WSJ Report Highlights Scams On Brokered Ethnic Stations

Reports On Ethnic Radio Scams

The growing problem of radio scams targeting immigrants gets the front-page treatment from the WALL STREET JOURNAL, which reports on how brokered Ethnic stations lease time to scammers running "Ponzi" schemes and other frauds while the stations look the other way. 

The JOURNAL's JENNIFER LEVITZ reports that many brokered-station managers and owners do not monitor the shows and sometimes can't speak the languages in which the programs air, and that some time blocks are sublet and that stations give minimal or no screening of the lessees or sublessees. 

One example highlighted in the article is a Creole program on ENTRAVISION brokered WLQY-A/HOLLYWOOD-MIAMI, FL that was thought by the station to be a "musical-variety show," but was instead an investment scheme that cost investors almost $6 million. Other examples in the story include a show on DAVIDSON MEDIA GROUP Spanish KCZZ-A/KANSAS CITY hosted by a woman offering legal assistance to immigrants who turned out to be an illegal immigrant herself, and cases of a man passing himself off as an immgration lawyer on shows aired on then-RADIO UNICA Spanish/Brokered Ethnic WWRU-A and MULTICULTURAL Brokered Ethnic WPAT-A/NEW YORK.

Read the JOURNAL piece by clicking here (registration required).

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