SEC v. U. S. Sustainable Energy Corp Et Al Doc 102 Filed 15 Oct 12

Case 5:08-cv-00245-DCB-JMR Document 102
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0001 1 2 3 SEC 4 VS. 5
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF MISSISSIPPI WESTERN DIVISION * *
6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 0002 1 A P P E A R A N C E S: 2 3 FOR THE PLAINTIFF: Mr. Alex Rue 4 United States Securities and Exchange Commission 5 3475 Lenox Road, N.E., Suite 500 Atlanta, Georgia 30326 6 404.842.7616 ruea@sec.gov 7 FOR JOHN AND ALICE RIVERA: 8 Mr. Clarence McDonald Leland Attorney at Law 9 200-A Town Square
* CASE NO. 5:08-CV-00245 DC * U.S. SUSTAINABLE ENERGY * CORP, ET AL * *************************************************** ORAL AND VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION OF JOHN RIVERA VOLUME 1 AUGUST 23, 2010 *************************************************** ORAL AND VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION of JOHN RIVERA, produced as a witness at the instance of the Plaintiff, and duly sworn, was taken in the above-styled and numbered cause on August 23, 2010, from 10:18 a.m. to 3:15 p.m., before Carol Jenkins, CSR, RPR, CRR, in and for the State of Texas, reported by machine shorthand, at the offices of Merrill Legal Solutions, 315 Capitol Street, Suite 210, Houston, Texas 77002, pursuant to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
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12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 0003 1 INDEX 2 PAGE 3 Appearances 02 4 Stipulations 01 5 JOHN RIVERA 6 Examination by Mr. Rue 05 7 Signature and Changes 150 8 Reporter's Certificate 153 9 10 EXHIBITS 11 12 NO. DESCRIPTION PAGE 13 Exhibit 108 78 Board of Directors Consent to Action Without Meeting 14 Exhibit 109 126 15 Previous Exhibit 58, Consulting Agreement 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
Brandon, Mississippi 39043 601.825.7978 ALSO PRESENT: The Videographer, Mr. Bill Marsh Ms. Alice Rivera
0004 1 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: All right. Going on 2 the record. Today's date is August 23rd, 2010. The 3 time on the monitor is 10:18 a.m. 4 This marks the beginning of videotape 5 No. 1 in the deposition of John Rivera in the matter of 6 Securities and Exchange Commission versus U.S. 7 Sustainable Energy Corp., John H. Rivera and Alice M. 8 Price, Case No. 5:08-CV-00245 in the United States 9 District Court, Southern District of Mississippi, 10 Western Division. 11 This deposition is taking place at 315 12 Capitol Street in Houston, Texas. The videographer 13 today is Bill Marsh of Merrill Legal Solutions located 14 at 315 Capitol Street. The court reporter today is 15 Carol Jenkins of Merrill Legal Solutions. 16 Counsel, would you please voice identify 17 yourself and state whom you represent. 18 MR. RUE: My name is Alex Rue. I'm here 19 on behalf of the Securities and Exchange Commission. 20 MR. LELAND: Don Leland here on behalf of 21 John Rivera and Alice Price, now Rivera. 22 THE WITNESS: I'd be more than glad to 23 take any oath, okay, as long as Mr. Rue affirms that he 24 will abide by the office of government ethics, 25 Securities and Exchange Commission rules, 5 CFR, part 0005 1 4401 and 17, part 200. 2 MR. RUE: Mr. Rivera, I am not going to 3 make that commitment to you. I am a lawyer licensed in 4 the state of Georgia. 5 THE WITNESS: You're not going to affirm 6 to abide by the Code of Ethics for the United States 7 Securities and Exchange Commission? 8 MR. RUE: Mr. Rivera, I'm going to obey 9 all ethical rules that I'm required to obey. 10 THE WITNESS: Thank you. That's all I 11 asked. 12 MR. RUE: All right. 13 THE WITNESS: I'll be more than glad to 14 make my oath now. 15 JOHN RIVERA, 16 having been first duly sworn, testified as follows: 17 EXAMINATION 18 BY MR. RUE: 19 Q. I guess I had better put on the microphone.
20 A. Yeah. We're already accused of see no evil, 21 hear no evil, speak no evil by the State Senate. 22 Q. What's the date of your birth, sir? 23 A. 5/13/49. 24 Q. As you know, Mr. Rivera, I represent the 25 Commission. I'm going to ask you some questions today. 0006 1 You've probably heard all this before. 2 A. I'm sorry, sir, I cannot hear you properly. 3 Q. I'm sorry. I'm going to ask you some questions 4 today. As you know, the court reporter can't take down 5 nods of your head and cannot distinguish between uh-huh 6 and huh-uh. So you'll understand -7 A. I will be quite distinct in everything I say, 8 and it will be perfectly understoodable and heard. 9 Q. Good. Now, if you don't understand my 10 question, please stop me. I'm sure you will. 11 A. Absolutely. 12 Q. And I'll try to rephrase it. 13 Okay. Where were you born? 14 A. In Miami, Florida when it was still a part of 15 the United States. 16 Q. All righty. Are you a United States citizen? 17 A. When I was born in Miami, it was a part of the 18 United States. Therefore, I conclude my birthright as 19 being an American citizen. 20 Q. Good. Where do you reside? 21 A. In Baytown, Texas. 22 Q. And how long have you lived in Baytown? 23 A. Approximately two years. Maybe more. 24 Q. When did you move there? 25 A. I don't remember. And prior to six weeks ago, 0007 1 when I realized that I had been poisoned for the last 2 eight years, I have no recollection, no short-term 3 memory, hell, I don't have long-term memory because of 4 the drugs that I've been taking. And I'm not trying to 5 avoid the question as to when I moved there, but I have 6 no firsthand information to that effect. 7 Q. All right, sir. Let's talk about what drugs 8 are you taking today? 9 A. Today I'm taking Lipitor -- oh, excuse me. No. 10 Please. Lipitor is the main culprit of the poisoning 11 that I've had. I said Lipitor because it is so 12 engrained into my mind of the eight years of suffering 13 and chronic pain that it was a Freudian slip. I beg
14 your forgiveness. It was not done on purpose. 15 Q. All right. What are you taking today? 16 A. I do not have the entire list with me, but I'd 17 be more than glad to send you all the prescriptions of 18 everything I'm taking today. 19 I am not taking Lipitor. I am not taking 20 Pro -21 THE WITNESS: Provigil, is it? 22 A. I am not taking Provigil, and I am not taking 23 two Vicodin twice a day. 24 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Are you under today the influence 25 of any drugs that would impact your memory? 0008 1 A. Not knowing all the side effects of the 2 individual drugs or the culmination of all the drugs 3 combined together, I cannot truthfully say yes or no 4 until all those drugs individually and combined can be 5 analyzed so that I can have an informed opinion. 6 Q. Do you -7 A. But to my limited knowledge, as of this date, I 8 do not believe so. 9 Q. You believe you're of sound mind and body 10 today? 11 A. I believe I am of sound mind, and I believe 12 that I am becoming of sound body through exercise, diet 13 and the deletion of the poisoning drugs that I have been 14 taking for the last eight years. 15 Q. When did you discover that you were being 16 impacted adversely by this combination of drugs you were 17 taking over a long period of time? 18 A. Six weeks ago when I was making arrangements 19 for my dad, because I was going from having to walk with 20 a cane to a walker, and taking two Vicodin twice a day 21 was not even taking the edge off the chronic pain I was 22 in. My wife knew exactly what -- what was happening and 23 started her own investigation as to everything I was 24 taking. 25 And with the aid of the Internet and 0009 1 Walgreen Drugs, we discovered that the Lipitor, all the 2 side effects that I was having of the chronic pain, of 3 the pain going all the way down my right side, to my 4 lack of balance, to the shooting pains as being stabbed 5 with a knife over and over again, with the sensation of 6 my veins and foot and thigh and ankle exploding were 7 side effects of the Lipitor.
8 And I immediately stopped taking the 9 Lipitor totally. And the next day -- the next day I was 10 pain free. I have not taken a Lipitor, Provigil or the 11 Vicodin for six weeks. 12 Now, as you know, Vicodin is a painkiller 13 and does limit one's mental capacity as per the warning 14 on the labels of the medication. I do not operate or 15 use heavy equipment or drive. 16 Q. Is it fair to say, Mr. Rivera, that 17 notwithstanding the medication you were taking before 18 your recent discovery, that you were able to conduct 19 your business? 20 A. I'm sorry. I either did not hear the entire 21 question or I did not understand it. Would you kindly 22 repeat it? 23 Q. Yeah, sure. Before you made this discovery 24 that has brought you back to health, while you were 25 taking this medication for some period of time before 0010 1 that. 2 A. Eight years. 3 Q. Eight years. You were able to conduct your 4 business? 5 A. Eight years ago, I was. 6 Q. Five -7 A. And -8 Q. Five years ago? 9 A. No, I wasn't. And to correct your statement, 10 sir, I did not testify that I made this discovery. I 11 testified that Mrs. Rivera made the discovery, and I 12 abided by it. 13 Q. But for the last eight years, you've been able 14 to conduct your business, haven't you? 15 A. Again, we apparently have problems with the 16 English language because I said for the past eight 17 years, I have not been at full mental capacity. I was 18 at less than 10 percent mental capacity. Therefore, I 19 could not properly conduct my business, okay, in a 20 businesslike manner that I have demonstrated prior to me 21 having a massive stroke in Thanksgiving 2003. I was not 22 supposed to be able to walk, talk, move on my own. I 23 was totally incoherent. I was told -24 MR. RUE: I move to strike this question 25 on the basis that it's not -- this -- this -- on the 0011 1 basis that it's not responsive to my question.
2 A. Excuse me. What part of it is not responsive, 3 sir? 4 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Well, you've answered my 5 question, Mr. Rivera. 6 A. Oh, okay. 7 Q. Let's move on. 8 A. I thought -9 Q. Where did you live before you moved to Baytown, 10 Texas? 11 A. Natchez, Mississippi. 12 Q. And where did you reside prior to living in 13 Natchez? 14 A. Port Gibson, Mississippi. 15 Q. Where did you live before Port Gibson? 16 A. In Florida. 17 Q. Where in Florida? 18 A. West Palm Beach, Hialeah. I remember Hialeah 19 because that's where I was born. Various places in 20 Florida. 21 Q. Do you presently own or have an interest in a 22 residence in Florida? 23 A. I did until it was repossessed because I was 24 unable to pay the mortgage as a result of this suit. 25 Q. Thank you. 0012 1 Where was that property located? 2 A. West Palm Beach. 3 Q. All right. Did you share ownership of it with 4 anyone else? 5 A. No. 6 Q. All right. Are you currently married? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. When did you get married? 9 A. Friday the 13th. 10 MR. LELAND: You better know that answer. 11 Q. (By Mr. Rue) The Friday the 13th of what year, 12 sir? 13 A. Last Friday the 13th. 14 Q. That was the Friday before we were here last 15 Monday? 16 A. Last Monday? 17 Q. Last Monday was the 16th. So you were married 18 the Friday before that? 19 A. We were married by the church the Friday before 20 that. 21 Would you repeat the question because I'm
22 now beginning to misunderstand what question I was 23 answering. 24 THE WITNESS: Would you be so kind as to 25 repeat his original question? 0013 1 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Sure. I just asked you when you 2 were married, and you told me that you were married on 3 Friday the 13th. 4 A. I would like to revise that statement. 5 Q. Certainly. 6 A. I was married by the church under God Friday 7 the 13th, Monday before. I was married via common law 8 in the state of Texas two years ago. 9 Q. Okay. Have you been married before? 10 A. Yes, sir. 11 Q. And how many times? 12 A. Twice. 13 Q. All right. When did you get married first? 14 A. When I was 16. 15 Q. Who did you marry? 16 A. Neida Luz Perez. 17 Q. Will you spell that for the court reporter, 18 please? 19 A. N-e-i-d-a, new word, L-u-z, new word, 20 P-e-r-e-z. 21 Q. Thank you. 22 Do you have any children by that marriage? 23 A. I do. 24 Q. What are their names and ages? 25 A. I have a child, a son. His name is John 0014 1 Francis Rivera. 2 Q. Where does -3 A. Excuse me, John Francisco Rivera. 4 Q. Where does he reside? 5 A. In Puerto Rico. 6 Q. All right. How long has he lived there? 7 A. Basically all his life. 8 Q. Okay. And when did you get divorced from your 9 first wife, approximately? 10 A. Approximately when I was 18. 11 Q. All right. Did you subsequently remarry? 12 A. I did. 13 Q. When was that? 14 A. I was divorced in 2004, and we were separated 15 like 20 -- approximately 20 years prior to that. I
16 never planned on getting married again. 17 Q. What was her name? 18 A. Doris Faye Caywood Harrison. 19 Q. The middle name -- the second name was what? I 20 misunderstood you. 21 A. Doris Faye Caywood Harrison. 22 Q. Okay. I can spell Harrison, I think. How do 23 you spell Vay? 24 A. Faye. 25 Q. Faye, okay. 0015 1 A. Yes, F-a-y-e. 2 Q. And Caywood? 3 A. C-a-y-w-o-o-d. 4 Q. Do you have children by her? 5 A. No. 6 Q. All right. Other than John Francisco Rivera, 7 do you have any other children? 8 A. No. 9 Q. Who is Marilyn Maddow (phonetic)? 10 A. Marilyn Maddow (phonetic) was a girlfriend. 11 Q. Okay. Does she now call herself Marilyn 12 Cherinsky? 13 A. I believe so. 14 Q. All right. And how long was she your 15 girlfriend or for what period was she your girlfriend? 16 A. Six, seven years. 17 Q. Until what year? 18 A. I have no firsthand recollection of that fact. 19 Q. Okay. Did -- when did you move to Port Gibson, 20 approximately? 21 A. Again, I have no firsthand knowledge as to 22 times and things of that nature. I have no firsthand 23 knowledge of that fact. 24 Q. How long have you lived with formerly Ms. 25 Price, now Mrs. Rivera? 0016 1 A. You're trying to get me in trouble. 2 Q. No, sir, I'm not. I'm not trying to get you in 3 trouble. 4 A. I'm probably wrong, but approximately nine 5 years, but it feels like yesterday. That should get me 6 off the hook. 7 Q. It sure should. 8 Did you -- did you live with her while you 9 still resided in Florida?
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10 A. Excuse me? 11 Q. Did you live with Mrs. Rivera while you still 12 resided in Florida? 13 A. No. But she was in -- she lived in Florida, I 14 lived in Mississippi. 15 Q. All right. So when did she come to live with 16 you in Mississippi? 17 A. Excuse me? 18 Q. When did she come to live with you in 19 Mississippi? 20 A. I have no firsthand knowledge as to dates. 21 Q. Were you living in Port Gibson at the time? 22 Strike that. 23 Were you staying in Port Gibson at the 24 time? 25 A. I wasn't dead in Port Gibson. 0017 1 Q. Okay. 2 A. Yes, I was alive with heartbeat and pulse in 3 Port Gibson. 4 Q. Okay. When Ms. Price came to live with you? 5 A. Excuse me? 6 Q. When Ms. Price came to live with you? 7 A. When Ms. Price came to live in the same home as 8 a caretaker. 9 Q. Okay. Does your son have any children? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. And their names and ages, please? 12 A. I am embarrassed to say that I cannot remember 13 all their names. One is Francisco Rivera. Another one 14 is Natalia Rivera. And I know he has three more, but I 15 cannot remember their names; and I should be ashamed of 16 that. 17 Q. I noticed last week that you had sent some 18 money to Natalia. Have you sent money to others of your 19 grandchildren? 20 A. I am sure that I have sent money to their 21 father for Christmas gifts, birthday presents, things 22 that a father would normally do for their grandchildren. 23 Q. Thank you. 24 Have any of your children -- has your son 25 or any of your grandchildren ever worked for you in any 0018 1 capacity? 2 A. My son worked for me for a time. 3 Q. How long ago, approximately?
