

amazing story. In many ways, I call the film Goodfellas for Dummies, because

these three kind of...

not exactly the sharpest guys around got in way over their head and managed to

piss off the NBA, the FBI, and the mob all at the same time.

Paul Martino contacts Michael Pierce, a fellow venture capitalist and former

movie producer with a track record of successful films.

So I read the script. He had hired someone to write the script, and it was

bad script.

I said, you know what? I'll look at the side pet project. Let me tinker with

this for a while.

With that... Paul Martino thinks he's found a way to make his movie -making

dreams come true.

Up next, the entrepreneur with a screenplay comes face -to -face with

Hollywood's dark side.

The live producer calls me up and says, Paul, why is there no money in the

production account?

And takes on a mission to expose the con men.

I said, Ben, I promise you.

This will be an outstanding episode of American Greed. It will be my life goal

to make sure that episode happens.

In early 2015,

serial entrepreneur Paul Martino makes a career shift.

From venture capital to filmmaking, with the production of his movie Inside

Game. This is like any other startup company. What do I need to go do?

I was like, okay, we need a director. We need to figure out what the budget is.

Martino and his new partner, Michael Pierce, anticipate needing about $4

to make the film.

And while Martino is hugely successful, he doesn't want to take on all the risk.

I said, look, Michael, I'm good for half that.

I have a couple buddies of mine. I put up a call with about $2 million.

Can you figure out how we do the rest?

Pierce hires a line producer and tasks him with finding a way to finance the

other half of the film.

And the producer comes back with a lead.

Weathervane Productions.

He says, I have found a financing arrangement that is foolproof and

only half of the capital. They'll give us the other half.

I said, okay, well, that sounds good. It's a matching deal.

So who are these guys and what have they done?

The guys are executive producer Jason Van Eman and wealthy investor Benjamin

McConley. Through Weathervane Productions, they have financed several

independent films and are in production on many more.

We did our reference calls on who Weathervane and Jason and his business

Ben McConley were.

We found other people who had made films with them.

Michael Pierce calls a reference at one of the largest talent agencies in

Hollywood and likes what he hears.

You know, well, they seem to have money, and they have a lending facility with

Wells Fargo Bank out of Miami.

I said, really? Wells Fargo? Wow, that's one of the oldest and most esteemed

lending institutions in America. So, sounds like it's legit to me, right? She

says, well, we haven't had any issues so far.

The agreement is relatively simple.

Martino and Pierce would send their half to Ben McConnell's personal Wells Fargo

banker, Benjamin Raphael, in Florida.

And Raphael would certify and manage the accounts.

Ben was presented to us as a very successful multimillionaire from a very

wealthy family.

He is able to collateralize your money up against his other assets to produce

the match.

So we talked to the banker. I got on the phone with him in Miami.

Get it all checked out.

Before sending his $1 .25 million to Weathervane as a final precaution,

decides to have the contracts reviewed one more time by his business partner, a

securities lawyer.

It haunts me to this day what he said to me.

This contract is weird, but it's ironclad.

Unless they have somebody inside the bank, there's no way you can lose your

money.

In May of 2015, Martino wires the money to McConaughey's account.

And that summer, pre -production on Inside Game gets underway.

All seems to be going smoothly.

Until it isn't.

We're doing pre -production work. We're scouting locations. We're interviewing

directors. And then eventually we get to the spot where the line producer now

needs to have access to the production budget because he needs to start writing

checks to go secure locations.

The line producer calls me up. He says, Paul, why is there no money in the

production account?

There's supposed to be about $4 million in their production account, but the

balance is zero.

Michael and I are like, look, that money needed to be there.

We're calling Ben. We're calling Jason. We're calling the bank.

You know, what's going on here?

They said, oh, it's coming. We just got a little held up, and we have, you know,

five movies in production.

It'll be here in two or three weeks.

Three weeks go by, and money doesn't get to the account.

And I'm starting to realize, ah, this is bad. This is bad.

Paul Martino decides it's time to figure out just how bad it is and hires a

private investigator to look into the man with the money.

I said, listen, I've got somebody I need to go check in on in Miami.

Would you please go take a look at Ben McConnell?

He goes, he observes his behavior.

He looks at bank account.

48 hours later, the investigator calls Martino with an update.

And it's all bad news.

He goes, Paul, your money's all gone.

This guy stole it all.

And so I call Michael up. I go, Michael, it's exactly what you thought.

And our investigator is 100 percent certain that the money is gone. 100

certain. No doubt in his mind.

What makes the P .I. so sure?

It's all laid out in his damaging dossier, a document laying bare Ben

McConnell's outrageous lifestyle, his financial information and his alleged

criminal record.

And it was everything Michael and I was worried that this report was going to

say. Our fears were realized. I just thought, great, he's got a fleet of

cars.

He frequents clubs and spends $20 ,000 on bottle service every night. Jeez, I

wonder where our money went.

Ben McConelly is brazenly spending lavish amounts of money all around South

Florida. And it is all documented on social media with his girlfriend and

wife, an Instagram model for whom McConelly employs personal photographers

her weekly photo shoots.

