Six Racers held in widening Venezuelan Scandal

No names have been released but news is that six prominent Venezuelan auto and motorcycle racers are being held or sought as a "precautionary measure"on suspicion of defrauding the state.

EJ Viso in the hospital

The scandal came to light when the minister for sport, Alejandra Benitez discovered forged signatures on funding requests and went public.     Today Interior and Justice minister Miguel Rodriguez Torres said the racers falsified requests and inflated costs for at least US $60 Million.

One of the persons of interest is, according to Rodriguez Torres, missing in the United States.    Andretti Autosport driver E.J. Viso was missing from the Indycar season finale because of a sudden attack of the "stomach flu" and even tweeted a picture of himself looking, one must say, not too ill on a hospital bed... but that may be just a coincidence.

The Venezuelan Minister goes on to put some of the blame on the country's "gigantic" enemy, the United States,  hellbent on bringing government down.

Whether you buy that conspiracy or not, US based teams did seem to have a special price menu for Venezuelan drivers, at least as suggested by requests approved by the former minister of sport, Hector Rodriguez and documented on his twitter account:
$ 936,277.76 for GrandAm practice for Gaetano Ardegna Perez?  $678,000.00 for Alex Popow for NASCAR Nationwide practice?

I'm guessing it did not all go to tires and crew sandwiches.


UPDATE: one driver was named among those held or sought in this investigation, Paolo Andreasi who has raced in Europe in the Blancpain Endurance series with Kessel Racing (top photo: Kessel Racing.com)

Farnbacher-Loles Owner Surrenders to Federal Authorities, Faces 20 Years

Greg Loles, team principal the the Grand Am Champion team Farnbacher Loles, surrendered to Federal Authorities Tuesday after a two week stay in a Bridgeport, CT hospital following a reported suicide attempt.

He faces two counts, wire fraud and mail fraud, felonies that each carry a 20 year maximum sentence. He is accused of, starting in 2001, "Madoffing" 6 to 8 million dollars taken from his own church and fellow parishoners with the promise of a steady 7% return. The money was never invested.

This confirms much of what had been rumored for the last 6 weeks. Not yet come to light is what happened to the Farnbacher-Loles clients rumored to have put money down for 2010 race cars.

Below is the arrest affidavit from the FBI alleging the two felony counts and detailing how Loles diverted funds both for personal use and to the Farnbacher-Loles race team.

More Info in this article from NewsTimes.com

LOLES Gregory Affidavit[1]


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Farnabacher-Loles Principal Involved in Financial Scandal

(photo by Ricardipus)

The principal behind the Farnbacher-Loles race team has been identified as the person allegedly behind a massive financial fraud involving embezzlement of funds from a Connecticut church, according to the New Haven Register.

Gregory Loles was in charge of managing the Saint Barbara Greek Orthodox Church's building and endowment funds as well as some church members retirement and college funds.

"...state Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said his office is reviewing facts to determine whether state laws were broken. But the U.S. Department of Justice has the lead in the investigation, he said.

“Sadly and tragically, this potential fraud seems to be of massive magnitude — making the federal investigation and involvement very appropriate,” Blumenthal said. “We are reviewing whether there are potential violations of state statutes and how we can pursue them and aid the federal investigation. We understand the FBI is actively involved, and we would commonly defer to federal criminal authorities in their criminal investigation. But there may well be state statutes that merit our investigation.”

You can read more here. We suspect this is only the beginning.


Farnbacher-Loles are officially supported by Porsche Motorsport and were the 2009 Grand-Am Rolex GT Champions as well as past class winners in the Daytona 24hrs. They are based in Danbury Connecticut.


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Hell Hath No Fury as a Piquet Scorned

Nelson Piquet Jr. did promise revenge on Flavio Briatore and Renault after his recent mid season firing and today, through the Brazilian Network Globo, allegations were made that he had been ordered to crash his car intentionally at last year's SIngapore GP in order to help Alonso who had just pitted before the rest of the field and thus gained a decisive advantage and a win. This in exchange for a contract for the current season.

Allegations are that there is proof of Flavio's and Renault's conspiracy but, frankly, Piquet's driving record is working against him on this one. One is hard pressed to believe Piquet could hold the car on the road consistently much less hold clandestine contract negotiation on the radio during a race. If this does turn out to be a true story ( and there should be plenty of onboard telemetry, radio transmissions and video to make this an open and shut case in about 15 minutes) it is doubly suicidal for the Brazilian, if it's pathetic for a team to be so desperate as to order a driver to crash, it is even more pathetic for that driver to be so desperate as to accept the proposition. Chances are both would be banned for life.





And here is the rest of it.