Pesach Program Discussion Master Thread

[aygart]

FTFY

-1

[Chief Rabbi of New York]

I'm still looking for possible scenario which will make him not guilty, so far I haven't found any. The only question that lies is really what he's guilty for.

Is it possible there is a scenario that you didn’t think of?
My only question is r u 100% sure he’s guilty before ruining his life ?

[Something Fishy]

Is it possible there is a scenario that you didn’t think of?
My only question is r u 100% sure he’s guilty before ruining his life ?

Nobody is ruining anybody's life here, take a deep breath.

And if anyone ruined someone's life it was HG going on a talk show not once but multiple times and shooting his mouth off.

[zale]

Just trying to understand what is going on, is the current belief that HG deliberately advertised the program in order to defraud his customers or that he had some sort of unforseen catastrophe that he was ashamed to be known for and decided to pull up a story about a scammer?

I think if Dan posts the timeline it might make some things more clear.

You asked for the current belief. Here is my personal (current) belief:

I don’t think he created the whole program to defraud people. He simply can’t handle money. My belief is that when funds came in he spent a big chunk of it on personal things that have nothing to do with the program. His justification for it might have been “I’m expecting to make $150k profit from the program, so I’ll take my cut now”. I unfortunately know people like this and this is their line of thinking. He was banking on a certain amount of reservations, and that did not happen.

His MO is to push-off paying vendors for as long as possible and until after the program is over, then he either pays off some of it or just leaves the vendors holding the bag.

He probably thought he can pull this off with the Claridge. Pay the first 100k and push off the rest until after the program is over, then just tell them he’s in bankruptcy and can’t pay. The Claridge was having none of it and warned him that he must pay up. Since he already spent the money, he couldn’t pay up, so he starting dodging (as shown in the emails) and then eventually made up a story about phishing to try to convince the hotel that he’s serious and will pay up. He was hoping the phishing tale would buy him the time he needs. The hotel must have gotten a sense that he’s bluffing and told him to take a hike.

So he was banking on the hotel not asking for the money and having more overall reservations, both of which did not end up happening. Since the hotel is not giving back the deposit and the rest of the money has been spent, there is no money to refund customers.

Disclaimer: this is my personal feeling about this at the given time and with the information available.

[Chief Rabbi of New York]

Does anyone know if he did the lie detector test ?

[yelped]

Does anyone know if he did the lie detector test ?

Who cares?

[Chief Rabbi of New York]

Who cares?

If it can prove his innocence
Then shouldn’t everyone care ?

[Yehuda57]

Polygraphs are entirely unreliable and cannot prove anything

[Sammy82]

If it can prove his innocence
Then shouldn’t everyone care ?

I think those who already are ready to burn him at the stake will never be convinced. And most others either don't care enough or feel he has some sort of sickness (ie if another you had yenne machla, you feel bad for him and daven he has a refuah shleima.) Obviously the people affected by him have to protect themselves and will iyh get repaid somehow. But to wish harm on another yid is mind blowing to me.
Throw in that these tests are beatable......
So no, this test isn't going to sway most people either way.
//.02

[amaaretz]

Goooood morning, it's polygraph test day!

And what a beautiful day it was for polygraph test, indeed.

If anyone wants to reach out to that judge who kept plugging his firm throughout the show to follow up and see if it ever happened, be our guest. In the absence of that, we'll assume he "couldn't come because [all sorts of nonsense]".

[Chief Rabbi of New York]

And what a beautiful day it was for polygraph test, indeed.

If anyone wants to reach out to that judge who kept plugging his firm throughout the show to follow up and see if it ever happened, be our guest. In the absence of that, we'll assume he "couldn't come because [all sorts of nonsense]".

So this means guilty until proven innocent ?
Assuming he didn’t come until someone reaches out to the judge

[zale]

Polygraphs are entirely unreliable and cannot prove anything

+1

A sociopath can handily beat the lie detector test.

I think the judge wanted to see if he’ll hesitate to agree to take it. He didn’t hesitate.

[amaaretz]

So this means guilty until proven innocent ?
Assuming he didn’t come until someone reaches out to the judge

You keep creating straw-men to engage with & gaslight people. This response is an acknowledgement of that, but I'm not engaging in a back and forth with you.
Nothing personal, I just don't have it in me. The situation speaks for itself. Be well.

[amaaretz]

+1

A sociopath can handily beat the lie detector test.

I think the judge wanted to see if he’ll hesitate to agree to take it. He didn’t hesitate.

I think the judge was being genuine with his offer. He acknowledged on-air that polygraphs are not conclusive - they're not even admissable in court - but it's still something.
And he also wanted HG to say he'll come & never show up, which I assume is what happened.

[yuneeq]

Polygraphs are fully unreliable, full stop. The 2 cases where it was used in my circles - one gave a false positive and the other a false negative. The case of the false negative was regarding theft, the person was nervous and failed the test, it wasn’t until years later that someone else admitted to taking the money. And the other case a friend told me he beat the test regarding his drug usage with a little prep.

[Yehuda25]

I'm more surprised that people don't use their credit cards to pay for the programs. Or do none of the programs actually take credit card? Would be well worth a 3% fee for the protection.

[Dan]

They don't take credit cards.

[Alexsei]

They don't take credit cards.

Wow wouldn't they get many more customers if they did?

[JMHO]

Wow wouldn't they get many more customers if they did?

They can get away without taking cc... not worth dealing with every dispute, etc...

[stmark]

They don't take credit cards.

Went on a program 2 years ago and they allowed 50% to be paid on a cc. opened an ink in my name and my wifes and got the points and enjoyed yuntif in the hotel (tri state program still in existence).