{"id":459,"date":"2014-11-07T15:48:47","date_gmt":"2014-11-07T15:48:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.golfballs.com\/?p=459"},"modified":"2024-02-19T15:17:43","modified_gmt":"2024-02-19T21:17:43","slug":"dustin-johnson-scammed-out-of-3-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/blog\/dustin-johnson-scammed-out-of-3-million\/","title":{"rendered":"Dustin Johnson: Scammed Out of $3 million?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dustin<\/a>

Dustin Johnson, image: weiunderpar.com<\/p><\/div>\n

It\u2019s a pretty safe bet to assume that Dustin Johnson and Nathan Hardwick won\u2019t be hanging around and hitting golf balls<\/a> any time soon.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because Hardwick \u2013 Johnson\u2019s former friend and adviser \u2013 is being accused of stealing $3 million of Johnson\u2019s hard-earned money according to a lawsuit filed in federal court in Atlanta on October 28th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s longtime buddy isn’t the only person being implicated in the alleged extortion scheme, either.\u00a0 The lawsuit accuses the Morris Firm, consisting of Mark and Gerard Wittstadt, along with former managing partner Hardwick who is no longer with the organization, of embezzling Johnson\u2019s money to cover account losses within the firm that were caused by Nathan Hardwick.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit details a relationship of trust between Johnson\u2019s longtime advisor and counselor Hardwick, and the financial investments that Johnson was talked into making with the firm, along with the Wittstadt brothers.\u00a0 According to court papers, Hardwick was the primary actor in the extortion scheme, convincing Johnson to put up his money for an investment that was too good to be true.<\/p>\n

Of course, the initial filing is just the beginning, as the Wittstadt brothers have promptly filed court papers of their own in an attempt to tell their side of the story.<\/p>\n

So was Dustin Johnson really coerced out of $3 million?<\/p>\n

A Timeless Tale<\/strong><\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s story is one that tends to coincide with success, wealth and fame quite often:\u00a0 As long as successful people have money, a \u201cfriend\u201d will always be close by to help them spend it.<\/p>\n

Hardwick, who was once listed as Johnson\u2019s \u201cattorney\/counselor\u201d on his website (it seems that the Alliance of Financial Professionals have taken his place) is being accused of talking Johnson out of a seven-figure sum, convincing his longtime friend to invest $3 million with his firm in exchange for a $1 million return.\u00a0 The full amount, $4 million, was to be paid back over the course of 30 months.<\/p>\n

The problem was that, according to the suit, Hardwick never had any intentions of investing the money for Johnson, instead using the funds to \u201ccover up the fact that they and the firm had misappropriated and mismanaged client assets.\u201d<\/p>\n

The suit also accuses Mark and Gerard Willstadt \u2013 who supposedly guaranteed the security of the investment \u2013 of conspiring with Hardwick in the scheme, as well as threatening to disclose private information about Johnson once he requested the repayment of his money.\u00a0 Johnson decided to sue after failing to receive the promised monthly payments in both September and October of this year.<\/p>\n

Of course, the brothers Willstadt aren’t staying silent regarding the situation, and have since filed court papers of their own in retaliation to what the lawyers have described as Johnson\u2019s \u201cshotgun filing,\u201d which allegedly was intended to cover any party that may or may not be responsible for his losses, with complete disregard for what could actually be proven.<\/p>\n

According to the Willstadts, they are just as pained by Nathan Hardwick\u2019s actions as Johnson is.\u00a0 The court papers cite Johnson\u2019s grievances with Hardwick while recognizing the fact that Johnson put all of his faith in the word of a man that misappropriated his funds without first seeking the counsel of the firm.\u00a0 The court papers go on to say that, \u201cEverything else asserted by Johnson consists either of patently false and irrelevant \u2018facts,\u2019 or completely unsupported, inactionable, conclusory statements.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pointing Fingers<\/strong><\/p>\n

So who is really to blame for Dustin Johnson\u2019s $3 million loss?\u00a0 It would have been too simple to think that Johnson\u2019s initial court filing was actually going to be the conclusive action in this story of friendly financial counseling gone wrong.\u00a0 It\u2019s something that happens all too often when wealthy individuals rely on trusted advisers and friends to handle large portions of their finances for them.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, as is the case in many of these situations, the money in question is rarely recovered.\u00a0 Let\u2019s hope that Dustin Johnson won\u2019t be forced to sell his TaylorMade clubs<\/a> any time soon and has a little stashed away in a secure location\u2014far from any \u201ctrusted advisers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s a pretty safe bet to assume that Dustin Johnson and Nathan Hardwick won\u2019t be hanging around and hitting golf balls any time soon. That\u2019s because Hardwick \u2013 Johnson\u2019s former friend and adviser \u2013...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2978,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,4],"tags":[66,115],"class_list":["post-459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-golf","category-news","tag-dustin-johnson","tag-nathan-hardwick"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=459"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":462,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/459\/revisions\/462"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}