William Franklin / Andy Stephens

716-712-3996: About the Fake "Kentropolis.Com Fraud" Blog

2011-04-18T10:55:00.000-07:00

http://716-712-3996.blogspot.com/

When Googling my phone number, a few people have come across William's retaliation site at kentropolisfraud.blogspot.com -- fortunately it has not cost me any business. But it's still annoying. That's how a lot of people found out about HIM ... Googling his phone number.

Hopefully this extra blog will make it easier for people to see through his libel.

{Note: His anonymous blog at kenstuczynskifraud.blogspot.com is still up, taking accusations made against HIM and swapping them with MY name. Just sad ...}

New Year, New Business Name (Yet Again)

2011-01-14T12:46:00.000-08:00

Using a new automated tracking system, we discovered William Franklin is now using a new site, FranklinDesigner.Com (registered last May), "Franklin Designer - Your Local Freelancer!" As of this post, his site for LA Design and Coding has not yet been shut down.

Like all his other sites, he's using Wordpress and changing the graphic theme copyright to his own unregistered company name. Like most of his previous sites, there is no contact information, such as name or mailing address (at least the LA site had a phone and press releaseses with his name and phone number on them). The "About Us" page has the usual lack of any real information and the "Contact Us" is a form. His portfolio pages are all blank, with one mention of a downloadable file, presumably the same one he used before. The domain contact information is masked.

As the number of (alleged) victims tracking him grows, people are calling in his Craigslist ads, some of which may be posted here. Also, special thanks to the commenters here for sharing their experiences on various articles.

NOTE: For serving papers, we encourage anyone out there to obtain a working mailing address for him under any of his company names.

William Franklin Launches Retaliatory Libel

2010-10-20T18:02:00.000-07:00

Across the web, William Franklin is posting copies of his defamation blog "kenhostfraud.com" (on his HostGator server) on various consumer complaint sites, anonymously claiming he was a company scammed by Kentropolis, Ken Stuczynski's company. The title of these rantings are "Kentropolis.Com is a Scam".

Also, the corporate phone number was listed on "Who Called Us" as someone trying to sell a website at 5am, even though the number in question is a forwarder and would not appear as that number on caller ID.

Apparently we struck a nerve with our latest report here. On a positive note, the more time he devotes to defaming us, the less time he can rip off other people ...

LA Design & Coding?

2010-10-15T18:50:00.000-07:00

Using the address "12228 Venice Blvd, Suite 102 / Los Angeles, CA 90066", William is taking on projects under this new name. The usual MO of no real idenitifying information can be found at http://ladesignandcoding.com/.

Recently he has been hounded by police in the Cincinnati area over cell phone repair scamming(suddenly moved and was lost again), but it is unclear if Los Angeles is another fake business location like Seattle Outsource, or if California associate Freddie Avila is in the mix. If anyone has information to confirm his whereabouts, please let us know and we will forward it to the authorities and alleged victims.

According to the most recent complaint sent to us, he no longer uses PayPal, and his Green Dot account may be cancelled or suspended as of today. The alleged victim cancelled the transaction and is awaiting refund.

Phone Repair Scamming Reports Flood In

2010-08-03T07:46:00.000-07:00

Newport, KY: According to alleged victims, he's using the same old "business" plan, different market.

William "Liam" Franklin is using Craigslist to sell phone repair services, such as for iPhone. Some report having to go to the police weeks or months later to get their phones back, unrepaired, with or without hope of getting their deposits back.

On the flip side, he has been allegedly hiring lists of drivers (he does not drive) to pick up cell phones from people, then firing them (or stringing them along until they quit) before getting paid. It's the exact same story as five years of complaints from web designers doing work for his "clients", only to not be paid, and the consumer often not having their finished product and losing a deposit -- with the started (unpaid) work being used as "proof" for any civil court to justify keeping the deposits for himself.

One of the victims found his address from a driver, only to find the apartment freshly abandoned. They have in turn found other victims who are all now looking for him and other victims, hoping the police will take more firm action. In an email from William's kin,

Hes been doing shit like this for over 15 years almost, and he will not
stop because its under 1000 dollars.

