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The Caffeine Awareness Association’s Community Service ScamBy Dr. Lori Gore-Green
In a recent article by the Oneida Daily Dispatch, New York a New York City group
admits to a community service scam. The group’s intention
was to make serving community service as easy as
taking an online quiz.
An anti-caffeine activist pleaded guilty to the scheme this past
Thursday. According to the Manhattan District Attorney
Cyrus R. Vance Jr. “a community service sentence is a public and
personal responsibility.”
Marina Kushner and the group that she founded, The Caffeine Awareness Association, pleaded guilty to a false-filing felony. Due to her sentencing she will have to complete 300 hours of actual
community service.
Kushner was recently arrested in Florida after officials became
suspicious after a local defendant filed a letter from Kushner’s group. They were also equally as suspicious at
the website linked to the group about “fast community
service.”
Before Kushner created her scam group, she had written anti-
caffeine e-books and her group’s website supported her messages. While the public is made aware
by the Food and Drug Administration about the harmful
effects of too much caffeine, Kushner took it to a whole other
level.
Soon after the trial, the groups website page was taken down
“due to technical difficulties.” As a part of the scam, the group
offered community service letters certifying completion and
would charge based on the number of hours needed for
completion.
All the customers had to do was take an online quiz, but were not
obligated to pass it. The questions on the quiz were based on the anti-caffeine e-books that Kushner wrote and would sell on
the website. Over the several years that the group was active,
the group received over $200,000.
As one could imagine, this “community service” raised suspicions in Portland and
Washington state where the group was headquartered.
It wasn’t until a 2013 case where a judge stated that the anti-
caffeine group community service was a “scam” and that it would
not pass as legitimate community service. New York prosecutors are
now on the lookout for group activity that is similar to the anti-
caffeine group.