WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) — Cancer Fund of America Inc. (CFA), Cancer Support Services Inc. (CSS) and their leader, James Reynolds Sr., agreed to settle charges CFA and CSS alleged to help cancer patients yet actually used donation funds on their families and friends.
The two nationwide organizations will be dissolved. James Reynolds Sr. will be banned from any charity fundraising, or profiting off of any charity efforts.
“The Federal Trade Commission and our state enforcement partners have ended a pernicious charity fraud that syphoned hundreds of millions of dollars away from well-meaning consumers, legitimate charities and people with cancer who needed the services the defendants falsely promised,” said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “Today’s settlement, along with those announced earlier, shut down the sham charities once and for all and banned the individual perpetrators for life.”
Additional defendants in the case include CFA’s and CSS’s chief financial officer and CSS’ former president, Kyle Effler, Children’s Cancer Fund of America Inc. (CCFOA) and its president and executive director, Rose Perkins, The Breast Cancer Society Inc. (BCS) and its executive director and former president, James Reynolds II.
Effler, Perkins and Reynolds also will be banned from fundraising and charity management due to the judgment.
“Our office is proud to have shut down these individuals who stole donations meant to benefit people suffering from cancer and used those funds to live luxurious lifestyles and for their own personal gain,” said New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas. “Together, the FTC and charity regulators from every state in the country have made it clear we will not sit idly while scammers defraud consumers and deprive legitimate charities of much needed support.”