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4 A. It was recent, but later than six weeks ago. 5 When he started or when he left, I have no firsthand 6 recollection. 7 Q. I'm not sure I understand your answer. 8 Did your son work for you as reason -- as 9 recently as six weeks ago? 10 A. No. 11 Q. Okay. He worked for you sometime before that? 12 A. Correct. 13 Q. And you can't remember when that was? 14 A. That is also correct. 15 Q. Did he work for you in Natchez, Mississippi? 16 A. I have no firsthand recollection of that fact. 17 Therefore, anything I say would be hearsay and don't 18 know. 19 Q. So your answer to that question is I don't 20 remember? 21 A. No, sir. The answer to that question is I do 22 not have any firsthand knowledge or recollection of that 23 fact. 24 Q. Okay. Did he work for you in Port Gibson? 25 A. Mr. Rue, if I have no firsthand knowledge or 0019 1 recollection whether he worked for me in Natchez, I 2 certainly would not have any recollection or knowledge 3 of him being in Port Gibson. 4 Q. Thank you. 5 A. Now. 6 Q. What does your son, John Rivera, do for a 7 living now, if you know? 8 A. I have no firsthand knowledge as to how he is 9 employed, if he is employed or what he is currently 10 doing. 11 Q. All right. 12 A. See, I just got you a trip to Puerto Rico. 13 Q. No, you didn't. I don't care enough to go to 14 Puerto Rico. 15 A. So why ask the question? 16 Q. All right. Can you summarize -- well, let's 17 talk about your education first. What was the highest 18 level of education that you -19 A. 9th grade. 20 Q. Where was 9th grade? 21 A. Hialeah High. 22 Q. All right. 23 A. And I have firsthand recollection of that
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24 because it was a very good time in my life. I was on 25 the football team and enjoyed myself immensely. 0020 1 Q. Why didn't you go back for the 10th grade 2 thereafter? 3 A. I was bored. 4 Q. What did you do in lieu of going to high 5 school? 6 A. I went to work and did quite well. 7 Q. Other than your education through the 9th 8 grade, have you had any other formal education since 9 that time? 10 A. Mr. Rue, I would be more than glad to answer 11 that question to the best of my ability if you would be 12 so kind as to give me your definition of formal. 13 Q. Anything that occurred in the classroom -- in a 14 classroom setting. 15 A. No. 16 Q. That could be in a -- it could be in a hotel. 17 It could be a seminar. It could be -18 A. There's a vast difference between a classroom 19 setting, a seminar and a hotel room where one is 20 delineating formal education. 21 Q. Well, Mr. Rivera, I -- you know, were you in a 22 class whether it took place in a hotel room, a school 23 building or anywhere else? 24 A. In a class where I learned something? 25 Q. Yes. 0021 1 A. Mr. Rue, I could answer that in so many ways 2 which I'm sure you would not want me to. But as far as 3 me sitting in a classroom environment with a 4 professional -- professional teacher or educator 5 licensed in that fact, no. 6 Q. All right. You said after you finished the 9th 7 grade, that you did -- that you went to work and did 8 quite well. 9 Can you summarize for me your employment 10 since then? 11 A. Since you insist on going through my childhood, 12 which is absolutely nongermane to this subject, -13 Q. Well, then, strike that. 14 A. -- then I feel that I must delineate why I quit 15 school in the 9th grade. 16 Q. Please. 17 A. Okay. I came home from karate. My wife -- my
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18 wife... My mother who was in an automobile accident in 19 a body cast was on the floor bleeding with my father 20 kicking her in the head and the body cast. And I pulled 21 him off of her defending my mother, at which time he 22 tried to rupture me. My training took over. I broke 23 both his arms, six ribs and both legs. And I walked out 24 of the house and never came back. 25 When she recovered, she was foolish enough 0022 1 to go back with him until the next time he beat her in a 2 drunken rage, and somebody else took care of the 3 problem. 4 So I was forced by circumstances to leave 5 my home because of a abusive drunken father. I 6 distanced myself by many states so that I would not do 7 something that I would regret in later life. 8 Q. Let me ask you another couple of questions 9 here. 10 A. Yes, sir. 11 Q. Do you have any brothers and sisters? 12 A. Yes, sir, I do. 13 Q. What are their names and where do they live? 14 A. One is called Richard. Okay. He is -- the 15 last time I knew of him, he was in New York. And what 16 does he do? He is an atheist. Anything other than that 17 is totally immaterial to me, because God is first and 18 foremost in my life. 19 Q. And his name is Richard Rivera? 20 A. Oh, excuse me, Michael Rivera is the atheist. 21 Q. Okay. And Michael Rivera is the one that lives 22 in New York? 23 A. As of approximately 20-plus years ago, which 24 that's the last contact I've had, -25 Q. All right. 0023 1 A. -- he lived in New York. 2 Q. Is he younger or older than you? 3 A. I am the eldest of the three. 4 Q. Okay. And so there's you, Michael and Richard? 5 A. Richard Rivera. 6 Q. And where does Richard live? 7 A. When I had a stern physical contact with him, 8 causing a few bruises here and there, for him stealing 9 my grandmother's checking account, maxing out his -- her 10 credit cards, all of which I supported and I gave her, 11 okay, and basically told him that it was in his best
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12 interest never to step foot in Florida or within ten 13 miles of my grandmother again, he moved to San 14 Francisco. 15 Q. And when did you last have any contact with 16 him? 17 A. The faggot e-mailed me about 15 years ago 18 telling me that he needed money because he had AIDS. 19 And I responded you walked the walk, you've got to pay 20 the price. I hope he rots in hell. 21 Q. And no other siblings? 22 A. No. 23 Q. All right. 24 A. If he's still alive in San Francisco, I guess 25 he's a happy guy because they have same sex marriages 0024 1 there. 2 Q. Not yet. 3 Cyber Care, tell me what Cyber Care is or 4 was. 5 A. Cyber Care, the direct vivid memory of Cyber 6 Care was a public company used by John Stanton to 7 continue his fraud and his career of ripping off 8 stockholders in public companies. 9 Q. What role did you play with Cyber Care? 10 A. John Stanton, who was a investor several times 11 with me in various of my companies before I was a public 12 company, was inducing me to put my technology into Cyber 13 Care. And since he was contributing large sums of money 14 to assist me in bringing my technology to fruition, I 15 agreed in principle to putting my technology into the 16 Cyber Care shell until I found out that it was another 17 one of his scams and that the shell was in bankruptcy. 18 Q. Before we go on with that, I guess, I better 19 quiz you a little about your employment for the last 20 20 or 25 years. You know, I -- I've heard some mention of 21 a Sheik? 22 A. Sir, it's a Sheik. 23 Q. Thank you. I stand corrected. 24 When -- who was the Sheik and when did you 25 meet him? 0025 1 A. Sheik. Okay. 2 Q. All right. 3 A. Like I address you as mister, since he is part 4 of the royal family, I believe that he merits the 5 correct title. Sheik is actually an insult to that
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6 community. And it was Sheik Naif Jabar Al Sabaha. 7 Q. Would you spell that for the court reporter, 8 please? 9 A. I can't. Sheik is, I believe -- okay, my 10 English was not my strong language -- is S-h-i-e-k. 11 Naif is N-a-i-f. I don't know if there's an E after it 12 or not. Jabar is Jabar. Al, A-l, Sabaha, S-a-b-a-h-a. 13 A member of the royal family of the Sheikdom of Kuwait. 14 Q. All right. How did you meet him? 15 A. The exact circumstances, I have no direct 16 memory of. I can, in fact, if you wish, delineate the 17 general circumstances on how we met in order to further 18 your investigation. I mean, Kuwait is a nice place to 19 visit. They've got great architecture. 20 Q. Does he live there now? 21 A. I have no knowledge of that. When he crashed 22 the Kuwaiti stock market, the King sort of exiled him. 23 Q. All right. Tell me briefly the general 24 circumstances of your involvement with him. 25 A. All right. I'm going to testify as to the 0026 1 general circumstances to the best of my memory and -2 and effort to aid Mr. Rue to do whatever investigations 3 into the royal family he wishes to conduct. 4 I have -- had invented a process in the 5 early to mid '70s to reclaim pit oil. For clarification 6 and definition to aid Mr. Rue so he doesn't have to go 7 into Wikipedia to find out what pit oil is, pit oil, 8 since the beginning of the energy explosion, refiners 9 and refineries, when they take crude oil -- oh, and 10 don't ask your expert because he wouldn't have any idea. 11 They would take crude oil, and they would run it through 12 a pipe. And these pipes have sensors in it to detect 13 the amount of BS&W. Now, BS&W means bottom sediment and 14 water. 15 When you're going into a cracking unit, a 16 cracking unit is an apparatus which vaporizes the crude 17 oil and puts it through a tower where it cracks the 18 various levels of fuel from C1 to C27. Layman's terms, 19 bunker, heavy oil, No. 5 oil, No. 4 oil, No. 2 diesel, 20 gasoline, jet fuel, naphtha and so forth. 21 Now, in order for that cracking tower to 22 do its job, it cannot have more than 6 percent, now I 23 think they raised it to 10. Please show my answer to be 24 somewhere between 6 and 10 percent BS&W. 25 When the pipe -- the testing station --
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0027 1 oops, excuse me. Let me -- I'm a very adamant speaker. 2 I'm sorry, I move a lot. It must be the Italian in me. 3 It would help if I could see my shirt. 4 Okay. When it detects more than the 5 specified amount of bottom sediment and water, it spits 6 out one to three barrels of crude. The one before it 7 found it and the one after it found it, and it was going 8 into a pit. A pit being, back then, a manmade lake for 9 the collection and the temporary -- supposably temporary 10 storage of off-spec crude oil and other debris. 11 Well, since the 1920 -- sometime in 1960, 12 '70, it's immaterial, EPA said they couldn't do that 13 anymore. And in Louisiana, you have thousands, if not 14 tens of thousands of these pits that the Environmental 15 Protection Agency wants cleaned up. They do not allow 16 them to do this anymore. 17 And I invented a chemical-mechanical 18 process that would take that pit oil, run it through my 19 process, separate all the BS&W as previously defined 20 down to less than 1/10th of 1 percent, and I would sell 21 it back to the refineries. 22 Q. Do you mean -23 A. This -24 Q. Do you mean sell the BS&W back to the 25 refineries or what else was left? 0028 1 A. No. What -- what was left. The -2 Q. Thank you. 3 A. The crude oil or the bunker oil or the -4 Q. Correct. That's what I thought. 5 A. Yes, sir. 6 Q. I just wanted to be sure. 7 A. Somehow unbeknownst to me, Kuwait or Sheik Naif 8 Jabar Al Sabaha heard about this invention. And he came 9 down and asked me if I could do -- recover it from oil 10 sands, from lakes and puddles, from, you know, oil wells 11 that were blown up in the water and all this other good 12 stuff, and I said yes. 13 And the man invited me over there to show 14 him and I did and he loved it. And he had a 15 disagreement with his father because his father wanted 16 the process to be under his domain rather than Sheik 17 Naif's, because Sheik Naif had nothing to do with the, 18 quote/unquote, "oil of the country." 19 But within our various meetings, social
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20 gatherings and attending several of his negotiations 21 while I was there and other places throughout the world, 22 I was hired to be a purchasing agent for the Sheik to 23 acquire real estate properties and other things that the 24 Sheik had an interest in. 25 Q. Let me stop you there for a minute. You had 0029 1 the pit oil process, and you said that the Sheik came 2 down to visit you. Where were you at that time? 3 A. I was either in Daytona Beach, Florida or in 4 Sulphur, Louisiana. I don't remember which. 5 Q. Okay. And your process to reclaim the crude 6 from the pit oil, was that -- did that process belong to 7 you? 8 A. I believe that my testimony was that it was a 9 process that I invented. Therefore, it would lead 10 someone to conclude that I am the owner of that process. 11 I was not working for anyone at the time; I was not 12 affiliated with anyone at the time. Therefore, the 13 fruits of one labor is generally acknowledged as being 14 theirs. 15 Q. Was the process or any aspect of the process 16 patented? 17 A. There was no aspect of the process patented, 18 applied for or even considered. 19 Q. Okay. 20 A. A secret is no longer a secret once you tell 21 one person. 22 Q. Do you still own the pit oil process? 23 A. It is not in operation. There is no company, 24 so there is nothing to own. 25 Q. Why is it no longer in operation? 0030 1 A. Greed. 2 Q. Explain that for me. 3 A. Mr. Rue, you're talking about something that 4 happened over 40 years. 5 Q. Then, I -6 A. That is totally -- totally not germane to this 7 case should the charges brought before me. And I do not 8 see why you're wasting my time, the stenographer's time 9 and your time on stuff that's 50 years ago. 10 Q. All right. Then I'll strike the question. 11 A. Thank you, sir. You're a gentleman. 12 Q. How long did you work for the Sheik? 13 A. About three years, give or take.
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14 Q. And how -- approximately when did you quit? 15 A. In the '70s. 16 Q. All right. What did you do after that? 17 A. I did some international trading. I became a 18 purchasing agent for the Venezuelan government. And I 19 got ripped off for $500,000 investing in a pyrolysis 20 system. 21 Q. Well, I guess that's where we better start our 22 focus. 23 A. Now, that makes good common sense. 24 Q. Well, thank you. 25 A. I congratulate you, sir. 0031 1 Q. Thank you. 2 A. You're finally going to get on track. 3 Q. I am finally going to get on track, that's 4 right. 5 Mr. Rivera, I'm entitled to know your 6 history. 7 A. Excuse me? 8 Q. I'm entitled to know your history. 9 A. And I'm entitled to know yours. 10 Q. Well, good. 11 So how did you get ripped off -- how did 12 you get involved in the pyrolysis business to begin with 13 and what was the state of development of the pyrolysis 14 business at the time? 15 A. I believe my statement was I got ripped off 16 investing in a pyrolysis system. 17 Q. Well, would you explain? 18 A. Now, if you're going to testify for me, please 19 answer the questions for me. 20 Q. Well, just tell me how you got ripped off. 21 A. A man came and -22 Q. A man whose name was came? 23 A. You know, I should remember it, but I don't. 24 It was a bad experience. And, you know, the human mind 25 is really a wonderful machine. It sort of, you know, 0032 1 lets you forget things that you don't want to remember, 2 as I'm sure you're fully aware of. 3 Q. Tell me how the -4 A. I'm not sure there's a lot of things. 5 Q. Tell me how the guy ripped you off. 6 A. Pardon me? 7 Q. Tell me how the guy ripped you off.
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8 A. Oh, okay. That is a direct question germane to 9 my testimony. 10 He ripped me off by telling me that he had 11 a system to take used tires and convert it to diesel and 12 natural gas. And this conversion, okay, was limitless. 13 The feedstock were billions upon billions of tires 14 around the world that had to be disposed of because 15 tires, as you well know, are not inert. They cannot be 16 buried in landfills, because if they're buried in 17 landfills, the tire, when it's crushed down with all the 18 soil on it, when the water comes through, it erodes and, 19 boop, back pops up the tires. 20 So I recognized it as a global problem 21 that if the system worked as it was delineated, an 22 opportunity to make a lot of money. So being extremely 23 busy with eight to ten projects at one time, which were 24 in various stages of negotiations and closing, I wrote 25 him a check for $500,000. 0033 1 And when I caught up with myself, which 2 sometimes is a feat, I went to investigate what I 3 invested in. And I said, okay, show me the plant; and 4 he said, oh, no, we don't have a plant. I said, well, 5 show me your -- show me what you sold me. Show me, you 6 know, how you can ascertain that you can do all these 7 things. 8 And he says, well, Hitler during World War 9 II was using pyrolysis to power his Sherman tanks. And 10 I said the same Sherman tanks that were left all over 11 the world with their motors blown up because of the bad 12 fuel? 13 And he says, well, we're going to -- I 14 said either show me the plant, show me a demonstration 15 where you did it in small scale, or give me back my 16 money. And he could not show me a demonstration. He 17 could not show me a plant. He could not show me 18 anything in small scale. And I made it perfectly clear 19 to him that it was in his best interest to return my 20 money. 21 Q. Did he? 22 A. Absolutely. 23 Q. Well, then, how did that lead to the pyrolysis 24 process that we have come to know about that was going 25 on in Port Gibson, Mississippi with tires? 0034 1 A. Mr. Rue, I am trying to afford you all
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2 courtesies and all professionalism as a senior trial 3 counsel for the Securities and Exchange Commission. 4 Please do not continue to insult me by calling my system 5 pyrolysis because it's the furthest from the truth. I 6 take exception to it, and I will not answer any 7 questions that you have associating my system as the 8 pyrolysis system of John Rivera. Are we perfectly 9 clear? 10 Q. Yes, sir. 11 A. Thank you, sir. 12 Q. All right. How did you get from this pyrolysis 13 system that you got your money back on to whatever it 14 was you were doing in Port Gibson, Mississippi? 15 A. First of all, I -- I invested in what was 16 delineated as a pyrolysis system when, in fact, it was 17 air of a con artist. 18 Q. Okay. 19 A. But in all fairness, it intrigued my mind. The 20 gray matter between my ears that God has so graciously 21 given me, tweaked interest in saying, wait a minute, if 22 Hitler did this in World War II, surely someone else is 23 doing it, and surely someone else has succeeded. 24 And I spent the next six to seven years, 25 not on a full-time basis, as time permitted within my 0035 1 scope of purchasing, buying and selling things 2 throughout Europe and Central South America, I visited 3 every known pyrolysis system in the world. In the free 4 world, in the Communist world, in the United States. 5 And I noted what was good, what worked, and what was bad 6 on each and every one of them. 7 Here again, I believed that my intellect 8 was as such that I could process all this information 9 and come up with my own system. And I did. 10 I took and found out why everybody was 11 failing. Why somebody spent $20 million in Taiwan, 12 built a pyrolysis system that was going to be operating 13 and feeding a steel mill. I mean, a perfect 14 application, why it wasn't running. 15 And the biggest problem that I saw in the 16 pyrolysis system is not being able to get the same 17 product each and every time. You may run for an hour 18 and get this, another hour and get that, and another 19 four hours and get something totally different, which 20 whether or not it was a crude oil or a fuel or whatever, 21 there was no consistency.
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22 So that was my first attempt -- excuse me, 23 that was my first challenge to overcome to proceed with 24 my system. 25 Now, if you go onto the Internet as your 0036 1 purported expert witness did, you can pull up thousands 2 and thousands and thousands of references and experts on 3 pyrolysis which, here again, has no bearing on what I do 4 because I spent three years figuring out how to be able 5 to produce the same product 24/7. As long as the 6 feedstock was the same, the product had to come out the 7 same. Okay. 8 And based on life experiences, not 9 education, I was able to formulate a catalyst that 10 unified and created the harmonics necessary to produce 11 one product, the same product. 12 Now -- do you have a question, sir? 13 Q. Yeah, I do. Can -- when did this discovery 14 take place? When did you first have your catalyst 15 developed? 16 A. Mr. Rue, my catalyst came into its embryo state 17 ten, 12 years ago. 18 Q. All right. And where were you operating? 19 Where were you experimenting with this process at the 20 time? 21 A. Daytona Beach, Florida; Tampa, Florida; 22 Albuquerque, New Mexico; Dominican Republic. Gosh, 23 what's the -- Vicksburg -- Vicksburg, Mississippi. 24 Various places. 25 Q. All right. 0037 1 A. In my kitchen. 2 Q. Okay. 3 A. In my garage. 4 Q. Well, while you were sleeping? 5 A. I do some of my best thinking when I'm 6 sleeping, sir. 7 Q. Yeah, that's what I thought. 8 A. Sleep is entirely overrated. A human being 9 only needs four hours sleep. The rest of it you're into 10 a state where your mind is most active. And if you know 11 how to train that mind, you can utilize it to the nth 12 degree. 13 Q. I understand. The embryotic state of your 14 catalyst? 15 A. Yes, sir.
