Dawn Olivares, operations officer at Zeek Rewards, pled guilty today to two counts of criminal charges for her involvement with the ponzi scheme. The SEC broke the story this morning in an article titled "SEC Charges Woman and Stepson for Involvement in ZeekRewards Ponzi and Pyramid Scheme." The copy of Dawn's guilty plea is signed below (hat tip to Don Ryan over at ASD Updates for finding the document). She pled guilty to both counts levied against her: Count 1 = Securities and Wire Fraud. Count II = Conspiracy to Defraud the IRS. Both counts carry a maximum penalty of 5 years imprisonment. The charges were filed and a plea was entered the same day, which tells me this was all negotiated between Olivares and the federal authorities. We'll see what kind of penalty shakes out of this. See below for an excerpt from the SEC's press release:

The SEC alleges that Dawn Wright-Olivares and Daniel Olivares, who each now live in Arkansas, provided operational support, marketing, and computer expertise to sustain ZeekRewards.com, which offered and sold securities in the form of “premium subscriptions” and “VIP bids” for penny auctions. While the website conveyed the impression that the significant payouts to investors meant the company was extremely profitable, the payouts actually bore no relation to the company’s net profits. Approximately 98 percent of total revenues for ZeekRewards – and correspondingly the share of purported net profits paid to investors – were comprised of funds received from new investors rather than legitimate retail sales.

If you're reading this via email, click here to download a copy of the guilty plea.