When you pictured a person that would steal your money in a scandal, you would

picture him living the lifestyle of Ben McConley in Miami. The model Instagram

girlfriend, the fancy cars, the big house, the P .I. on earth, that his

girlfriend was now pregnant and that they had this baby shower. He said, I

they spent a million dollars on this baby shower.

So when you're picturing somebody who's going to steal money from you.

and spend it like it's not theirs. You're picturing Ben McConley.

With their money gone, Martino and peers make the tough decision to stop

production of Inside Game.

Next, Paul Martino is not giving up without a fight.

You know that the whole house of cards has now collapsed on itself. There is no

new money coming into the system.

And that's when I got the bright idea how to go after these guys.

In the fall of 2015, Paul Martino and Michael Pierce should be filming their

indie movie Inside Game, but their $4 million budget has vanished.

and they suspect that their financiers, Jason Van Eman and Ben McConley, are

running a Ponzi scheme.

They probably used money from later projects to fund the few projects that

got the good references for, and they ran out of money by the time it was time

to do our project.

I just remember that pit -in -my -stomach feeling of, this really

I'm the person who got duped, and I brought other people with me? That's a

horrible feeling.

Most of Paul Martino's career has been spent in the tech industry in Silicon

Valley. So he pulls in his IT team to develop a website alert that pops up

anytime someone searches the Internet for keywords related to weathering

productions. The pop -up details his allegations of fraud and asks anyone

concerns to contact Paul Martino.

And over the course of six or so months...

Almost 30 different people called me on that phone number. And those calls, they

were all over the map.

Some of them were, these guys stole my money.

Some of them were, I'm thinking about working with them. What do you think?

Boy, this pissed Ben and Jason off.

They knew my phone was going to ring every time they were trying to reel in

another fish.

Martino gathers a list of other producers and investors who claim they

their money to weather vane deals.

We know that we're victims of fraud. We know that these are criminal actors on

the other side. And our objective is really now just to collect enough

information to try and go after them. And I remember telling Ben, at some

somebody's going to call me from the FBI and ask for all the names I found.

In 2016, Assistant U .S. Attorney Christopher Brown begins fielding

about a possible film financing fraud.

Several victims told us that they had been looking for financing, many of them

to make movies, and that they initially approached or were approached by a

company called Weathervane Productions and its principal, Jason Van Eman.

FBI Special Agent Mark Soucy is brought in to investigate and is quickly alerted

to Paul Martino.

Paul was one of those victims when I spoke to that I just could not believe

he would lose all his money to these individuals.

So I'm on the phone and Mark is being polite. He's kind of like, you know,

we think that you might have been a victim of a crime. I know I was a victim

a crime. By the way, would you like to see the report I got from the P .I.?

like, yes, I would.

Oh, by the way, I set up a website, and I found 30 other victims and references.

Would you like to speak with them?

He's like, yeah, yeah, I would like to speak with them.

So Paul Martino was unique in this investigation, and a lot of referrals

lot of victims came to the FBI through that source.

The investigation team learns that while the largest loss is a staggering $28

million,

The vast majority of victims are much smaller players, creative individuals

scraping together funds to realize a dream.

Jason Van Eman and Ben McConaughey had promised to help make those dreams come

true.

But it's all lies.

They targeted a pretty small insular community of creatives, of people who

in this independent film world who really need financing because they don't

big studios backing them.

So they put a lot of trust in these defendants, and ultimately that trust

betrayed.

Investigators also learned that Ben McConnell's so -called private banker,

Benjamin Raphael, is simply a mid -level bank employee recruited by McConnell to

participate in the fraud.

Agent Soucy discovers that Raphael was fired from the bank in 2015.

Yet he continues to provide fake official -looking bank letters to Van

McConley to give to their investors about the security of their accounts.

What we found is there was no secure account.

It was Forrest Capital Partners, Benjamin McConley's business checking

at Wells Fargo. That's solely what it was.

And a giant portion of investor money was moved and spent nearly immediately.

The FBI calculates that over the course of seven years, more than $68 million

moves into and quickly out of McConley's account.

Much of it spent as fast as he could get it.

Social media was full of Ben McConley and Livia McConley. Her Instagram

accounts, Twitter, were filled with...

Luxury travel, luxury clothing.

At one point, he was spending tens of thousands of dollars a month just on

flowers for his wife with all victim money.

Investigators trace approximately $20 million of the fraudulent proceeds to a

company controlled by Jason Van Eman. And he alone decides how much to keep

how much to send to his various investors.

Some of these projects would get desperate.

They had time deadlines they had to meet. They had actor schedules they had

keep up with. At times, Mr. Vaneyman would send them just pieces of the money

keep the project going.

Some projects didn't receive any of the money that went to Jason.

Next, as the investigation continues, Weathervane Productions is still

operational, and they have a new stream of income.

And it's not coming from Hollywood, but all the way on the other coast.

These were individuals, writers, producers that were involved in some of

most well -known Broadway shows over the past 25 years.

In 2018, Jason Van...