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16 Q. Was that -- where were you on the continuum of 17 developing your catalyst from the embryotic state until 18 what it is now when you moved to Port Gibson? 19 A. I'm sorry, I don't know that I heard that 20 question correctly. 21 Q. Well, it's not a very good question. 22 A. Well, I thought so, but I was being kind. 23 Q. Let me try again. 24 What was the -- when did you -- as I 25 understand it, you have two kinds of reactors. You have 0038 1 the continuous batch reactor which is the 65-foot-long 2 tube. And then you have the mini reactor; is that 3 correct? 4 THE WITNESS: Would you please read back 5 his statement, because I don't understand what he's 6 trying to say. And I really want to understand it. 7 A. Or if you could repeat it, whichever you 8 prefer. 9 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Yeah, do you -- when did you 10 first develop the mini reactor? 11 A. I don't know, 24 years ago in my kitchen. 12 Q. Okay. When did you develop -13 A. It was a pressure cooker. 14 Q. All right. When did you develop the mini 15 reactor as it is today in its general configuration as 16 it is today? 17 A. I have no direct recollection as to that 18 timeframe, but it was within the last, you know, ten 19 years. 20 Q. Okay. And what was the state of your process 21 -- first of all, how did you -- how did you come to move 22 to Port Gibson, Mississippi? 23 A. I'm afraid to say. I've got a Mississippi 24 lawyer. 25 Q. All right. 0039 1 A. I was induced by the mayor of Vicksburg, 2 Mississippi. Came down to me and said, I hear you can 3 do all these marvelous things and make fuel out of tires 4 and any organic material. And I said, yeah. And he 5 says, what can you do with chicken litter? And I looked 6 at him sort of the way you are looking at me right now. 7 And I said what the hell is chicken litter? 8 You know, I'm a Florida boy. I buy 9 chickens at Publix. Well, you don't know what Publix
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10 is, but it's a really nice supermarket in Florida. 11 So he explained to me that basically 12 chicken litter is chicken shit collected at these hen 13 houses, and they have this massive problem with it. 14 Tyson and, you know, all these other people. They used 15 to just spread it on the cotton fields until the 16 nitrates got -- concentration got so high that the EPA 17 stopped it. 18 And I told the representative of the 19 mayor's office that, gentlemen, I'm sure I can do 20 something with it, but I've never seen it. I would know 21 nothing about it. Send me a 5-gallon pail, and I'll let 22 you know. So they sent me a 5-gallon pail. 23 And I ran it through my mini reactor and 24 got a combustible gas out of it and reduced the volume 25 by, I was going to say 90 percent, but I have no way of 0040 1 proving 90 percent. So I substantially reduced the mass 2 between 70 and 90 percent of its original volume. 3 I produced a inert -- inert means -- let 4 him find out -- an inert carbon which could be either 5 utilized or disposed of without any harm to the 6 environment. And a -- for the sake of explanation only, 7 I am neither insinuating in any way, shape or form that 8 I was producing pharmaceutical grade water from chicken 9 shit. But I will say that since the moisture in water 10 was vaporized in a vacuum and in -- distilled, that one 11 could, not that I would, knowing where it came from, 12 drink it or use it for -- it was -- it was pure. So I 13 reported this. 14 Q. Now, you said you got -- you got three products 15 out of this, then? You got the inert -16 A. Carbon. 17 Q. You got water? 18 A. Got water. 19 Q. And what else? 20 A. And a flammable gas. 21 Q. All right. 22 A. Okay. But that is the way you or I would have 23 looked at this. The mayor and the mayor's 24 representative did not look at it in that venue. They 25 could really care about the flammable gas or the pure 0041 1 water or the carbon. All they wanted to do is get rid 2 of the chicken litter, which I did. 3 So they said, you know, we understand
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4 that, you know, you've got a 5-ton-a-day reactor that 5 you're shipping to Florida. Ship it to Mississippi. 6 We'll give you, you know, $30 million in grants to build 7 a system capable of doing 250 tons a day. We'll give 8 you tax credits. You won't have to pay taxes for 20 9 years. We're going to give you a building. We're going 10 to give you -- we'll have classes at our technical 11 school to help train your employees. I mean, they 12 offered me this -- everything. 13 So I started disassembling my 5-foot -- my 14 5-ton-a-day reactor. 15 Q. And let me stop you there. You said you were 16 disassembling it. Where was it located at the time? 17 A. At the time, it was in New Mexico. 18 Q. Okay. Albuquerque or near Albuquerque? 19 A. You know exactly where it's at. 20 Q. Okay. 21 A. I mean, why play games? 22 Q. All right. 23 A. Gee. 24 Q. And we're not playing games, Mr. Rivera. 25 THE WITNESS: Do I have stupid written 0042 1 across my forehead, Alice? 2 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Now, your 5-ton-a-day reactor. 3 THE WITNESS: He doesn't either. 4 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Your 5-ton-a-day reactor. What 5 was the size of that? Tell me -- give me some idea of 6 what it was like. 7 A. Some idea? Rather than risk making a 8 misstatement or anything that you can misinterpret, I 9 will do you one better. I will cause to be delivered a 10 videotape of the system in operation in 1977 or '79 or 11 '70 something. 12 Q. I'd be delighted to see it. 13 A. Very good. 14 Q. Let me -15 A. Would you like to see a picture of our wedding? 16 I've got that here, too, on video. 17 Q. No, I don't want to see that. They don't need 18 that. 19 THE WITNESS: Alice, I'm sorry, honey. 20 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Yeah. 21 THE WITNESS: Some people have no couth. 22 Q. (By Mr. Rue) That's all right. It's not my 23 business.
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24 A. That never stopped you before. 25 Q. It certainly had. 0043 1 Mr. Rivera, I've seen -- I have seen your 2 larger reactor in Baytown. 3 A. Yes, the one that you went with your expert in 4 looking for buried pipes to see where I was bringing oil 5 in from? 6 Q. The one that I looked at in Baytown, Texas. 7 A. Uh-huh. 8 Q. And I've seen pictures of that -- I guess that 9 same reactor as it was set up in Natchez. 10 A. Excuse me, sir. You are assuming that it was 11 the same reactor because A, you weren't there, you did 12 not inspect it, you did not see it; and B, that is a 13 very false impression, and I take exception to it 14 because it is not the same reactor. 15 Q. Would you agree that it's similar to the 16 reactor that was in Natchez? 17 A. I will agree that it is as similar to the 18 reactor in Natchez as you are similar to the man sitting 19 down at the end of the table because you're both -20 well, I know he's a man. 21 Q. Thank you. 22 And I've seen your mini reactor. 23 A. Which one? 24 Q. The one I saw in Baytown. 25 A. Very good. 0044 1 Q. The 5-ton-a-day reactor, how would you compare 2 it to the big one or the little one or both? 3 A. That is a multi-part question. If you would 4 break it down to individual questions, I'd be more than 5 glad to answer them individually. 6 Q. How did the 5-ton reactor compare in size to 7 what you currently have as a mini reactor? 8 A. That is a very simple question to answer. And 9 quite frankly, you know, I know I need glasses, but 10 apparently you need your prescriptions filled, too, 11 because the mini reactor is 5-foot long. And the 12 production reactor is 65, 85, almost 90-foot long. So I 13 would think that that would be inevitable to comprehend 14 the two. I certainly couldn't sneak in the big reactor 15 for the little reactor. 16 Question No. 2, sir. 17 Q. No, sir, you didn't answer my question.
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18 A. Oh, you said how do you compare them? 19 Q. My question -- my question wasn't how you 20 compared those two. 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. My question was: How did the 5-ton-a-day 23 reactor compare in size to the mini reactor? 24 A. Again, the mini reactor was 5-foot long. And 25 the 5-ton-a-day unit -- and here again, I do not have 0045 1 any ironclad recollection of that, but I would say that 2 it was 20- to 30-foot long. 3 Q. Thank you. 4 Did it contain the same type of components 5 that you have in your larger reactor today? 6 A. Please expound on the word "it," so I do not 7 try to compare -8 Q. The 5-ton-a-day reactor that you've been 9 talking about it. 10 A. Does it have the same components as the 11 reactor -12 Q. I said does it have similar components. 13 A. It has similar components as the Model T Ford 14 has to the 2008 Corvette. 15 Q. Did the 5-ton reactor have a length of tube 16 down which the raw material was sent in a vacuum, and 17 the temperature of it raised? 18 A. Did it have a tube where the temperature was 19 raised? 20 Q. Yeah. 21 A. Yeah, but so does a shotgun. 22 Q. Mr. Rivera, you know what -- you know what the 23 question is. Answer it. 24 A. You will address me in a civil tone, sir. I 25 answered your question. And you, with an intimidating 0046 1 voice, you do not intimidate me, sir. You do not scare 2 me, sir. 3 Q. Mr. Rivera? 4 A. And we will be civil here. 5 Q. It's pretty plain that you have taken a tone 6 with me that will show up on the video. 7 A. Absolutely. 8 Q. Good. 9 All right. When did you develop the first 10 prototype of your batch continuous reactor? 11 A. About 24 years ago. Oh, excuse me. Here
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12 again, I apologize profusely for not listening to the 13 question. 14 Okay. I did not absorb continuous 15 reactor. The first batch continuous reactor was first 16 demonstrated to me some 24 years ago in Korea. 17 Q. All right. And when did you make your first 18 attempt to create the same sort of thing in the United 19 States? 20 A. I don't know, ten, 12, 14 years ago. 21 Q. All right. Was the first time you assembled 22 something like that in Port Gibson? 23 A. No. 24 Q. Where was it, in Florida? 25 A. Yeah. 0047 1 Q. In Daytona? 2 A. No. 3 Q. The Palm Beach area? 4 A. No. 5 Q. The Tampa area? 6 A. Yes. 7 Q. Okay. All right. Let's move back to the 8 businesses. We've talked briefly about Cyber Care. We 9 need to talk about Phoenix Eco. We need to talk about 10 Earth First Technologies, USSE, SSTP and Zeons. Which 11 of those businesses came first? 12 A. I'm sorry, sir. You said a platitude of 13 businesses, and I don't know what chronological order 14 you're putting them in. 15 Q. I'm asking you to put them in chronological 16 order. 17 A. I can't. Well, I have no direct knowledge, all 18 right, of the timeframes of any of those businesses. 19 Excuse me. I have no direct recollection of the 20 timeframe of any of those businesses. 21 Q. Well, Cyber Care was something that you did 22 with Mr. Stanton, you've testified to. Was Mr. Stanton 23 also involved in Earth First Technologies? 24 A. Earth First Technologies, Mr. Stanton was the 25 owner, president, chairman of the board of Earth First 0048 1 Technologies. 2 Q. What role did you play in association with 3 Earth First Technologies? 4 A. They had a license with me. 5 Q. A license for what with you?
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6 A. To participate in my process. 7 Q. Can you explain that for me? How were they 8 going to participate in your process? 9 A. They were going to get a percentage of the 10 profits derived thereof. 11 Q. All right. And what was Earth First 12 Technologies' business? 13 A. The scope of their business changed faster than 14 I changed my -- my shoes. They had everything from 15 plasma arc furnaces to medical supplies to wrecking 16 companies to steel foundries to -- I could not begin to 17 delineate all the different purported businesses that 18 Earth First Technologies was in or is in. I don't even 19 know if they're still in existence. They shouldn't be. 20 Q. All right. Who was involved in that besides 21 Mr. Stanton? 22 A. Mr. Stanton is a master of misdirection. He 23 only dealt -- I only dealt with him or Walter Hammock. 24 Q. Pardon me? 25 A. Walter Hammock. 0049 1 Q. Okay. 2 A. Or Mark Clancy. But for me to delineate who 3 else was involved with Earth First and John Stanton, I 4 would have a easier task as to delineate as to who's 5 involved with the Securities and Exchange Commission. 6 Q. All right. That's fine. 7 Is it fair to say that Mr. Stanton 8 controlled the business? 9 A. Yes, sir. 10 Q. All right. Did you hold any title with the 11 business as an officer or an employee? 12 A. To the best of my recollection, I was never 13 paid as an employee of Earth First Technologies. I did 14 receive compensation from them or one of their entities 15 or one of their Does or from John Stanton in the 16 capacity of a joint venture agreement with various of my 17 companies. 18 Q. Which companies would those have been, your 19 companies there? 20 THE WITNESS: Did you say something? 21 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: No. 22 THE WITNESS: Oh, I'm sorry. 23 A. If I misstate the names, it is not being done 24 on purpose. EFWE, which is a acronym for Earth First 25 Waste Energy. GWE which is Green Waste Energy. And I
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0050 1 believe Phoenix Eco. 2 Q. All right. Did you ever -- how were you 3 compensated by Mr. Stanton or Earth First Technologies? 4 In cash? 5 A. No. 6 Q. In shares? 7 A. I had shares of Earth First Technology that 8 predates John Stanton. Earth First Technologies was 9 originally Tubes Technology Licensing, and I was 10 instrumental in securing contracts and land purchases 11 and various other things in the Dominican Republic for 12 Tubes Technology Licensing. And I was compensated 13 millions of shares of that company as far as shares 14 goes. 15 When Tubes violated the joint venture 16 agreement trying to take over my technology, which 17 they've been trying to do for eight years, nine years, I 18 took those shares and I encumbered them with a loan to 19 continue my work with my mechanical -- my chemical20 mechanical process using a catalyst vacuum system. It's 21 a chemical mechanical process utilizing a modified 22 pyrolysis type system as a carrier. I borrowed $500,000 23 to continue my work. 24 Q. From whom? 25 A. Hmm? 0051 1 Q. From who? 2 A. An offshore company that lends money against 3 restricted stock. 4 Q. Okay. What's the name of it? 5 A. I don't remember. Oh, wait a minute. I am not 6 sure. 7 Mr. Rue, rather than risk the possibility 8 of stating something that is false, I will answer that 9 question by stating that I will do my utmost to find the 10 name of that company and, if possible, find the loan 11 agreement and have it delivered to you. 12 Q. Okay. Was there any relationship between Earth 13 First and Cyber Care? 14 A. The best way I could answer that question would 15 be is there any relationship between Chrysler 16 Corporation and Fiat? They're all owned by the same 17 person. 18 Q. So I can translate that into meaning -19 A. It was all one entity owned --
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20 Q. These were -21 A. -- by John Stanton. 22 Q. They were both owned by John Stanton. 23 A. I did not say that. Cyber Care owns Earth 24 First or Earth First owns Cyber Care. I'm saying they 25 all are owned by John Stanton. 0052 1 Q. All right. That's what I wanted to find out. 2 And what is Phoenix Eco? 3 A. Phoenix Eco was a company that I started to 4 continue my R&D for my tire process when Stanton reneged 5 on his joint venture and paid one of my employees for a 6 sample of the catalyst. I threw him out in violation of 7 the joint venture agreement and started Phoenix Eco. 8 He had already obtained copies of 9 blueprints of my system and how it was built. And he 10 had probably spent a half a million dollars in having 11 engineers come out and design, reduce to blueprints my 12 system where he promptly went to Mobile, Alabama and 13 duplicated my system. 14 Then when he found out that it didn't work 15 because he didn't have the right catalyst, he came back. 16 Q. Back to Earth First a minute. I believe you 17 testified -18 THE WITNESS: Are you having trouble 19 hearing him? 20 MR. LELAND: No. 21 THE WITNESS: It's probably me. 22 Q. (By Mr. Rue) I believe you testified with 23 regard to Earth First Technologies that you licensed 24 your process to them; is that correct? 25 A. That is incorrect. I had a licensing -- they 0053 1 were the benefactor of a licensing agreement that I had 2 with Tubes Technology Licensing that when Stanton bought 3 Tubes Technology Licensing, he inherited that licensing 4 agreement. 5 Q. Okay. Did Earth First sell any product that 6 was the subject of that licensing agreement? 7 THE WITNESS: Do you have any in your 8 purse? 9 MR. RUE: Do you need to take a break? 10 THE WITNESS: No. It's just -- I was just 11 surprised. I drink expresso by the gallon, and I must 12 have distracted my wife this morning because she only 13 put Splenda in two of them. The third one had no
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14 sweetener in it whatsoever, and it just got my 15 attention. 16 MR. RUE: Ah. 17 THE WITNESS: I am like (indicating). 18 A. I'm sorry, sir, what was the last question? 19 Q. (By Mr. Rue) You had a licensing arrangement 20 with Earth First. 21 A. I had a licensing arrangement with Tubes 22 Technology Licensing which Earth First inherited -23 Q. Okay. 24 A. -- when it purchased -25 Q. Tubes Technology? 0054 1 A. -- Tubes Technology. And they immediately sent 2 their generals and gurus and loan crushers down to tell 3 me what I was going to do, how, when and where. And 4 needless to say, I was not intimidated, and it did not 5 happen. 6 Q. So can I conclude from what you've just told me 7 that Earth First Technologies did not take advantage of 8 the process that you were licensing or that they had 9 inherited through Tube Technologies? 10 A. You may not. 11 Q. All right. Explain then. 12 A. They instructed me to do a 48-hour run with 13 their engineers, their processing engineers, all right, 14 so that they came in, they documented every nut and bolt 15 and hose and temperature setting of the entire process 16 from the first tire chip going in to the steel carbon 17 gas and oil going out. Then they stole the technology 18 and rebuilt it in Mobile, Alabama. 19 So if that's not taking advantage and 20 grand theft in the first degree, then your 21 interpretation of taking advantage of the license and 22 the situation and mine are totally different, sir. 23 Q. All right. 24 THE WITNESS: Could I have a two-minute -25 oh, no, Alice, just go get me some Sweet'N Low. I can't 0055 1 be without expresso. 2 Q. (By Mr. Rue) All right. How -- what is the 3 relationship between Phoenix Eco and U.S. Sustainable 4 Energy Corp., the Mississippi corporation? 5 A. The relationship is that neither of them exist. 6 Q. That's not responsive to my question. 7 A. Excuse me. You said what is the relation --
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8 they don't exist anymore. 9 Q. What was their relationship in October of 2006? 10 A. When U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp., the 11 Mississippi corporation came to be, okay, Phoenix Eco 12 ceased to be because it took on or U.S. Sustainable 13 Energy Corp. took over the licensing -- the license 14 agreement and the process that Phoenix Eco had because 15 U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp. -- okay, it was another 16 joint venture agreement between John Stanton and myself. 17 Q. All right. As I understand the record in this 18 case, then, there was a time or up until a certain time, 19 Mr. Stanton funded the operations of Phoenix Eco; is 20 that correct? 21 A. For a short time, yes. 22 Q. And then -23 A. Let me modify that answer -- that answer. 24 Q. Sure. 25 A. For a short time, okay, while U.S. Sustainable 0056 1 Energy Corp. Mississippi was being formed. 2 Q. Okay. All right. 3 And there came a time when he didn't fund 4 it any longer. Why not? 5 A. I have already testified that John Stanton's 6 purpose of joint ventures or funding my operation in any 7 way, shape or form was to gather information to steal my 8 technology. Once he has -- once he was satisfied that 9 he had enough information, he'd stopped funding it and 10 continue with his operations in Mobile, Alabama. 11 Q. All right. All right. Tell me about the -12 tell me what you know about the trans -- transaction 13 between U.S. Sustainable Energy and Zeons Corporation. 14 A. I'm sorry, I didn't understand that second 15 word. 16 Q. Zeons Corporation. 17 A. No. The, and then there was a second word that 18 I did not understand what you said. I could not hear it 19 properly. 20 Q. All right. What's the relationship between 21 USSE and Zeons Corporation? 22 A. I have absolutely, positively no knowledge of 23 Zeon Corporation other than the fact that I read on the 24 Internet that Zeon Corporation or USSE became Zeon 25 Corporation. Other than that, the -- anything that had 0057 1 to do with Zeon Corporation was handled by Richard
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2 Cutler. 3 Q. All right. Did you transfer shares of USSE to 4 the people involved with Zeons Corporation? 5 A. No, sir, I did not. 6 Q. Okay. 7 A. I would like to clarify for the record that 8 when I dis -- when I resigned from the board and as 9 president and everything, and Richard said that there 10 was a company that had a chain of gas stations that 11 wanted to buy USSE, okay, and they wanted to compensate 12 me for it and this, that and the other, I said I want 13 nothing to do with it. 14 He said, well, they can't do it because 15 you're the -- you're the major stockholder. And I said, 16 well, I'll give them my proxy to do whatever the hell 17 they want, okay. And as a result of that, they did some 18 ungodly -- and I don't even know what the numbers are -19 reverse split. 20 Basically, I don't know if I had 300 21 million or 400 million. I don't know what I had, but 22 I -- I think that after all the smoke clears, I may have 23 500 shares from -- it was -- I never even heard of a 24 reverse split that big. But that's all I know about 25 Zeon. 0058 1 Q. Okay. I understand you have traveled outside 2 the United States? 3 A. Extensively. 4 Q. Extensively. And you've been to the Dominican 5 Republic? 6 A. You know that. You sent your people there 7 trying to -- well, actually interviewing Vice Admiral 8 Radhames Lora. You've also been investigating corrupt 9 foreign government practices act that people in Central 10 and South America are taking exception to, but that's -11 that's another story. 12 Q. Have you been to Guatemala? 13 A. Yes, sir, I have been to Guatemala. 14 Q. In connection with the activities of U.S. 15 Sustainable Energy? 16 A. And in connection with other businesses. 17 Q. Okay. What other countries -18 A. Have I been in? 19 Q. Pardon me? 20 A. Have I been in? 21 Q. No, sir.