From other sources regarding his methods, this is apparently so he can stay below the radar of criminal law, keeping it a "civil" matter. But collectively, it is unknown how much money we're talking about since the complaints started in January.

Cincinnati Phone Repairs?

2010-06-21T14:46:00.000-07:00

This has got to be him:
http://cincyphonerepairs.com/
513-488-1325
It's even on the same server as his other sites, though he masked his contact info on the domain.

But really -- "Copyright 1996-2010"? There is no record of this company's existence outside of Craigslist, and no human or physical address information about the company -- typical of all his dozens of "company" web sites over the years. Let's see how long until the phone number changes and the site is down ... tick, tock, tick, tock.

2010-02-02T10:35:00.000-08:00

NOTE: William has retained the services of the law firm of Maguire & Schneider, LLP to send out several Cease & Desist letters to sites carrying content he does not like.

We strongly recommend that if you feel you have a case against him that you have your lawyer contact them, Their information is as follows:

Maguire & Schneider, LLP c/o D. Timothy Hughes
250 Civic Center Drive, Ste 500
Columbus, OH 43215

But be sure to file a report with the federal government (link to the right)!

Research Links

2010-01-25T18:00:00.000-08:00

Our previous consumer warning site has been made unavailable to avoid legal harassment. However, we are still accepting information concerning the "business" activities of William Franklin / Andy Stephens at master@kentropolis.com for our files. As we become aware of others posting information, we will link to it here for your convenience.

If you believe you are a victim of William Franklin or Andy Stephens under any number of business names, be sure to include both names, all contact and other identifying information when you file a report with the Internet Complaint hot-line, the joint effort by the FCC and the FBI to investigate such individuals. Once a certain threshold of monetary loss is reached, they will take action. The exact amount necessary (and the total amount already registered with them) is unknown at this time.

You are also strongly recommended to go to http://www.ripoffreports.com/ and http://www.complaints.com/ and post your experience there. Once you do so, send us a link to your report and we will link to it here. We make no claims of accuracy of the information on these other sites, and by clicking them, you assume all responsibility in the use of said information.

Rip Off Reports

While we have encouraged others to mirror our previously available information, we have no control over what others do with that content. The original site associated with this domain was launched by Mr. Hubbard and was the only one maintained by Mr. Stuczynski, taken over a couple years later. Other sites by alleged victims:

http://www.williamfranklin-fraud.com/
http://www.williamfranklinfraud.info/
http://www.william-franklinscam.com/

Forums (See, it's not just a couple of us!)

Huge Web Hosting Scam - WNY Servers, William Franklin http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?p=2701831
Huge Web Hosting Scam - WNY Servers, William Franklin http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=349694
William Franklin @ it again! Scamming Developers out of Thousands sinc '04 http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=616300
Freelance Scam Update http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=627734
Myhostingdeals.com - A Little Sleazy http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=333050
GLOBAL INFUSION SCAM - Freddie Avila http://www.scam.com/showthread.php?p=833305
Huge Web Hosting Scam - WNY Servers, William Franklin http://www.hosthideout.com/showthread.php?t=15872
A con man, scam artist, criminal! BEWARE! http://web.archive.org/web/20070506110736/www.talkaboutsoftware.com/group/microsoft.public.webhost.windows/messages/470.html
Huge Web Hosting Scam - WNY Servers, William Franklin http://web.archive.org/web/20051015035157/www.idigforums.com/archives/2004/12/03/
A con man, scam artist, criminal! BEWARE! http://groups.google.com/group/alt.design.product/browse_frm/thread/b1fdd9fbeb5f530a/f4e626b2106017ac?q=%22william+franklin%22+fraud#f4e626b2106017ac
"scam alert" http://siteownersforums.com/archive/index.php/t-12170.html
Huge Web Hosting Scam - William Franklin, WNY Server http://groups.google.com/group/alt.internet.providers.america/browse_frm/thread/528806ac8f2e4eb6/fcf8b87681d58dc0?q=%22william+franklin%22+scam#fcf8b87681d58dc0
Beware William Franklin Scam http://groups.google.com/group/clientcentersnetwork/browse_frm/thread/e79f4c3f15f1a389/9161507d40c1bb06?q=%22william+franklin%22+scam#9161507d40c1bb06