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22 A. We don't have that much time. 23 Q. Let me finish my question, and then you can 24 attempt to answer it. 25 A. I will do my utmost to attempt to answer. 0059 1 Q. What other countries have you been in in 2 connection with furthering the business opportunities of 3 U.S. Sustainable Energy or Sustainable Power 4 Corporation? 5 A. The Dominican Republic, period. And after we 6 signed contracts with a major mining company and we put 7 a press release out to that effect, within 30 minutes, 8 we had calls from the paid bashers from the people who 9 have been proven to be directly involved with the dart 10 pool, telling them about the SEC investigation and how 11 I've been found a fraud and all this other stuff. And 12 the contract was cancelled because they want nothing to 13 do with Sustainable Power Corporation or the Securities 14 and Exchange Commission. 15 And this contract was put into SSTP as a 16 courtesy to my stockholders, because I wanted them to 17 start seeing some resolve for their investment. But 18 they want nothing to do with the Securities and Exchange 19 Commission. They want nothing to do with Sustainable 20 Power Corporation. 21 And Sustainable Power Corporation is not 22 the owner of the process or the technology. They are a 23 licensee. And that license encumbers solely the United 24 States. 25 Q. All right. What was the -- what was the 0060 1 company that Sustainable Power had a contract with? 2 A. Falconbridge. 3 Q. All right. Do you have a signed copy of that 4 contract? 5 A. I don't know if I have one here. 6 Q. Do you have one available to you? 7 A. I would have to check. That entire thing was 8 in the Dominican Republic. 9 Q. Do you maintain a business office in the 10 Dominican Republic as of today? 11 A. I maintain a residence in the Dominican 12 Republic where I do conduct business. 13 Q. Do you have records there, business records 14 there? 15 A. I doubt it.
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16 Q. All right. I will send your attorney a formal 17 request, but I'd like you to start seeing if you can 18 find a copy of the Falconbridge copy for me, please. 19 A. Will the Securities and Exchange Commission pay 20 for my trip to the Dominican Republic? 21 Q. No, sir. 22 A. Well, I have no way of getting to the Dominican 23 Republic to ask for that. 24 Q. Okay. 25 A. I have a lot of places I'd have to go to 0061 1 find -- to find a copy of it. They were really ticked 2 off to say the least. 3 Q. But it's your testimony that you have -- that 4 there was a signed contract with Falconbridge? 5 A. It is my testimony that I have no direct 6 recollection if there was or was not a signed contract. 7 If Mr. Cutler put out a press release, it would only be 8 logical that there was, but I have not signed a contract 9 with anybody. 10 Q. All right. Are you aware of any bank accounts 11 that you, Mrs. Rivera or either entity, USSE or SSTP, 12 have had or continue to have outside of the United 13 States? 14 A. I have no direct recollection of any bank 15 accounts outside of the United States. 16 Q. How about an indirect recollection? 17 A. That would be hearsay and totally unadmissible. 18 Q. It wouldn't be hearsay. 19 A. Pardon me? 20 Q. It wouldn't be hearsay. 21 A. I don't -- if I have no direct recollection, 22 then I wouldn't have any, you know, gee, did I open up a 23 bank account to change dollars into pesos? I don't 24 know. I don't believe so. 25 Q. All right. Do you have a household bank 0062 1 account that you used in the Dominican Republic? 2 A. I do not. 3 Q. All right. Did you file your federal income 4 tax returns for the tax year 2006? 5 A. I did not. 6 Q. For the tax year 2007? 7 A. I did not. 8 Q. For the tax year 2008? 9 A. I hired a attorney who has taken care of all
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10 that stuff. I have not made any income to report. And 11 as I said, I hired an attorney to file all those things, 12 and I don't know what the status is. I have no direct 13 knowledge of what he has done or what he hasn't done. 14 Q. What's that attorney's name? 15 A. That, I have, I just do not remember at this 16 time. I'll get it to you forthwith. 17 Q. All right. Did you have income in 2008? 18 A. No. 19 Q. How about 2007? 20 A. I have no direct knowledge. 21 Q. Did you sell stock in USSE or -- or Sustainable 22 Power Systems in -23 A. Excuse me? 24 Q. USSE or Sustainable Power Corp.? 25 A. What about them? 0063 1 Q. Did you sell shares in those companies during 2 calendar year 2007? 3 A. There were private placements made, all done 4 legally through an SEC attorney. 5 Q. And who was that? 6 A. Richard Cutler. 7 Q. All right. Did you sell any stock that you 8 personally held in connection with any of those private 9 placements? 10 A. I afforded the company -- they asked me for a 11 number of free-trading shares which I had, if I would 12 give them to the company so that they could raise 13 capital; and they replaced it with restricted shares. 14 And, you know, trying to help the company survive, I may 15 have given some of my free-trading shares. 16 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Mr. Rue, five minutes 17 left on this tape, sir. 18 MR. RUE: All right. Let me follow-up 19 here, then, and we'll take a break. 20 A. What time is it? 21 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Would you say, Mr. Rivera, that 22 your brokerage account statements would more accurately 23 reflect your stock transactions than your memory here 24 today? 25 A. You're stating that I have brokerage accounts 0064 1 that I have no direct recollection of other than a 2 Scottrade account which has come to my attention via a 3 e-mail communication stating that they were going to put
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4 my account inactive, and my funds were going to go into 5 some other account, whatever. When I notified them I 6 had not had any statement or anything from them in five, 7 six years, whenever it was, and I came to know that I 8 had $1700 in there, which I immediately took out to pay 9 bills. 10 Q. All right. 11 A. Other than that, I don't have any direct 12 recollection of me personally having any stock accounts. 13 Q. Do you not have any direct recollection of 14 having a brokerage account at LaSalle Street Securities? 15 A. If I have a brokerage account at LaSalle Street 16 Securities, I'd be very surprised. But anything is 17 possible considering my mental state at the time. 18 Q. All right. Did you -- do you have any 19 recollection of having a brokerage account at Janney 20 Montgomery Scott? 21 A. I believe -- no, I don't have any recollection. 22 Q. And how about at Scottsdale Capital Management? 23 A. Not that I know of. 24 THE WITNESS: Your kidneys are better than 25 mine. 0065 1 MR. RUE: Well, mine are getting at the 2 limit. Let's go off the record. 3 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Okay. This marks the 4 end of tape 1. The time is 12:08 p.m., and we're off 5 the record. 6 (Short recess from 12:08 p.m. to 12:29 7 p.m.) 8 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Here marks the 9 beginning of tape 2 in the deposition of John Rivera. 10 The time on the monitor is 12:29 p.m. We're on the 11 record. 12 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Mr. Rivera, what role did you 13 play in the preparation of the SSTP form 10 registration 14 statement? 15 A. What participation? 16 Q. What role did you play in the preparation of? 17 A. Zero. I didn't see it until it was posted on 18 Edgar. 19 Q. Didn't review it? 20 A. Pardon me? 21 Q. Didn't review it before it posted? 22 A. I was at a state where I could not read that 23 many documents and, A, focus my eyes; or B, comprehend
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24 what I was reading. 25 Q. Uh-huh. Other than this case, have you ever 0066 1 been involved in a proceeding with the Securities and 2 Exchange Commission? 3 A. No. 4 Q. How about any state securities commission? 5 A. No. 6 Q. How about have you been involved in any sort of 7 NASD or FINRA regulatory proceeding? 8 A. No. 9 Q. Arbitration? 10 A. Arbitration and anything to do with FINRA, the 11 Securities and Exchange Commission, state, anything in 12 that venue, no. 13 Q. Do you know what a -- you are aware of what a 14 FINRA arbitration is or an NASD arbitration? 15 A. I have no direct knowledge since I've never 16 been involved in it. 17 Q. Okay. How about have you been a defendant in 18 any civil case in the last ten years? 19 A. You know I have. 20 Q. Well, can you help me out and tell me which 21 ones? I know of the Nurant case. 22 A. Okay. 23 Q. Anything else? 24 A. Oh, yes, I was arrested for stealing a fuel 25 tank. 0067 1 Q. Yeah. That's a criminal case. I'm asking 2 about civil ones. I'll get to criminal in a minute. 3 A. Oh. I guess is dissolution of marriage a civil 4 case? 5 Q. Yeah. And we've got that, and that's 2004? 6 A. Very good. There was a stockholders dispute 7 that was settled. 8 Q. Was it filed in court before it was settled? 9 A. Oh, yeah, in Florida. 10 Q. Was that -- who was involved in that besides 11 you, or which entity was involved in that? 12 A. Pardon me? 13 Q. Which entity was involved in that case? 14 A. I was sued personally. I was -- during the 15 operation of, I believe it was Phoenix Eco or GWE, I 16 don't remember which, but tried -- well -17 Q. All right.
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18 A. I was raising money to buy something or the 19 other, and I sold ownership in either GWE or Phoenix Eco 20 to three different individuals. And when it was 21 converted to U.S. Sustainable Energy Corporation, stock 22 was issued to two of the individuals. The third one 23 couldn't be found because he moved back to Colombia and 24 no longer lived at the address that I knew him at. And 25 we couldn't find him and didn't hear anything from him 0068 1 until he had somebody in the state's attorney's office, 2 you know, file charges. 3 And I was arrested here in Texas. And 4 when I found out what it was all about, I said, look, 5 you know, we've got this guy here, he got his stock, he 6 got his stock, he was in Colombia, he was unavailable. 7 Q. Is this the suit that was in connection with a 8 fellow named Mejia? 9 A. Mejia, that is correct. And I said -10 Q. He's a talker. 11 A. Huh? 12 Q. He's a talker. 13 A. Oh, sir, you have not heard -14 Q. Yes, I have. 15 A. -- a talker yet until you sit down with Michael 16 Garjian. 17 Q. Okay. 18 A. Okay. He will redefine the definition of 19 talker. 20 Q. Well, I'll compare him to Mr. Mejia. 21 A. Okay. 22 Q. I -- how about -- I know you were charged 23 criminally with the theft of the tanks? 24 A. Uh-huh. Yes, sir. 25 Q. And that was disposed of? It was dismissed? 0069 1 A. Well, as long as you brought up my criminal 2 record onto the record, I would like to expound on what 3 that was about. 4 Q. Well, that would be fine. 5 A. Okay. We had an individual file charges with 6 the Harris County Sheriff's Department that I stole a 7 6,000-gallon tank. The detective comes out and says, 8 Mr. -- oh, God, what's his name? Helmut. 9 Q. That would be Helmut Gass? 10 A. Yeah. 11 Q. Okay.
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12 A. So I said, I don't know what you're talking 13 about. Can you tell me which one of these tanks I 14 stole? I've got nine of them. 15 And he said, well, did you -- what do you 16 mean you've got nine? I said I've got nine of them. 17 Okay. And here's the cashier's check for all nine of 18 them. Here's the bill of sale for all nine of them. 19 Okay. And, you know, I thought that was the end of it. 20 Two weeks later, they come and they arrest me for grand 21 theft. 22 We submitted so much indisputable 23 documentation, it was not dismissed as you portray. The 24 grand jury refused to indict and claimed it to be a 25 frivolous criminal lawsuit. 0070 1 Q. So the term is not dismissed but no-billed? 2 A. No what? 3 Q. No-billed. 4 A. Why thank you, sir. My day is complete. I 5 have learned something new. 6 Q. Good. 7 Other than that criminal case, I guess the 8 Mejia case had a criminal component to it, also? 9 A. When I found out what it was about, there was 10 no criminal component to it because A, I owed him the 11 money. I gave him the option of getting stock or 12 getting his money back. He chose his money back. And 13 when he made that choice, the money was paid within 24 14 hours. 15 Q. Okay. Any other criminal charges brought 16 against you since -17 A. Yes, sir. 18 Q. -- since 2000? Let's limit it. 19 A. Yes, sir. 20 Q. Okay. Tell me about it. 21 A. I got a criminal restraining order lodged 22 against me. Okay. Someone in fear of their life by the 23 name of Jens Dalsgaard. He got a criminal -- he got 24 a -- are you ready for this? 25 Q. Yeah. 0071 1 A. A restraining order because he thought I was 2 going to take one of my guns and shoot it in the air in 3 Houston and hit him in California. And the judge said, 4 Mr. Dalsgaard, I don't think Mr. Rivera is that good a 5 shot where he can shoot a gun in Houston, Texas and hit
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6 you down here. 7 Q. All right. 8 A. And that was thrown out, and I was awarded 9 court costs. 10 Q. All right. Now, did you have a civil suit with 11 Mr. Dalsgaard? 12 A. We did. 13 Q. What was the resolution of that? 14 A. That -- the resolution of that I really have no 15 direct recollection or knowledge because when they said 16 that -- the board said that they were going to settle 17 the suit, I said I'd fry in hell first. All right. But 18 I was acting on behalf of myself and a stockholder and 19 that is the officer or director of SSTP. 20 Q. So that was S -- SSTP related. Approximately 21 when was that? 22 A. Sometime in the last two years. 23 Q. Where -- where did -- where was the lawsuit 24 filed? Do you know? 25 A. I don't know. I think it was California, but 0072 1 you should have much more information on that since the 2 federal judges gave you the paperwork, okay, where they 3 referred charges on the Rico Act for Jens Dalsgaard and 4 all of his Does to the Securities and Exchange 5 Commission for you guys to go after him. So I'm sure 6 you have a dossier 2,000 pages long. 7 Q. I don't. But -8 A. Well, -9 Q. -- someone else does -10 A. -- gee, I would only imagine that since -11 Q. Someone else at the Commission might. 12 A. I would only imagine since Jens Dalsgaard is so 13 intimately involved in the fraud committed with 14 Sustainable Power and Sustainable Energy, okay, and he 15 was the author of all, if not most, of the press 16 releases, and he was committing the pump and dump which 17 you have proof of beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the 18 case, since you have such intimate knowledge of, would 19 have been assigned to you. 20 Q. Well, that doesn't always work that way, sir. 21 A. I'm sorry. My grandfather told me what happens 22 when you assume, and I fell into that trap. 23 Q. Oh, good. 24 What about Torco Oil? Do you remember 25 that lawsuit? Torco Oil versus Charlotte Aircraft?
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0073 1 A. Gee, I guess my memory isn't as good as I 2 thought it was because I do believe that you 3 unequivocally put a 2000 -- year 2000. 4 Q. You're right. 5 A. Ah. 6 Q. You're right, I did. 7 A. So, you know -8 Q. All right. That's fine. 9 A. That was 30 years before 2000 or 40 years 10 before 2000. 11 I'm sorry. I just -- look, -12 Q. All right. 13 A. -- I'm trying to comprehend everything and 14 answer my questions -- the questions that were asked to 15 the best of my ability. 16 Q. Okay. Let me -- well, let's just change the 17 subject, then. 18 A. Thank you. 19 Q. What e-mail addresses have you used over the 20 past five years? 21 A. Jhrivera@jhrivera.com. 22 Q. All right. Is that the only one? 23 A. No, sir. I was being courteous and giving you 24 enough time to write it down. 25 Q. That's fine. 0074 1 A. If you want, I can just blurt them out. 2 Q. No. Let's go through them the way you feel 3 most comfortable. 4 A. No, sir, I'm just trying to answer your 5 question. 6 Q. How about jhrivera@yahoo.com? 7 A. That was the next one I was going to delineate. 8 Q. All right. Now -9 A. How about jhrivera@msn.com. 10 Q. All right. 11 A. How about jhrivera@aol.com. 12 Q. Okay. 13 A. How about jhrivera@rhino -- I'll have to get 14 you the rest of that acronym because I don't know if 15 it's rhino.com or greenrhino.com, something to that 16 effect. 17 And I am sure that I've had other e-mail 18 addresses in the 61 years of my life, but those are the 19 only ones that come to mind.
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20 Q. How about did you have an e-mail address that 21 you used at U.S. Sustainable Power? 22 A. There you go. Thank you very much. 23 Jhrivera@usse.us, jhrivera@sstp.us. 24 Q. All right. 25 A. Now, the reason that I did not delineate those 0075 1 is because all those e-mails that -- every one of them 2 that we've -- I have just delineated are all forwarded, 3 all right, to jhrivera@ -- jhrivera@yahoo.com. 4 Q. So jhrivera@yahoo.com is your principal e-mail 5 address? 6 A. That is correct. 7 Q. All right. Now, I remember earlier reading 8 through some of these transcripts, you talked about that 9 as being a spam e-mail address? 10 A. I'm sorry. I don't know of what testimony 11 you're referring to. If you would care to show me what 12 you're talking about, I'd be more than glad to respond 13 to it. 14 Q. All right. I might. 15 You recall that you gave testimony in 16 Atlanta in connection with this matter? 17 A. I have no direct recollection of anything that 18 happened there. 19 Q. Do you recall that you gave testimony in 20 Atlanta in this matter? 21 A. How could something that painful not be, even 22 under my diminished state, I still remem -- still 23 remember such an unpleasant experience. 24 Q. Okay. And you did that three times? 25 A. If you say so. 0076 1 Q. Once in March. And I have transcripts here. 2 We can talk about them if you want. 3 A. As I said, I have no direct recollection of any 4 of those times or even if I've been there three times. 5 Q. All right. 6 THE WITNESS: Somebody is beeping. Oh. 7 Q. (By Mr. Rue) So after listening to that 8 description of your e-mail addresses, let me ask you 9 this: Would it be fair to say that any e-mail that was 10 sent to you at either jhrivera@ussec.us or 11 jhrivera@yahoo.com would have been an e-mail that you 12 were likely to have read? 13 A. No.
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14 Q. Okay. Then explain your answer. 15 A. Pardon me? 16 Q. Explain your answer. 17 A. Any e-mail other than jhrivera.com, if the 18 sender, the person sending the e-mail -19 Q. Yes. 20 A. -- is not in my contact list, it goes into spam 21 and is not forwarded. 22 Q. All right. Well, let's talk about some people 23 that might have been in your contact list. Was Jens 24 Dalsgaard on your contact list? 25 A. Yes, he was. 0077 1 Q. How about Kelmer Smith? 2 A. Yes, he was. 3 Q. How about Robert Davis? 4 A. Absolutely. 5 Q. How about Alex Machado? 6 A. Alex has so many variations of his -- so many 7 different e-mail accounts that, you know, he's told me 8 of a lot of e-mails that he has sent that I never got 9 because of the account that he sent it from. 10 And he's a personal friend. I would have 11 no reason not to accept his. It's just that, you know, 12 you can only put so many aliases in a reception box. 13 Q. All right. How about Keith Mazer? 14 A. He was a employee. 15 Q. Was he on your contact list? 16 A. He was on the SSTP contact list. He was 17 definitely a -- a mistake that was augmented by my 18 limited mental capacity when I hired him and throughout. 19 He was asked to resign for moral 20 turpitude. And when he refused to do that, the board of 21 directors -- is there an exhibit number or something you 22 want to give this? 23 Q. Well, let me -- hand it to me. What are -- you 24 have just handed me a document -25 A. Which is a corporate resolution -0078 1 Q. -- that -2 A. -- firing Keith Mazer for public drunkenness 3 and various other causes. 4 Q. That's dated the 2nd day of February 2008. All 5 right. 6 A. I should have never hired anybody and would 7 have never hired anybody known to be -- oh my God,
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8 mental blank -- bipolar. 9 Q. All right. Let's mark this document that 10 you've just given me as Plaintiff's Exhibit 108 just so 11 we got a record of it. 12 (Exhibit No. 108 marked.) 13 A. What was that, sir? 14 Q. (By Mr. Rue) I just marked this as Plaintiff's 15 Exhibit 108. 16 A. 108. Thank you, sir. 17 Q. All right. Which you just provided me and 18 which appears to be a consent to action without meeting 19 of the board of directors of Sustainable Power, dated 20 the 2nd day of February 2008. 21 Let's -- let's talk for another moment 22 about a document that's previously been marked as 23 Plaintiff's 87. 24 And Plaintiff's 87 is a, I believe, 25 two-part exhibit. The first part of it as it's 0079 1 presented here appears to be the United States 2 Securities and Exchange Commission statement of 3 financial condition of John Rivera as of December 18th, 4 2009. 5 Would you look at page 7 of that document 6 for me, please, Mr. Rivera? The page numbers are on the 7 bottom of the page. 8 A. Yes, sir. 9 Q. Is that your signature? 10 A. Yes, sir, it is. 11 Q. All right. And you signed it on December 8th, 12 2010? 13 A. Yes, sir, it is. 14 Q. All right. Who provided the information that 15 is presented on this form? 16 A. Richard Cutler provided it to you. 17 Q. I know that Richard Cutler provided the 18 document. 19 A. Oh, I'm sorry, I misunderstood the question. 20 What is the question? 21 Q. I understand that he provided the document to 22 Tom Gorman who in turn provided it to me. 23 A. Okay. 24 Q. And I understand that someone in Mr. Cutler's 25 office prepared the document from some information that 0080 1 they got from somewhere. Were you the person that
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2 provided the information that supports this document? 3 A. It appears generally to be something that I 4 would have supplied. Although, the mortgage amounts, 5 auto loans and all these liabilities, I'm not familiar 6 with these numbers, and I'm sure that the liabilities 7 are much more than what is being delineated here. 8 Q. All right. Looking at the first page of the 9 document, under securities it shows 545 billion shares 10 of the Sustainable Power restricted common stock. 11 A. What page? 12 Q. 1. Item 8. 13 A. Wow. You're going to have to excuse me, sir, 14 because when I went to school, six zeroes meant million 15 not billion. 16 Q. You're right. 17 A. I'm sorry, I -18 Q. I stand -- I stand corrected. It's 545 million 19 shares of SSTP restricted stock. Is that about right? 20 A. I would say that was within the range of what I 21 have. 22 Q. And what about U.S. Sustainable Energy stock, 23 how much of that do you have? 24 A. None. I gave it all back to the company. 25 Q. All right. Now, this lists assets. It appears 0081 1 to me that you're wearing a rather nice diamond ring. 2 A. That's my wedding ring. 3 Q. All right. 4 A. I wore that last Monday. 5 Q. All right. Is it itemized on here anywhere? 6 A. No. 7 Q. When did you get that ring? 8 A. I don't know. It was three or four or five 9 years ago. I don't know. 10 Q. Okay. How about watches, do you see any 11 watches listed here under assets? 12 A. No. 13 Q. Do you have any watches? 14 A. Yes, sir, I've got a platitude of watches. 15 I've got a watch on my phone. I got a watch on my 16 computer. 17 Q. How about Rolex watches? 18 A. Do I -- no, sir, I do not. 19 Q. Okay. 20 A. Aren't you going to ask why? 21 Q. I will.
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22 A. Oh, thank you. I'm sorry. I'll wait for you 23 to ask the question. I'm -- so bad of me. 24 Q. Go ahead. Tell me why. 25 A. Because I had to sell them in order to pay 0082 1 living expenses, in order to pay for my prescriptions, 2 in order to pay for my medical insurance which I will 3 not be able to pay next month because of you. 4 Q. No, sir, not because of me. 5 A. Time will tell. 6 Q. Perhaps because of the Securities and Exchange 7 Commission, but I am only an employee. 8 A. Not according to Bevins. 9 Q. I beg your pardon? 10 A. I'm sorry, nothing. 11 Q. Let's look at the second page under 12 liabilities. 13 A. Yes, sir. 14 Q. It shows a mortgage there of $277,617. 15 A. Yes, sir. 16 Q. What is that mortgage on? 17 A. Not attesting that that figure is correct 18 because I don't know what that is, all right, but it was 19 delineating a property in West Palm Beach, Florida which 20 had an appraised value of $450,000. 21 Q. Okay. 22 A. And was repossessed and sold under a short sale 23 by the bank for $102,000. 24 Q. All right. Auto -- auto loans. Is that number 25 approximately correct, 230,000 -- 233,600 bucks? 0083 1 A. Item No. 2? 2 Q. Uh-huh. 3 A. Well, I don't know what that number is now, 4 because we've had -- I don't know if it was eight, nine, 5 ten, 11 vehicles all repossessed since this was made, 6 so... 7 Q. Okay. 8 A. I don't know what the deficit balances are, 9 but... 10 Q. All right. But this was right at the time it 11 was signed? 12 A. To the best of my knowledge. 13 Q. Good. Item 8, judgment settlements, 150,000. 14 Can you tell me what lawsuit that's in connection with? 15 A. No, sir, I cannot.
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16 Q. All right. Did you review this document before 17 you signed it? 18 A. As well as I could under the conditions I was 19 living in. 20 Q. What -- did you attempt to review this document 21 before you signed it? 22 A. I attempted to review the document. Only 23 having less than 10 percent of my mental capacity 24 available to me, I did the best job I could. 25 Q. All right. 0084 1 A. Is this for me or do you keep that? 2 Q. No. That's the official copy. 3 A. Here you go, sir. 4 Q. There we go. Let's keep a pile of those face 5 down, then they'll all be in order when we're done. 6 Have you made loans to either USSE or 7 Sustainable Power Corporation? 8 A. I am not trying to avoid the question. I 9 intend to answer it fully, but definitions of loans -10 does the money owe -- does the company owe me money? 11 Yes. 12 Now, I have given up a large quantity of 13 my free-trading stock to the company in order for the 14 company to raise money where I have mostly received 15 restricted stock in exchange. I have about 5 million 16 dollars' worth of equipment that was mine prior to the 17 existence of any public company that may or may not have 18 been listed as a loan. As I said, I have no firsthand 19 recollection of that time period. 20 I have a 500,000-dollar-a-year salary that 21 I have not collected, okay, and have agreed not to 22 collect until the company was profitable. 23 So have I loaned them money in one way, 24 shape or form or another? Yes. And I've just 25 delineated the occurrences that come to mind. 0085 1 Q. All right. Have you advanced cash to the 2 company to allow it to continue its operations and pay 3 its expenses? 4 A. I have advanced cash either through a private 5 placement or a -- contributing my free-trading shares 6 for restricted shares so the company could continue. 7 Q. I guess I need you to help me with private 8 placement. What are you talking about there? 9 A. Private placement. That is -- and I'm not an
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10 attorney, so therefore, I have to rely upon my 11 Securities and Exchange Commission attorneys. 12 It is a sale of stock not made in the 13 public arena, okay, at a, I believe, and I'm not sure, a 14 discounted price, to sell a block of stock in order to 15 raise money so the company could continue. That is what 16 I understand from my SEC attorney. 17 Q. All right. It seems to me that what you've 18 said is subject to a couple of interpretations. One of 19 them would be that you gave stock to the company, either 20 restricted or free-trading stock. 21 A. Uh-huh. 22 Q. And the company made a private placement of 23 that stock with under -- with individuals. And as a 24 result, we see the money directly in the company. 25 A. That's correct. 0086 1 Q. And the other way I could interpret that is 2 that you, John Rivera, made a private placement of stock 3 that you owned in the company which was restricted or 4 freely traded. And the money from the investors came 5 directly to you, and you advanced it to the company. 6 A. I, John Rivera, have no knowledge and had no 7 knowledge of public companies or the workings thereof. 8 I wouldn't have known a private placement if it hit me 9 on the head with a 2-by-4. 10 All transactions, whether for SSTP or to 11 John Rivera or for anybody else who helped the company 12 out, was fully authored and executed by Richard Cutler, 13 our Securities Exchange attorney. 14 So as to, you know, the mechanics of that, 15 you would have -- I would have to refer to him. 16 Q. All right. Now, you -- well, you mentioned 17 5 million dollars' worth of equipment that belongs to 18 you? 19 A. That is correct. 20 Q. All right. And you have allowed the companies, 21 I assume, to use that equipment for a period of time? 22 A. That is incorrect. 23 Q. Well, then, explain to me. 24 A. I gave it to the company. I don't know if I 25 received loan payments for it or if I didn't receive 0087 1 loan payments for it, but the company owns it. 2 Q. Okay. 3 A. And it's about to be going off for public
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4 auction. 20 million dollars' worth of equipment is 5 probably going to go for about $2,000. 6 Q. Okay. Do you recall -7 A. He's done a great job. 8 Q. Do you recall whether or not you directly 9 advanced cash to either U.S. Sustainable Energy or 10 Sustainable Power Corporation? 11 A. The only direct cash that I can recall taking 12 out of my pocket to anybody is for a cab driver, a limo 13 driver, or a tip at a restaurant. Those transactions 14 for the company, not knowing anything about a public 15 company, I relied upon my investment bankers, Berkshire 16 Capital, Joe Fiore, and my Securities and Exchange 17 attorneys and my CPAs to advise me. I didn't know that 18 my IR firm and my investment bankers were in collusion 19 to defraud me and all my stockholders. 20 Q. So you can't remember whether you advanced 21 money directly to the company from one of your bank 22 accounts or brokerage accounts or not? 23 A. Mr. Rue, I just answered the question to the 24 best of my knowledge. Okay. I have no problems 25 answering questions one time. 0088 1 Q. All right. 2 A. That question has been asked and answered. 3 Q. Well, if you have a bank or a brokerage account 4 that shows a transaction going -- a sum of money going 5 to USSE or SSTP, would that be a transaction that you 6 authorized or not? 7 A. If I had a brokerage account, which I have no 8 memory of, and monies went from that brokerage account 9 to SSTP and USSE, I do not believe that that brokerage 10 house would transfer those monies to anybody without my 11 direct written consent. 12 Q. Thank you. 13 All righty. Let's look at a bunch of 14 exhibits here. Let me show you a document which is not 15 completely stapled as nicely as I'd like it to be. But 16 it's previously been marked as Exhibit 66 in this case. 17 A. Cutler Law Group? 18 MR. RUE: Do you need a copy, Don? 19 MR. LELAND: Nah. 20 MR. RUE: I'd like to give you a copy so I 21 don't have to pack it back to Atlanta. 22 MR. LELAND: Okay. All right. 23 MR. RUE: You can throw it away when I
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24 leave. 25 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Now, this is a package of 0089 1 documents, all of which have been written by M. Richard 2 Cutler, Esquire, who you've identified as your 3 securities attorney. 4 A. Where on this document does it attest that 5 these are original, exact copies of what he has? 6 Q. Well, I expect, Mr. Rivera, if we go back to 7 Mr. Cutler's deposition, we can find that he 8 authenticated them. But again -9 A. I'm just asking the question. 10 Q. Well, I -- you know, I think Mr. Cutler has 11 identified them. But if that's not the case, you know, 12 they came from records of transfer on-line. And I 13 just -- I don't want to ask you about the documents 14 themselves because you're not a lawyer, and you don't 15 know whether these are good Rule 144 letters or not. I 16 am just asking you -- well, I'm going to ask you: Who 17 is Radhames Lora, and how come you gave him -- how come 18 he was given 20 million shares of Sustainable Power 19 Corp.? 20 A. What page is that, sir? 21 Q. The first page. Or his letter dated August 22 11th, 2008 from Mr. Cutler to Transfer Online, re: Rule 23 144(k), sale of up to 20 million shares of Sustainable 24 Power Company stock by Radhames Lora, represented by 25 certificate number such and so. 0090 1 A. Okay. And your question is? 2 Q. Who is Radhames Lora? 3 A. Radhames. 4 Q. Radhames? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. Who is he? 7 A. Vice Admiral Radhames Lora is a personal friend 8 of mine going back 20, 30 years. 9 Q. Okay. 10 A. Who is a retired two star admiral. He is the 11 youngest man ever to graduate or get his Ph.D. at 12 Cornell University. The only man that the chancellor at 13 Cornell University wrote and thanked the president of 14 the Dominican Republic for sending him to Cornell. 15 He is the Caribbean, Central and South 16 America judo champ. He is the youngest man ever to 17 enter the Judo Hall of Fame. He is --
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18 Q. Now, where is the Judo Hall of Fame? 19 A. Pardon me? 20 Q. Where is the Judo Hall of Fame? 21 A. Well, I'm sure I could look it up for you. All 22 I've seen is the awards. 23 Q. Okay. I'll find it. 24 A. Oh, I'm sure. 25 Q. All right. Go on. 0091 1 A. He is a -- the advisor to the former president, 2 and he is -- was the director of disaster and emergency 3 response. He is the only man in the history of the 4 Dominican Republic where the U.S. and other countries 5 have written him open checks to take care of disasters 6 because he is the only man in the history of the 7 Dominican Republic ever to account for every cent that 8 was ever given, where it went, who it went to. 9 When he was replaced, they started 10 dropping off beans and tomatoes instead of getting what 11 was needed. 12 Q. Do you know how he came to be -- how he came to 13 hold 20 million shares of Sustainable Power Corporation? 14 A. I do. 15 Q. Would you tell me? 16 A. For work done in the past, obtaining contracts, 17 lands, introductions for Tubes Technology Licensing, 18 Earth First Technologies. And acting as a political 19 advisor and introducing us to major energy and fuel 20 sources in the Dominican Republic. And as a ambassador 21 for us in various Central and South American countries. 22 For bringing in the Dominican Institute of Technology to 23 invite us to the Dominican Republic to work hand in hand 24 with their scientists, proving or disproving our 25 technology. 0092 1 The man has been invaluable to me and the 2 companies I either was with or represented for the last 3 30 years. 4 Q. All right. 5 A. And he has an impeccable worldwide reputation 6 and is respected worldwide. 7 Q. Thank you. 8 Does he maintain a residence in and around 9 Ithaca, New York? 10 A. I don't know. 11 Q. Where do you think he lives?
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12 A. In the Dominican Republic. 13 Q. All right. Let's look at the next page of 14 this. Well, that's -- the next page is the same one. 15 Let's look at the third page down which is a September 16 5th, 2008 letter from Mr. Cutler to Transfer Online, re: 17 Rule 144(k), sale of up to 11,360,000 shares of 18 Sustainable Power common stock by Berkshire Capital 19 Management Company, Inc. 20 Do you know how Berkshire Capital 21 Management Company, Inc. came to acquire 11,360,000 22 shares of Sustainable Power Company stock? 23 A. My opinion or fact? 24 Q. I'd like fact first. 25 A. This stock was -- wait a minute. 0093 1 (Sotto voce discussion.) 2 A. This appears to be a legal opinion, if I'm not 3 correct. 4 Q. (By Mr. Rue) It is a legal opinion? 5 A. Well, I don't know. I'm just reading the text, 6 and this is what I'm assuming. 7 Q. That's what's commonly referred to as a Rule 8 144 letter. 9 A. Okay, sir. 10 Q. And it removes the restriction on restricted 11 shares of common stock. 12 A. And what is your question on this for me? 13 Q. And my question is: How come, if you know, 14 Berkshire Capital Management Company, Inc. acquired 15 11,360,000 shares of Sustainable Power Corp.? 16 A. I don't know how they acquired 11,360,000 17 shares of Sustainable Power Corp. I do know, okay, how 18 they defrauded Sustainable Power out of 50 to 60 million 19 shares. 20 Q. Well, before we get to that, tell me what 21 Berkshire Capital Management Company is. 22 A. They're investment bankers supposably. 23 Actually, they are cohorts, partners in crime with 24 Redwood Consultants and Jens Dalsgaard. 25 Q. And Berkshire Capital Management is represented 0094 1 by individuals, I would assume? 2 A. Berkshire Cap -- oh, people that work for them? 3 Q. Yes. 4 A. Oh, that's a great assumption, yes, sir. 5 Q. And who is the head of Berkshire Capital
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6 Management Company? 7 A. Well, Joe Fiore would be a pretty good guess, 8 and I would probably bet my life on it. 9 Q. All right. 10 A. So I guess I'm pretty sure it's Joe Fiore. 11 Q. How did you come to meet Mr. Fiore? 12 A. I was introduced to him as my investment 13 banker, okay, the person that would make sure that the 14 company had all the money it needed to do all its 15 business and build all its plants and make sure that, 16 you know, everything we did and all our financial needs 17 would be covered by a Mr. Jens Dalsgaard. 18 Q. Dalsgaard introduced you to Fiore, correct? 19 A. I believe that's what I just said, yes, sir. 20 Q. Okay. Other than Mr. Fiore, can you give me 21 the names of some other people associated with Berkshire 22 Capital Management in a management capacity? 23 A. There's an Angela. I don't know what their 24 capacities are because all our conversations and all our 25 interactions has been on a friendly first-name basis. 0095 1 And, you know, their specific functions, I have no idea. 2 Q. Okay. 3 A. But there's an Amanda, then there's another guy 4 that I know of. 5 Q. James Mylock? 6 A. There you go. Thank you, sir. 7 Q. And others? 8 A. All right. There's Joe, there's Mylock, 9 there's Angela. 10 Q. Gina Dellafina? 11 A. Yes. I know that name from there. 12 Q. And probably others. 13 A. Oh, a platitude of others that are readily 14 available to you if you take the stock transfer on-line 15 records and see all the people that the Berkshire 16 Capital stock is broken down into, and you'll find 20 or 17 30 different people. 18 Q. Yes, sir, I have seen -19 A. I'm sure -20 Q. -- some of that. 21 A. I'm sure you have, sir. 22 Q. And I understand that there's some affiliation 23 with Berkshire -- between Berkshire Capital Management 24 and Eat at Joe's, Ltd.? 25 A. Eat at Joe's, Ltd., is -- gee, Eat at Joe
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0096 1 Fiore's would be a better title. 2 Q. It's another company that Mr. Fiore owns? 3 A. That is correct. 4 Q. And Diamond Ranch, Ltd., is another one of 5 those entities? 6 A. Can I talk to my attorney for a second? 7 Q. Sure. 8 (Discussion held off the record for less 9 than one minute.) 10 A. I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to be obtuse. 11 Q. (By Mr. Rue) That's fine. You get the right 12 to consult with your attorney anytime you want. 13 A. I do know Diamond Ranch as being associated in 14 some way with Berkshire Capital. 15 Q. Did U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp., the 16 Mississippi corporation, acquire or merge into Laforza 17 Automobiles as a result of some effort on the part of 18 Mr. Fiore or his colleagues? 19 A. Mr. Rue, I want to answer this question as 20 forthright as possible. If I could have a little wiggle 21 room because I don't know whether it was -- in fact, I'm 22 pretty positive that U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp. 23 Mississippi never transacted any business whatsoever. 24 So, but I will say that whether it was 25 Phoenix Eco or whatever the entity was, it did become a 0097 1 public enemy -- entity because of Joe Fiore's bringing 2 Laforza. And this was, quote/unquote, Laforza was a 3 "clean shell" that had -- that was fully reporting. And 4 I would say at least three hours of dissertation on why 5 this was the right move and probably another eight hours 6 of dissertation explaining why I had to give up stock to 7 this person, that person, the other person in order to 8 get it. 9 Q. Okay. 10 A. Excuse me? 11 Q. I said okay. 12 May I conclude from what you just said 13 that you had to give up stock in U.S. Sustainable 14 Energy, the publicly-traded company, to a variety of 15 individuals that were associated with Mr. Fiore? 16 A. No, sir. That is totally an incorrect 17 statement the way I recall it. 18 Q. Okay. 19 A. A correct statement that I would be willing to
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20 attest to is that I had to give up stock of Laforza, the 21 public company -22 Q. All right. 23 A. -- before USSE could obtain the shell and 24 continue as a public company. There was no stock to be 25 given in USSE at that time because it was not a public 0098 1 company. 2 Q. How did -3 A. I hope that clarifies it. 4 Q. It does. 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. How did you acquire the stock in Laforza that 7 you had to give up? 8 A. Don't ask me for exact numbers or even 9 approximate numbers because I have no idea. I do not 10 remember. But there was a big block, or for me a big 11 block, of stock that was coming to -- when I say me, I'm 12 referring to John Rivera as CEO and chairman of the 13 board of USSE. Acting on that capacity, there was a 14 large block of stock of, quote, "insiders of 15 free-trading stock" that we were going to get. And, you 16 know, I thought that was wonderful. 17 But then they said that this guy had to 18 get so many million shares, and that guy had to get so 19 many million shares. And then, you know, Joe Fiore's 20 people had to get so many shares because he put the deal 21 together. And Jens Dalsgaard had to get so many shares. 22 And, you know, they said that they would 23 have the stock selling at a dollar in 90 days. And, you 24 know, that was going to pay for websites, and it was 25 going to pay for PR firms. I want to say 5W or 0099 1 something like that. 2 Q. I've seen that name. 3 A. Something -- oh, the Wall Street Journal 4 Review, you know, pay for that. So, anyway, there was a 5 large amount of stock that -- and I said, well, why 6 doesn't the company just distribute the stock? And they 7 says, well, if you put it into the company's treasury, 8 it all becomes restricted. That's why you have to put 9 it into individual names like it is now. 10 Q. Did you pay for your portion of the Laforza 11 stock? 12 A. Excuse me? 13 Q. Did you pay for the portion that you -- of
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14 Laforza stock that you received? 15 A. Only by putting my technology into the company. 16 Q. All right. So you were given stock in Laforza, 17 which became USSE, in consideration for the technology 18 license that you granted to the company? 19 A. That is correct. 20 Q. All right. And I have noticed last week when 21 we were here that Ms. Price appears to have purchased 22 some number of shares of Laforza in the open market. 23 Are you familiar -24 A. Yesterday? 25 Q. I didn't say yesterday. 0100 1 A. Sometime in the near -2 Q. I remem -- I remember when we were here last 3 week and looking at brokerage accounts, that Ms. Price, 4 now Mrs. Rivera, -5 A. Yeah. 6 Q. -- purchased a certain amount of Laforza stock 7 in the open market. Are you familiar with that? 8 A. No, I'm not. 9 Q. Okay. Now, what was the corporate shell that 10 was the predecessor of Sustainable Power Corporation? 11 A. What was the corporate shell that was the 12 predecessor of Sustainable Power Corporation? 13 Q. Yes. 14 A. There was no predecessor. 15 Q. Well, that was another corporate shell. There 16 was another corporate shell out there that we -- that 17 Sustainable Power Corp. merged into, wasn't there? 18 A. Sustainable Power Corporation merged into 19 Laforza Automotive. 20 Q. U.S. Sustainable Energy merged into Laforza. 21 Sustainable Power merged into somebody else, the name of 22 which escapes me right now. 23 A. Please take back all testimony that I just gave 24 on Laforza. I had the companies mixed up. And the 25 testimony which I just gave on Laforza, okay, was not 0101 1 Laforza. I misunderstood. I confused USSE with SSTP. 2 Q. Okay. 3 A. If you want to substitute SSTP with USSE, the 4 testimony is accurate. 5 Q. What's the name of the other shell? Do you 6 remember? Clear? 7 A. Hmm?
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8 Q. Was it Clear something? 9 A. Some weird name. 10 Q. No matter. Well, here, I have a source of 11 information. 12 A. I can't believe I did that. But that's just so 13 damn convoluting, it would mix Einstein up. 14 Q. I think, in fact, Mr. Rivera, you were correct 15 about USSE and Laforza. And the other company here -16 ah, how about the name Offshore Creations? Does that -17 A. Bingo. 18 Q. -- ring a bell? 19 A. That is Joe Fiore. 20 Q. That one is Joe Fiore, too? 21 A. Absolutely, yes. 22 Q. And it's the same sort of transaction that 23 you've just described? 24 A. The transaction that I just described was for 25 Laforza, okay, with the Offshore Creations. That was a 0102 1 shell that Joe purportedly could get. I later found out 2 that it was always his. You know, more of the fraud. 3 And basically the same scenario. Only 4 this time where Jens got the lion's share of the stock 5 from Laforza, Joe got the lion's share of the stock. 6 Joe and Jens got the lion's share of the stock from 7 Offshore Creations. 8 THE WITNESS: And I need to go off the 9 record and out of here for three minutes. 10 MR. RUE: That's fine with me. Let's go 11 off the record. 12 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 1:34 p.m. 13 We're off the record. 14 (Short recess from 1:34 p.m. to 1:37 p.m. 15 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: The time is 1:37 p.m. 16 We're back on the record. 17 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Mr. Rivera, let's go back to the 18 document that I had marked as Plaintiff's Exhibit 66. 19 Four or five pages down in there, there is a letter 20 dated September 5th, 2008 from Mr. Cutler to transfer 21 on-line where a stock certificate from Ms. Price, now 22 Rivera, is transferred to a number of individuals. Do 23 you see that? It's a transfer, Alice Price, Edmond 24 Price -- Edwin Price, Berkshire Capital Management, Eat 25 at Joe's, Diamond Jim -- Diamond Ranch Foods, et cetera. 0103 1 A. How many pages?
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2 Q. I don't know. Four. One, two, three, six. 3 A. Oh. 4 Q. Six. 5 A. Okay. 6 Q. Is that one of the transactions that you were 7 talking about a moment ago in connection with the 8 acquisition of Sustainable Power Corp. shares? 9 A. I'm sorry, what is the question, sir? 10 Q. Who is Edwin Price? 11 A. That's Alice's brother. 12 Q. How did he come to own 22 million shares of 13 Sustainable Power Corporation? 14 A. For work that he's done throughout, GWE, the 15 various companies for writing safety manuals, for a 16 platitude of services which he provided. 17 Q. Okay. Two pages behind that or three, there is 18 a letter dated September 16th, 2008 from Cutler to 19 Transfer Online. And the RE on that is Rule 144(k), 20 sale of up to 22 million shares of Sustainable Power 21 Corp. common stock by Doroteo A. Rodriguez. Do you see 22 that document? 23 A. Yes. I'd like to go back to the prior document 24 and -25 Q. Sure. 0104 1 A. What is it that you're trying to signify with 2 this document here? 3 Q. I wanted to know who Edwin Price was. 4 A. All right. Edwin Price is Alice's brother. 5 Q. All right. And I wanted to confirm that this 6 is another one of the transfers of shares from Ms. Price 7 and her brother to Berkshire, Eat at Joe's, Diamond 8 Ranch, Amanda Johnson and Mylock. 9 A. This was a transfer of shares belonging to Mrs. 10 Price, Mrs. Rivera, okay, which she has supplied 22 11 million shares and distributed as found here, okay, 12 which she had the shares, the legend removed off the 13 shares under a 144 rule. And then she supplied it to 14 these people here for the company to raise money, okay? 15 And the company has promised to issue her back 16 restricted shares for this transaction. 17 Q. Okay. Now, how was this -- explain how this 18 transaction was going to operate to finance the company. 19 A. The way I have it understood, the shares going 20 to Berkshire Capital, Eat at Joe's, Diamond Food Ranch, 21 Amanda Johnson, James Mylock, okay, were being purchased
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22 by Berkshire Capital from SSTP where Alice Price, as a 23 stockholder, facilitated her free-trading shares so that 24 the company could sell these shares to Berkshire to 25 continue its operation. 0105 1 Q. And did they pay you -- did they pay 2 Sustainable Power for these shares? 3 A. Mr. Rue, I can only believe beyond a shadow of 4 a doubt that if this document was generated by Mr. 5 Richard Cutler, that he received the funds and put it 6 into the bank. 7 Q. All right. Then one, the second page, the -8 oh, it's the third page. The second page after this is 9 the September 16th, 2008 letter to Transfer Online 10 regarding shares held by Doroteo Rodriguez. Who is Mr. 11 Rodriguez? 12 A. Mr. Rodriguez is -- was with Endotek, which 13 is -- I don't know if to say the Army Corps of Engineers 14 or Oakridge National Laboratories or something of that 15 nature. The equivalent in the Dominican Republic for 16 alternate fuels, renewable fuels and general technology. 17 And he's been in that or other like 18 positions with the government for the last 20, 25 years. 19 Q. Did Admiral Lora introduce you to him? 20 A. He did. 21 Q. All right. How did Mr. Rodriguez come to 22 acquire these shares? 23 A. Mr. Rodriguez, or Dr. Rodriguez, okay, acquired 24 those shares. We owed Admiral Lora a bunch of shares 25 for all the work that he's done and contracts and 0106 1 acquisitions that he was promised stock for. And when 2 it came time to pay him, he said that his brother 3 assisted him. And he wanted to split up whatever shares 4 he got with his brother. 5 Q. And is Mr. Rodriguez his brother? 6 A. That's what I'm told. 7 Q. Rodriguez didn't perform any services that 8 you're aware of for U.S. Sustainable Energy or 9 Sustainable Power Corp.? 10 A. That is absolutely incorrect. Being with 11 Endotek, and I'm sure you've seen the videos, all right, 12 of the study done in the Dominican Republic where he's 13 identified himself and how he's saying that U.S. 14 Sustainable Energy was the only company who said they 15 had a technology and actually brought the technology to
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16 the country so that their scientific community could 17 either validate or disvalidate the technology. 18 I'm sure that if you saw all the videos, I 19 mean, you're on every website there is, you couldn't 20 have missed that one. And if you have, I will be more 21 than glad to facilitate. 22 Okay. Not only did he assist, but he had 23 the military there assisting us. He had all his 24 scientists assisting us. And he was instrumental in 25 bringing in scientists from Guatemala, Ecuador, Panama, 0107 1 Venezuela, Spain. So to say that he did not assist 2 Sustainable Power Corporation or USSE in any way would 3 be a total injustice and incorrect. 4 Mr. Doroteo Rodriguez has, over the years, 5 followed me and my technology. He's been to -- been to 6 Tampa. He's been to Port Gibson. He's been to Natchez. 7 He's been to Baytown. And they're just waiting for 8 these SEC charges for us to win the case or whatever. 9 And, you know, we're going to go full bore. 10 The only reason I'm still here is to take 11 care of my stockholders, because I can go overseas and 12 start this up tomorrow. But I am loyal to my 13 stockholders. I've done nothing wrong, and I intend to 14 fully prove that. 15 Q. Did Mr. Rodriguez facilitate either of your 16 companies obtaining contracts with anyone in the 17 Dominican Republic? 18 A. Mr. Rue, I just said that he set up 19 demonstrations with several different countries -20 leaders from several different countries, directors 21 of -- from Spain of the biofuel and alternate energy 22 director. And he threw three press conferences, okay, 23 delineating what a great job we are and how we got seven 24 gallons of fuel out of (Spanish spoken). Please don't 25 ask me to spell that one. English translation, castor 0108 1 oil beans. 2 And as I said, I'd be more than glad to 3 send you again the videos since you send copies of those 4 videos to Tom Gorman. So I guess if you sent it to him, 5 you must have seen them. 6 Q. Well, I'm sure we have copies of them. 7 A. I'm so sorry, sir. It could have been Westrick 8 that sent it. 9 Q. No, I sent them to those guys.
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10 A. Okay. Well, I was right the first time then. 11 Q. Stumbling down here several more pages back to 12 a December 17th, 2008 letter, that's a letter to 13 transfer -- another letter to Transfer Online from Mr. 14 Cutler that deals with Sparkman? 15 A. Who? 16 Q. Ronald Sparkman. 17 A. December 17th? 18 Q. Yeah. 19 A. Okay. 20 Q. You got that one? 21 A. I think so. Hold on. 22 Q. Who -23 A. Is this it? 24 Q. Yeah. Let me see. 25 A. Hmm? 0109 1 Q. No, no, no. No, no. The one before that, I 2 think. This letter. 3 A. Oh. 4 Q. Who is Ronald Sparkman? 5 A. Which one of these, sir? 6 Q. The -- I'm looking at this one here. 7 A. Is that it? 8 Q. No, that's not it. This is the one. 9 A. That one there? 10 Q. No, that's not the same one. 11 A. I'm sorry, that's all I have, sir. 12 Q. Well, look at that one. 13 A. And -14 Q. My question is: Who is Ronald Sparkman and how 15 did he come to acquire Sustainable Power Corporation 16 shares? 17 A. I have no idea -- any knowledge of Ronald 18 Sparkman other than him, according to what I'm seeing 19 here, being one of the Does of Joe Fiore. 20 Q. One of the Does, you mean one of the people 21 there associated with Fiore? 22 A. Yes, sir. I thought that was the definition of 23 Does. But I don't know. 24 Q. I mean, I have not heard that used that way, 25 but now that I understand, we can use it that way. 0110 1 How about Melvin Kanan or Kanan? Another 2 one of the Does of Joe Fiore? 3 A. Where's that one, sir?
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4 Q. It's the second name down. 5 A. Oh. Oh, yeah. 6 Q. TD Ameritrade? 7 A. Yeah, yeah. And Jon Callahan, the same. 8 Q. And then some to Berkshire, I guess. Amanda 9 Johnson, we've already identified. 10 A. Yes, we've already identified the rest of these 11 people. 12 Q. Mylock, yeah. All right. 13 Let's see if there's anything else here I 14 want to know about. All right. I'm done with that 15 exhibit. I think. 16 A. Richard was a pretty good attorney. 17 MR. LELAND: He was. 18 A. Jesus. 19 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Oh, I suspect that's not all of 20 them. 21 A. Well, that's enough for me to see. 22 Q. Let me show you a document previously marked as 23 Exhibit 67 which is apparently a document that 24 Sustainable Power provided. It bears the Bates numbers 25 SSTP 00389 through 393. 0111 1 Would you look at the next to the last 2 page of this one for me, sir. The next to the last 3 page. 4 A. The last page being blank. 5 Q. The last page being blank. 6 A. Yeah. 7 Q. Who are those people? Who is Marlin Molinaro? 8 A. Oh, okay. Marlin Molinaro, we haven't -- we 9 haven't discussed him. 10 Q. Let's -- let's talk about him then. Who is he? 11 A. Marlin Molinaro is -- Molinaro is an IR 12 specialist who was operating in Las Vegas where he had 13 his own investor relations firm. Jens Dalsgaard made 14 him a apparent very lucrative offer to come work for 15 Redwood. And, yeah, he packed up and went to sunny 16 California and worked for Redwood for a short period of 17 time. 18 Once Marlin realized what a scam artist 19 and the fraud he was committing on all his clients, he 20 quit, packed up and went back to Las Vegas and went back 21 to work on his own with his own investor relation firm. 22 Q. How did you meet him? In connection with 23 Redwood?
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24 A. Yes, I did. 25 Q. Did he have any specialty, or was there any 0112 1 particular responsibility that he was assigned to 2 perform while he was associated with U.S. Sustainable 3 Energy or Sustainable Power Corporation on behalf of 4 Redwood? 5 A. He was to act as a invest -- as a investors 6 relations counselor. We had links to his -- to him and 7 his office in Las Vegas. We used him as contact 8 information for Sustainable Power and on and on and on. 9 Q. Can I see that a minute? See if there's 10 anybody else on there that I care about. 11 A. Richard Tessi? 12 Q. Tell me about Mr. Tessi. 13 A. Mr. Tessi, I believe, was described as Jens' 14 wife's brother-in-law -- brother or cousin or some shit. 15 Some sort of relationship. He's a little man. A little 16 kid with a Caesar complex. 17 He would -- his prime function as I 18 understood it was to make 40, 50, 100 calls a day and 19 get people to buy USSE or SSTP or whatever it is. 20 With Jens Dalsgaard second trip to 21 Mississippi after he came down and saw everything 22 operating himself, he came down with two jets -- two 23 chartered jets with all sorts of people from Wall 24 Street, brokers, and whatnot for introduction of 25 Sustainable Power or USSE and to Wall Street. And while 0113 1 they were -- we were doing the demonstration, he says 2 you want to see what kind of control I have? Before -3 during the -- during the demonstration, okay, you'd see 4 one or two or three of the brokers breaking off, okay, 5 and purchasing USSE, bringing it from like 2 cents to 6 like 12 cents in one day. And it was all them. Now, I 7 know they were trading on insider information, but I 8 didn't know it at the time. I didn't even know what 9 insider information was. 10 Q. But you knew -- and when does this occur? This 11 is the first or second trip that Mr. Dalsgaard had made 12 to you? 13 A. I believe I recited that it was the second 14 trip -15 Q. All right. 16 A. -- that Mr. Jens Dalsgaard came in two 17 chartered jets.
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18 Q. All right. And you were aware that they were 19 manipulating the price of the shares as you watched that 20 day go on? 21 A. I was not aware of manipulation, okay, absence 22 of malice on my part. I was happy that they saw what I 23 was doing and believed in the company and purchased 24 shares. I did not know at that time that that was, A, 25 insider information; or, B, I certainly didn't know it 0114 1 was manipulation. 2 Talk about manipulation, Jens Dalsgaard, 3 okay, would be on the phone with an investor saying 4 there's going to be a press release out tomorrow. Buy 5 3 million shares right now so you can catch it and get 6 out of it tomorrow afternoon. 7 And, you know, he would spend 25, 30 8 minutes telling the stockholder to buy 3 million shares. 9 When he agreed to buy the 3 million shares, he would 10 call -- he would tell John Barkman, who worked for him, 11 to sell 3 million shares. They just got a 12 3-million-share buyer coming in. 13 And, you know, it seemed that every time 14 we put out a press release, the stock went down, and I 15 couldn't understand why. Now I know why. 16 And this stockholder that I'm referring 17 to, him and his little group of investors have lost 18 upwards of $3 million. 19 Q. Who were -- who's the investor? 20 A. That's going to be supplied to you with -- from 21 my attorney. He's going to be one of our witnesses. 22 Q. All right. Who is he? 23 THE WITNESS: Don? 24 MR. LELAND: Yeah, go ahead and tell him. 25 A. Larry Greer. 0115 1 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Okay. Did you hear Mr. Dalsgaard 2 make these statements to people? 3 A. That would be hearsay. We're talking about the 4 conversation directly from Larry Greer and Jens 5 Dalsgaard and instructions given by Jens Dalsgaard and 6 John Barkman, both of which are going to testify on our 7 behalf. 8 Q. All right. Did you witness personally any part 9 of those conversations? 10 A. Since I was in Baytown, Texas and he was 11 operating out of Novato, California, and I did not have
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12 a transporter beam or a hidden camera in his office, 13 there's no way that I could have witnessed anything of 14 that nature. 15 Q. All right. How do you know about this, then? 16 A. Direct communications between Larry Greer and 17 myself and John Barkman and myself. 18 Q. Okay. 19 A. That's what I am testifying to, what I have 20 direct knowledge of, nothing hearsay. Mr. Greer bought 21 the stock; Mr. Barkman sold the stock. 22 Q. Who is Richard Pisano? 23 A. He is another one of the Does from Mr. 24 Dalsgaard. 25 Q. All right. 0116 1 A. Actually, he's probably -- he's more than that 2 because he didn't have -- I do not know of any real 3 source of income from him, but he did manage to buy, you 4 know, a million-plus-dollar house that Jens owned in 5 Novato and now Pisano owns it. 6 Q. All right. And is it -- there are a number of 7 people on this list. Do you know who they are? Here's 8 the list. 9 A. Poor son of a bitch. The last person is 10 Juliana's father. 11 Q. What's his name? I don't have the list in 12 front of me. 13 A. Volpacchio. A real nice guy. I mean, he's 14 done nothing wrong other than having an asshole for a 15 son. Excuse me. 16 Jens Dalsgaard, Kristine MacKay. Kristine 17 MacKay. Kristine MacKay. MacKay. MacKay. MacKay. I 18 thought I knew who Kristine MacKay is, but 10,000 shares 19 would not be -- you know, would not be the person I'm 20 thinking of. 21 Christian Hollant is another John Doe, 22 another one of the Does of Dalsgaard empire. 23 Christopher Marquez, the same. Amanda Shoemaker. 24 Q. Schmieder? 25 A. Schmieder, thank you. Richard Pisano, Angela 0117 1 Williams. There's two Angelas. There's an Angela 2 Williams, which is I think is Redwood, and then there's 3 Angela -4 Q. That's fine. I'm done with that exhibit. I'll 5 figure it out.
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6 Now, who is Bruno Valenzisi? 7 A. Bruno Valenzisi is supposed to be a stockbroker 8 who's got the morals and the guts of a female dog in 9 heat. He is a, in my opinion, okay, a pathological 10 liar. And when it becomes public what he has attempted 11 to do, he will probably lose his license. But I'm sure 12 he'll lose all his customers. And he's your most 13 favorite son. 14 Q. I doubt that. 15 A. Well, then you do have taste. Congratulations. 16 Q. How did you meet him? 17 A. I never have. Oh. I have never had a 18 face-to-face with him. Okay? When, as I said, I knew 19 nothing about public companies or stock. I had never 20 traded a stock in my life. I was fully dependent upon 21 Redwood Consultants, Jens Dalsgaard and Berkshire 22 Capital for advice. Jens recommended him as a 23 stockbroker who would not let me do anything wrong and 24 would advise me and who I could trust. 25 Q. So did you open accounts with Bruno? 0118 1 A. I -- I believe I opened up an account, okay, 2 and I placed a bunch of restricted shares with him is 3 the way that started out. 4 Q. All right. How did you meet Jens Dalsgaard? 5 A. You know, Mr. Rue, I am confused whether Jens 6 introduced me to Bruno or Bruno introduced me to Jens. 7 I don't know if Bruno told me to call Jens as an IR firm 8 or Bruno called Jens to tell me about me. I -- I just 9 don't remember what the circumstances were. 10 Q. Okay. 11 A. But it's -- it's all convoluted in that -- that 12 arena. And -13 Q. Did you have any -14 A. -- Mr. Dals -- Mr. Bruno, okay, and, you know, 15 I praise the Lord that I'm a God-fearing man, all right, 16 conspired with Mr. Westrick sending me a e-mail or 17 purporting to have sent me an e-mail with some really 18 defamatory information on it, except Mr. Westrick, 19 which, you know, I can understand -- but I thought Bruno 20 had more sense -- sent it from his private e-mail 21 instead of from LaSalle Securities where every e-mail 22 we've ever received has only been through LaSalle 23 Securities. And his e-mail address at yahoo.com was 24 never delivered to me because of the spam blocker. 25 But the mere audacity that he would
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0119 1 conspire with Westrick to do something like that, I 2 don't know how he ever got licensed. And when it's made 3 public, I don't think he will be. 4 Q. What else did Bruno do wrong? 5 A. That's the only thing that I know. Okay, 6 that's the only thing that sticks out in my mind. When 7 you look at something and you just know you've never 8 seen it before and you start questioning yourself 9 because you're saying Jesus, you know, this is -- this 10 is my e-mail address. How -- how could I not have seen 11 this? Until I realized it came from his personal e-mail 12 address at yahoo.com which would have never gotten 13 through my spam blocker. 14 Q. All right. Who -15 A. So that's why that -- that's why that name and 16 that incident sticks out. 17 Q. Who's John Barkman? 18 A. John Barkman is -- who is John Barkman today? 19 Who was John Barkman a year ago? What do I know? 20 Q. Who's John Barkman in 2006 at the October 31st 21 demonstration in Vidalia? 22 A. To the best of my recollection, he was vice 23 president of some stock company. 24 Q. Janney Montgomery Scott? 25 A. Bingo. 0120 1 Q. All right. And why was he at the Vidalia 2 demonstration riding that four wheeler? 3 A. Because he can. 4 Q. What business did you have with him at the 5 time? 6 A. He was part of the delegation invited down by 7 Redwood Consultants. We usually use a professional -8 oh, no, that was in Vidalia. That was in Mississippi. 9 And when he came, he got on the four wheeler and started 10 doing a bunch of stuff which I considered to be 11 absolutely crazy for somebody to do on a motorcycle, but 12 he enjoyed it. And he was demonstrating the power 13 generated from bio gasoline made from my process. 14 Q. All right. Who is he today? 15 A. Today he owns a company called Riverview. 16 Riverview something. It's an IR firm. Him and his 17 infant child, 2- or 3-year-old. 18 Q. All right. 19 A. Mr. Barkman was working for Redwood. And when
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20 the pump and dump became totally apparent to him, he 21 resigned. And just for the record, Mr. Barkman has come 22 forward to the company and has made it known that when 23 Jens was on the phone pumping the stock, he had him on 24 the other phone selling the stock, or he would have him 25 calling Joe Fiore on the other line saying, hey, I got 0121 1 3 million shares coming in at this, you know, so that 2 Joe could sell 3 million shares. Hence, every time I 3 put out a press release, the stock would go down. 4 Q. All right. Let's talk about bank accounts for 5 a minute. Last week during Mrs. Rivera's deposition, 6 which you attended, we identified a bunch of bank 7 accounts. Let's go over the list with you. 8 It's true that you had -- did you have a 9 joint bank account with Ms. Price, now Rivera, at 10 Regions? 11 A. If she said so. 12 Q. And did you have a USSE account over which you 13 and Ms. Rivera had signatory authority at Regions? 14 A. Where we were the only ones that had signatory 15 authority? 16 Q. No. Where you were able to sign on behalf of 17 U.S. -18 A. If she said so, I'm sure it's true. 19 Q. All right. 20 A. But not exclusively. I mean, Gerald Brent, 21 other people had -22 Q. I didn't -- I didn't ask that. 23 A. I -- I understand, but I just want to clarify. 24 Q. All right. Did you have an account at River 25 Hills Bank in Port Gibson? Which, of course, I couldn't 0122 1 find when I was there. 2 A. Well, you know what, neither could I. Okay? 3 But, you know, when he wasn't giving birth to a cow or 4 feeding chickens, there was a bank in Port Gibson that 5 you couldn't deposit over $5,000 in without getting an 6 act of Congress. If the name of that bank was River 7 Hills Bank, then so be it. But yes, I did have an 8 account, or the company did have an account there. 9 Q. When you were at the Commission being 10 interviewed earlier in this case, you mentioned that you 11 might have had an account or a brokerage account at an 12 Indiana bank. 13 A. What testimony are you referring to?
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14 Q. One of your testimonies at the Commission. 15 A. When? 16 Q. When? 17 A. Today? Are we talking about one of the three 18 times that I testified? 19 Q. Yes, sir. 20 A. I have no -- no recollection of anything that 21 occurred there. 22 Q. Do you have any recollection that you had a 23 bank in Indiana? 24 A. I have no recollection of anything that 25 happened at those meetings in Atlanta. 0123 1 Q. We'll come back to that. 2 We marked these last week as Exhibit 105 3 to your -- to Mrs. Rivera's testimony. 4 MR. RUE: Do you need a copy, Don? 5 MR. LELAND: Uh-huh. 6 Q. (By Mr. Rue) And this is a series of checks 7 and cashier's checks, and I think there's a wire 8 transfer in here from Admiral Lora to you and Ms. Price 9 that I believe adds up to about $764,000. 10 A. Yes, sir. 11 Q. Why did Lora give you this money? 12 A. Well, if you look at the check, it says loan 13 (prestamo). Admiral Lora has been a friend for 20 to 30 14 years, I don't remember how long, but it's been over 20 15 years, possibly 30. Okay. And when we cranked up his 16 public company, he was, prior to that, extremely 17 instrumental in helping us with various contacts and 18 testimony and bringing -- I'm sorry, my thingy fell off. 19 Q. That's your microphone thingy that fell off. 20 A. Yeah. The other one will wear off. 21 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Let me help you, sir. 22 THE WITNESS: Slippery little sucker. 23 There we go. 24 A. Okay. I mean, he's -- he's made visits there. 25 He's had the Secretary of State come down. He's had the 0124 1 Secretary of the Civil Aviation come down. He has 2 issued press releases and statements in the Dominican 3 Republic validating our -- our process with Tubes 4 Technology Licensing. He assists -- assisted us in 5 acquiring like 6,000 hectares of property adjacent to 6 the Santa Domingo beach. And -7 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Who owns those -- who owns that
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8 acreage? 9 A. Well, I'm not trying to be obtuse or evasive, I 10 would say that if I had to give a opinion, I would say 11 that -- that acreage is owned by the defunct 12 stockholders of Earth First Technologies. 13 When Stanton took over Earth First, I told 14 him, you've got all the -- you've got, you know, all 15 this land out here. It's beach front property. It's, 16 you know, worth ten times or 100 times what -- what you 17 guys paid for it. And he didn't want to hear about 18 anything from a third-world country, you know. They're 19 so much garbage under his toes. 20 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Excuse me, Mr. Rue, we 21 have five minutes left on this tape. 22 MR. RUE: Let's go off the record and 23 change this one right quick. 24 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Okay. This marks the 25 end of tape 2. The time is 2 :21, we're off the record. 0125 1 (Short recess from 2:21 p.m. to 2:31 p.m.) 2 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: Here marks the 3 beginning of tape 3 in the deposition of John Rivera. 4 The time on the monitor is 2:31 p.m. We're back on the 5 record. 6 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Let's go back to Mr. Lora for a 7 moment. We looked at these packages of checks that are 8 marked as Exhibit 105. 9 A. Yes, sir. 10 Q. Is it -- do I understand your testimony that 11 each of these checks that total $700,000 -12 A. Uh-huh. 13 Q. -- plus were loans to either you or Ms. Price? 14 A. They were loans, okay, to Sustainable Power or 15 USSE. They were delineated as such until restricted 16 stock at a discount was reissued to him because this 17 money was for the purpose of helping to maintain the 18 company and ourselves to keep going. And if you take 19 this $760,000, I believe the figure you said, in its 20 totality, all right, it does not represent 1 percent of 21 the float which any stockholder is entitled to sell up 22 to 1 percent of the float every quarter. 1 percent of 23 3 billion shares, okay, is way less than the totality of 24 this. 25 Q. All right. 0126 1 A. And this was over a long period of time.
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2 Q. All right. Still trying to get an answer to my 3 question. The first page of this says a loan to John 4 Rivera. Has that loan been repaid? 5 A. Yes, it has. 6 Q. And was that repaid by the issuance of 7 restricted shares? 8 A. Yes, it was. 9 Q. That's fine. And the same would be true for 10 the rest of this money? 11 A. That is also true. 12 Q. Okay. That's fine. 13 MR. RUE: Let me mark for you a document 14 that I think today I will call Exhibit 109. 15 (Exhibit No. 109 marked.) 16 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Let me show you Plaintiff's 17 Exhibit 109, which was marked in the investigative 18 stages of this as Exhibit 58. It is a multi-page 19 document, the second page of which says USSE consulting 20 agreement, effective April 21st, 2006, entered into and 21 by and between U.S. Sustainable Energy Corporation, a 22 Mississippi corporation, and Redwood Consultants. Are 23 you familiar with that document? 24 A. No, sir, I'm not. 25 Q. Do you want to look on the last page of it? 0127 1 A. Pardon me? 2 Q. Do you want to look on the last page of it, 3 please? 4 A. I've looked at the last page. 5 Q. And there's some signatures on that page? 6 A. There is some facsimiles of signatures on that 7 page. 8 Q. Is the facsimile of the signature on that page 9 a facsimile of your signature? 10 A. That's somebody trying to copy it. 11 Q. Pardon me? 12 A. It's somebody trying to copy it, A; and B, I've 13 never seen a document, all right, especially one that 14 I've initialed every page on that has USSE in some sort 15 of Magic Marker written on it. 16 Q. Well, I'll just assume that's not on the 17 original document. 18 A. So why show me this? 19 Q. Well, I'm showing you for the printed material, 20 Mr. -21 A. I do not recognize this document.
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22 Q. You're not aware that that is a contract 23 between your company and Mr. Dalsgaard's firm? 24 A. I am aware that that's what it appears to be. 25 But as I stated before, okay, I have never initialed a 0128 1 contract that has USSE written in some sort of Magic 2 Marker that was put on after my initial was put there 3 because -4 Q. So if you initialed that, you wouldn't have 5 seen the USSE, would you? 6 A. It wouldn't have been there. 7 Q. That's correct. 8 A. That is correct. 9 Q. Do you remember that document without the USSE 10 written on the top of it? 11 A. No. First of all, I would not sign a document 12 or issue a document, okay, where I don't even know the 13 name of my company. Even at 10 percent mental capacity, 14 I still know the name of my company. 15 Q. And what's the name of the company on there? 16 A. U.S. Sustainable Energy Corporation, a 17 Mississippi corporation. 18 Q. And that's -- you're telling me that's 19 incorrect? 20 A. It is incorrect. 21 Q. And it should be Corp. period instead of 22 corporation? 23 A. It should be Corp. period, okay, and it should 24 be a Nevada corporation. 25 Q. Was U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp. period first 0129 1 incorporated in Mississippi? 2 A. Yes, it was. 3 Q. And was it subsequently incorporated in Nevada? 4 A. That is also correct. 5 Q. All right. 6 A. But we've had lawsuits that we've tried to 7 institute. We've had all sorts of things going back and 8 forth with the illustrious Mr. Stanton and his 9 attorneys, okay, because he formed U.S. Sustainable 10 Energy Corporation in Florida and put out press releases 11 as U.S. Sustainable Energy Corporation, which was not 12 us. We issued a cease and desist, okay, and we 13 complained that he was infringing upon our corporate 14 name and our trademark. 15 So for me to sign a document that clearly
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16 -- it doesn't clearly state because it looks like this 17 was whited out and something else was put in. 18 THE WITNESS: Don, do you see there? 19 MR. LELAND: Yeah. 20 A. So, no, I do not recognize this document. 21 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Let me -- let me -- let me see it 22 a minute. Let me see if I can see what's whited out 23 here. 24 A. Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't -25 Q. And you can explain that to me. 0130 1 And when you say whited out, are you 2 talking about the little dots that appear to be behind 3 the U.S. Sustainable Energy? 4 A. I'm looking at where something was whited out 5 and something else was printed over it. 6 Q. And where is that on here? Would you point it 7 out to me, please? 8 A. May I mark on this? 9 Q. Sure. 10 A. You know, it is just so coincidental that the 11 only thing that's there is U.S. Sustainable Energy 12 Corporation, a Mississippi corporation. The rest of 13 this document is perfectly clear. 14 Now, I don't know who was tampering with 15 exhibits, but in my opinion, somebody has definitely 16 tampered with this exhibit. And if -- I do not 17 recognize this document or anything that it has to say. 18 Q. Is the substance of this contract something 19 that -20 A. I didn't even bother reading it. 21 Q. Well, take a look at it. 22 A. Why should I read a fictitious document? 23 Q. So it's your testimony that this is a 24 fictitious document? 25 A. It is my testimony that it -0131 1 Q. And those are not your initials on there? 2 A. It is my testimony that that document appears 3 to be altered and -- it's the only place there that you 4 can see quite clearly where it was changed. There's no 5 -- there is no other place in that document. 6 (Discussion held off the record for less 7 than one minute.) 8 A. Was that a document given to you by Mr. 9 Westrick?
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10 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Sir, that was an exhibit in the 11 investigative stages of this case. 12 A. Was that investigative stages the ongoing -13 Q. I believe it was prepared -- I believe it was 14 produced by Mr. Dalsgaard. 15 A. By Mr. Dalsgaard? 16 Q. Yeah. 17 A. Amazing. 18 MR. LELAND: It looks like it was faxed 19 from Gerald Brent. 20 THE WITNESS: From Gerald Brent, yes. 21 A. But you see, they can change a fax any way they 22 want. Can we get a copy of this? 23 Q. (By Mr. Rue) It will come with your copy. 24 A. Before it disappears. 25 MR. LELAND: It will be on your -0132 1 THE WITNESS: No, no, no, no. 2 MR. LELAND: -- deposition copy. 3 THE WITNESS: Huh? 4 MR. LELAND: It will be attached to your 5 deposition. 6 THE WITNESS: No. I want a copy of -- of 7 this. 8 MR. LELAND: I'm sure we can find a -- we 9 can find a copy machine around here somewhere. 10 THE WITNESS: Yes, please. I definitely 11 want this. 12 MR. RUE: Well, the court reporter will 13 take these when it's over and she will attach them to 14 the depositions and it will be done. 15 THE WITNESS: Might I request that I see 16 the facsimiles to how it represents the original 17 document? 18 MR. LELAND: We can get you a copy today, 19 I think. I think there's a copy machine here. 20 THE WITNESS: Yeah. 21 MR. RUE: I bet there's one. 22 THE WITNESS: Oh, I imagine so. There's 23 technology to go behind that. 24 Him stating that that came from Mr. 25 Dalsgaard, that's part of the record because we're still 0133 1 on the record, right? 2 MS. RIVERA: Yes. 3 THE WITNESS: Okay.
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4 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Let's look at a document that's 5 previously been marked as Plaintiff's No. 32. 6 A. And your question? 7 Q. Are you familiar with this press release? 8 A. I'm familiar we put out -- a press release was 9 put out by U.S. Sustainable Energy Corporation regarding 10 Oppenheimer. The context or the wording on this press 11 release, I have no direct recollection. 12 Q. Well, this was printed out from, if you'll look 13 at the fax tracks across the top of it, it was printed 14 out from marketwire.com and purports to be a November 15 16th, 2006 press release announcing that U.S. 16 Sustainable Energy Corp. engages Oppenheimer & Company, 17 Inc. as an investment banker. 18 A. Well, again, I reiterate I know we put out -19 the company put out a press release about Oppenheimer 20 that sticks in my mind. But as to the content when this 21 was put out or what this thing says, I have no direct 22 recollection. No immediate recollection or direct 23 recollection. 24 Q. So you don't recall anything at all about this 25 transaction? 0134 1 A. The question has been asked and answered, sir. 2 Q. Mr. Rivera, I'm entitled to ask questions. 3 THE WITNESS: Don, how many times do I 4 have to answer the same question? 5 MR. LELAND: Well, if you answered the 6 question, I'm not sure what his question was. What was 7 your question? 8 Q. (By Mr. Rue) My question was: Do you have any 9 recollection of this transaction with Oppenheimer? 10 A. And I said I had -- that was not the question. 11 Of this press release was the question, sir. 12 Q. All right. Do you have -13 THE WITNESS: Would you kindly read back 14 if there is any disagreement on that? 15 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Let's get -- let's get the whole 16 thing, then. What do you remember about the transaction 17 with Oppenheimer? 18 A. I remember that we had representatives from 19 Oppenheimer down to the plant. I remember that they 20 spoke with the Mississippi -- there is an act or a law 21 or something that where there was a lot of funds made 22 available because of the hurricane. 23 THE WITNESS: Do you remember what that
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24 is? 25 MR. LELAND: It's a go zone. 0135 1 A. The go zone. Okay. 2 MR. LELAND: Go zone. 3 THE COURT REPORTER: Go zone? 4 MR. LELAND: Go zone. 5 THE WITNESS: Go zone, yeah. Oh, they got 6 all sorts of neat stuff over there. 7 A. And these representatives from Oppenheimer met 8 with the powers to be with the state and with the county 9 for a 50-million-dollar bond. And after Oppenheimer was 10 satisfied as to the validity of the bond and all this, 11 they sent me a letter of engagement via e-mail, you 12 know, asking for -- I don't remember how much money it 13 was. It wasn't much, but a deposit and all this other 14 good shit. And upon receiving that letter, we put out a 15 press release. What the press release said or how it 16 was worded, I don't know. I have no direct 17 recollection. 18 But I do remember that within 30 seconds, 19 maybe a minute, maybe I'm exaggerating, of the press 20 release going out, I have Oppenheimer's legal staff 21 calling me saying what the hell are you doing? We're 22 going to sue you for this and for that and for the 23 other. That was a draft proposal for discussion 24 purposes only. 25 And I said really? He said yes. You 0136 1 retract that. I said I'm not retracting shit. Excuse 2 my French, okay, and, you know, you want to come talk to 3 me, come down here in a civil tone and we'll discuss 4 this; otherwise, take me to court. 5 And he says what are you talking about? I 6 says, well, I understand your demeanor as an attorney, 7 but screaming and hollering at me does no good. 8 I've got an e-mail from the author of this 9 document which I opened up in my e-mail browser which is 10 customary when you receive an e-mail. I read the 11 content of the letter with the signature, and I put out 12 a press release. And you can come here, or I will 13 forward you a copy of this, and you will see nowhere on 14 there does it say a draft for discussion purposes only. 15 So get off your damn high horse, okay, and let's talk 16 reality. And sent it to him. 17 He called me back and he apologized and we
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18 talked about it. We -- we did a -- some sort of 19 retraction or explanation, I don't remember. All I know 20 is that they wanted to come down and sue us from here to 21 kingdom come, and they found out that they were in 22 error. That's all I remember about Oppenheimer, which I 23 think is quite sufficient. 24 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Well, I've just got one more 25 question about it. 0137 1 A. Yes, sir. 2 Q. That contract that you opened in your e-mail 3 browser? 4 A. Yes, sir. 5 Q. Was there anyone's signature on it? 6 A. Yes, there was. But I couldn't tell you who it 7 is at this point. 8 Q. Do you have a copy of the contract? 9 A. I've been looking for it. I'm still looking 10 for it. Everything is in disarray since we no longer 11 have an office or a place to store records or anything 12 else like that. But I am still looking for it. 13 Q. It is your testimony that it was signed by 14 somebody from Oppenheimer? 15 A. Yes, sir. 16 Q. You're sure about that? 17 A. Without having the document in front of me, 18 okay, I remember it being signed. 19 Q. Okay. Let's look at a document that's 20 previously been marked as Exhibit 33 in this lawsuit 21 which is a one-page document bearing the date November 22 15th, 2006 former Pratt Whitney senior vice president, 23 Dr. David E. Crowe joins U.S. Sustainable Energy Corp. 24 board of directors. Are you familiar with this press 25 release? 0138 1 A. No, I'm not. 2 Q. Okay. When did you meet David Crowe? 3 A. When did I say I met David Crowe? 4 Q. You didn't. Did you ever meet David Crowe? 5 A. No. 6 Q. Was he ever on the Sustainable Energy Corp. 7 board of directors? 8 A. Not to my knowledge. 9 Q. So this press release is false? 10 A. I don't remember this press release in any way, 11 shape or form. I'll have to investigate it. It says it
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12 came from Market Wire, so it was obviously put out, but 13 I don't know who put it out. 14 Q. The second paragraph of it is a quote. "Dr. 15 David Crowe's extensive background with Pratt & Whitney 16 is one of the many reasons we wanted him on the board of 17 directors, said John Rivera of USSEC's CEO." 18 A. Mr. Rue, let me make something perfectly clear. 19 Q. Let me ask you the question, Mr. Rivera. Then 20 you can -21 A. Not if you're going to continue reading from 22 this, I need to make something perfectly clear. 23 Q. Then you -24 A. Now -25 Q. -- do that after I finish my question. 0139 1 A. I will be more than glad to listen to you, sir. 2 Q. "His addition, among many others planned, will 3 help attract other top industry talent to our company, 4 further bolstering our board of directors, management 5 and executive teams." 6 Did you make this statement? 7 A. Since I've never seen this press release 8 before, I -- I couldn't have made that statement. 9 And for the record, I neither wrote, 10 authored or authorized any press release that did not 11 have at least one, if not two, legal opinions attached 12 to them. All the press releases were written by Jens 13 Dalsgaard, Joe Fiore, Robert Davis, and some were 14 written by Keith Mazer. 15 Q. You recall nothing about this press release? 16 A. I've seen places on the Internet that say that 17 you're responsible for some ungodly acts and that your 18 moral habits are just (indicating). I mean, does that 19 make them true? 20 Q. That's not my question. 21 A. I've never seen the document. I did not make 22 the statement. Asked and answered. 23 Q. All right. You did answer the question. 24 A. Excuse me? 25 Q. You did answer the question. 0140 1 A. Thank you. 2 Q. Now, did you receive a letter from Dr. Crowe 3 asking you to retract this press release? 4 A. Asked and answered. 5 Q. No, sir, it hasn't been.
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6 A. I said I've never seen the press release. I 7 don't know who Dr. Crowe is, okay, was, if he exists. I 8 have no knowledge. Anything having to do with Dr. 9 Crowe, which I do not know, have never talked to, have 10 no intervention with, I have no knowledge. Is that 11 clear enough, Mr. Rue? 12 Q. No, sir, it isn't. 13 A. Then I'm sorry. 14 Q. My question is: And it's a simple yes or no 15 answer will do. Did you receive a letter from Dr. Crowe 16 asking you to retract this press release? 17 A. One final time. I have had no communications, 18 no e-mail. 19 Q. Let me stop you right there. 20 A. No documents, anything whatsoever with this 21 doctor whoever it is. 22 Q. Crowe. 23 A. Crowe. Does he exist? 24 Q. Yeah, he does. 25 A. Oh, okay. 0141 1 Q. Here is a document that's previously been 2 marked as Plaintiff's Exhibit No. 36. 3 A. When was that marked? 4 Q. Huh? 5 A. When was that marked as Plaintiff's Exhibit 36? 6 Q. In one or the other of the depositions in this 7 case. 8 A. In Atlanta? 9 Q. No, sir, it was not marked in Atlanta, because 10 I haven't taken any depositions in this case in Atlanta. 11 A. When was it marked Exhibit 36? 12 Q. Well, sir, I don't happen to recall. 13 A. You don't know? 14 Q. No, sir. At either the deposition of Mr. Smith 15 or perhaps at the -- perhaps at the deposition of Mr. 16 Moffitt. I don't recall which. 17 MR. LELAND: I believe that would be 18 Kelmer Smith. 19 MR. RUE: Is it? 20 MR. LELAND: One-page document, October 21 the 17th, 2006. 22 MR. RUE: That's it. 23 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Are you familiar with this press 24 release? 25 A. No. And had I seen it, I would have hit the
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0142 1 roof. 2 Q. Why is that? 3 A. Why is that? Because anything that has to do 4 with the patent or the patent pending or anything with 5 my proprietary catalyst, I would have never allowed to 6 be published in the public market. 7 Even though the SEC claims that I've never 8 had a patent or patent pending with the patent office, 9 even though you have copies of both, you know, you -10 you continue with this silliness. 11 Q. Well, maybe; maybe not. 12 A. Excuse me? You don't have copies of the patent 13 pendings. 14 Q. I do, and I've looked at them. 15 A. Do I have patent pending technology, or did I 16 have patent pending technology at the time. 17 Q. Not in the strictest sense of the word. 18 A. Whose word? 19 Q. I'm asking you about this press release, Mr. 20 Rivera. 21 A. I have no idea. No direct knowledge of this 22 press release. 23 Q. Thank you. All right. 24 A. They're putting the -- the patent attorneys' 25 contact information on that damn press release. 0143 1 Q. Okay. Let me show you another one. This one 2 is marked Plaintiff's Exhibit 37. I bet it was marked 3 the same day. And Exhibit 37 is an e-mail from Kelmer 4 Smith sent Friday, January 26th, 2007 at 7:06 a.m. to 5 Alex Machado, Gerald Brent, Jens Dalsgaard, 6 jhrivera@ussec.us, and some other people. Do you 7 remember receiving this e-mail, Mr. Rivera? 8 A. No, sir, I do not. 9 Q. Well, the first paragraph reads, "FYI, current 10 plan is to protect the USSEC/Rivera process technology 11 by a trade secret. Specifically the catalyst will be 12 protected by a trade secret" -- and will seek -- "and 13 will seek patents on the equipment used in the Rivera 14 process. 15 "We will withdraw the current patent 16 applications, hence will not have the molecular 17 structure or the Rivera process patented (we would have 18 to disclose the catalyst in the patent which we will not 19 do)."
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20 Is that an accurate statement of the 21 patent process at or around this time? 22 A. No. 23 Q. What would be accurate at this time? 24 A. Several things would be accurate. Kelmer Smith 25 had a e-mail address which he was authorized to use -0144 1 the only one he was authorized to use for company 2 business which was kelmersmith@usse.com, not 3 krs235@hotmail.com. That would go directly into spam, 4 No. 1. 5 No. 2, Kelmer Smith knows nothing 6 whatsoever of the catalyst. 7 No. 3, he is an engineer, which I have 8 trouble talking to because you ask him what time it is, 9 and they tell you how to build a clock and then they 10 don't give you the right time. 11 No. 3, to secure a patent on the nuts and 12 bolts of my process is ludicrous at best, because I have 13 published the blueprints and all the details of my 14 system other than -- without the catalyst on the 15 Internet, given copies to various people. So for me to 16 even consider taking a patent on the nuts and bolts of 17 it is even crazier than I was at that time. 18 So A, I know nothing about this 19 communication. B, if it was, in fact, sent, okay, it 20 would have been spammed out because I have no idea who 21 krs235@hotmail.com is. 22 Q. All right. Had you decided not to disclose the 23 formula for your catalyst and protect it as a trade 24 secret at this time, the end of January 2006? 25 A. Since I have no knowledge of this correspondent 0145 1 or the time that it happened, I have nothing further to 2 say on the subject. 3 Q. That's not responsive to my question. I didn't 4 ask you whether you had seen this. That was asked and 5 answered. 6 A. Okay. 7 Q. I asked you: Did you decide not to complete 8 your patent applications because you didn't want to 9 disclose the makeup of your catalyst? 10 A. On or about this time? 11 Q. At any time. 12 A. At any time, yes. 13 Q. When was that?
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14 A. Sometime after my patent attorneys told me that 15 I would have to insert the -- not only the ingredients 16 but the formulation on how everything has to be added 17 into the patent. And I told them I would never do that. 18 Q. All right. Just so we're clear, is there any 19 patent whatsoever outstanding on any aspect of the 20 Rivera process? 21 A. At the time that the press release made, there 22 was a patent pending application. 23 Q. Patent pending is not what I asked. What I 24 asked: Was there a patent on the process? That is to 25 say, a patent pending application that had approved the 0146 1 patent? 2 A. I never claimed to have a patent on the 3 process. I claimed to have a patent pending process, 4 which I did. 5 Q. That's fine. The answer to my question is you 6 didn't have a patent? 7 A. I never claimed to have a patent. 8 Q. Well, okay. Thank you. 9 Did there come a time, sir -10 A. Sir? 11 Q. I said did there come a time when you became 12 acquainted with a company called Diversified Ethanol 13 also known as Only New York, Inc.? 14 A. There was a time that I became acquainted with 15 Diversified Ethanol, Only New York, Inc. and four or 16 five other acronyms. 17 Q. All right. When was that time? 18 A. Sometime in the last eight years. 19 Q. Could that time have been around the beginning 20 of December 2006? 21 A. It could have been. 22 Q. All right. How did you meet them? 23 A. I have no direct memory of that. 24 Q. Do you recall whether representatives of 25 Diversified Ethanol visited your plant in early December 0147 1 2006? 2 A. I know that members of Diversified Ethanol 3 visited the plant at some time. 4 Q. Do you recall that you and others associated 5 with United States Sustainable Energy Corp. visited the 6 Diversified Ethanol site in Eagle Grove, Iowa on 7 December 21st and 22nd, 2006?
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8 A. I do not remember the specific town in Iowa, 9 but I remember the trip from hell. The coldest I've 10 ever been in my entire life. I remember having to land, 11 you know, a hundred -- well, a considerable distance 12 away from our destination and then having to rent a car 13 to drive to that location. 14 I remember my first experience of slipping 15 and sliding in snow and ice. I remember having to 16 change my underwear when I finally got there. Yes, I do 17 remember visiting them. 18 Q. All right. Do you remember that you signed a 19 contract with the folks from Diversified Ethanol on 20 December 22nd, 2006? 21 A. I know that I signed a contract sometime. What 22 that date was or timeframe was, I have no direct 23 recollection. 24 Q. Let me -- let me show you the signature page of 25 a contract dated December 26th, 2006 and purportedly 0148 1 signed by you and one Taylor Moffitt, and ask you: Do 2 you recognize that as your signature? 3 A. Yes, I do. 4 Q. All right. Who prepared that contract? 5 A. I don't know. I don't know if it was Richard 6 Cutler or Rick whatever his name is. 7 THE WITNESS: Let the record show that the 8 document that Mr. Rue has given me, in fact, is not a 9 contract but a memorandum of understanding. 10 Q. (By Mr. Rue) I'm sorry. I stand corrected. 11 It is a memo of understanding. 12 Did you read it before you signed it? 13 A. I don't know. I have no direct memory of the 14 occasion other than almost getting killed in the snow 15 and ice. 16 Q. Would it have been your practice to read 17 contracts before you signed them? 18 A. Mr. Rue, you asked me if I signed this 19 contract. You did not ask me if it was my practice to 20 read a contract before signing it. 21 Q. I asked you -22 A. Which question would you like answered? 23 Q. I asked you, did you read this contract? 24 A. And I said I don't remember. I have no direct 25 knowledge -0149 1 Q. And now --
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2 A. -- or memory of this. 3 Q. Now, my -- my second question, then, is: Was 4 it your practice to read contracts before you signed 5 them? 6 A. It would be my practice to read contracts 7 before I signed them if I had prepared the contract or 8 if the contract had been prepared by anyone other than 9 my counsel or a trusted advisor. 10 Q. All right. At the time, was Kelmer Smith a 11 trusted advisor? 12 A. As much as an engineer could be. 13 Q. All right. Let's look at the front page of the 14 memo of understanding between U.S. Sustainable Energy 15 Corp. and originally New York, Inc., dated December 16 22nd, 2006. 17 THE WITNESS: Let the record show that Mr. 18 Rue is referring to memo of understanding. The title of 19 the page is memorandum of understanding between -20 Q. (By Mr. Rue) Thank you. I stand corrected. 21 A. I would like to make sure we're talking about 22 the same document here. 23 Q. All right. Look at page B -- I mean, paragraph 24 B, statement of mutual benefit and interests, item 2, 25 ONYI acknowledges USSE has exclusive license of John 0150 1 Rivera's patented fertilizer and biofuel technology. Do 2 you see that? 3 A. I see that. 4 Q. Is that statement true? 5 A. As I said, I have no knowledge of this 6 document. After having read this, okay, I would have 7 never signed this because I would never make such a 8 statement. 9 Q. But you just testified that you signed this 10 document. 11 A. I testified that it appears to be my signature 12 adhered to this document. 13 MR. RUE: We've got to go off the record. 14 THE VIDEOGRAPHER: All righty. The time 15 is 3:15 p.m. We're off the record. 16 THE COURT REPORTER: Did you want to read 17 and sign? 18 THE WITNESS: Yes, and I need a copy of 19 the transcript and video. 20 (Deposition concludes at 3:15 p.m.) 21
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22 ___________________________________ 23 JOHN RIVERA 24 25 0151 1 THE STATE OF TEXAS ) 2 SUBSCRIBED AND SWORN TO BEFORE ME, the undersigned 3 authority, by the said JOHN RIVERA on this the _________ 4 day of ___________________, _________. 5 6 ___________ 7 Notary Public in and for 8 the State of Texas 9 10 My Commission Expires: __________________ 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 0152 1 CHANGES AND SIGNATURE 2 PAGE LINE CHANGE REASON 3 _______________________________________________________ 4 _______________________________________________________ 5 _______________________________________________________ 6 _______________________________________________________ 7 _______________________________________________________ 8 _______________________________________________________ 9 _______________________________________________________ 10 _______________________________________________________ 11 _______________________________________________________ 12 _______________________________________________________ 13 _______________________________________________________ 14 _______________________________________________________ 15 _______________________________________________________
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16 _______________________________________________________ 17 _______________________________________________________ 18 _______________________________________________________ 19 _______________________________________________________ 20 _______________________________________________________ 21 _______________________________________________________ 22 _______________________________________________________ 23 _______________________________________________________ 24 _______________________________________________________ 25 _______________________________________________________ 0153 1 COUNTY OF HARRIS 2 STATE OF TEXAS 3 4 REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE 5 6 I, CAROL JENKINS, Certified Shorthand 7 Reporter in and for the State of Texas, hereby certify 8 that this transcript is a true record of the testimony 9 given by the witness named herein, after said witness 10 was duly sworn by me. 11 I further certify that the deposition 12 transcript was submitted on ___________________, 13 ________ to the witness or to the attorney for the 14 witness for examination, signature, and return to me by 15 ______________________, _____________. 16 I further certify the amount of time used 17 by each party at the deposition is as follows: 18 Mr. Alex Rue - (04h23m) 19 Mr. Clarence McDonald Leland - (00h00m) 20 I further certify that I am neither 21 attorney nor counsel for, related to, nor employed by 22 any of the parties to the action in which this testimony 23 was taken. Further, I am not a relative or employee of 24 any attorney of record in this cause, nor do I have a 25 financial interest in the action. 0154 1 SUBSCRIBED AND SWORN TO by the undersigned 2 on this the ________ day of ______________, _________. 3 4 ______________________________ CAROL JENKINS, CSR, RPR, CRR 5 Certificate No. 2660 Date of Expiration: 12/31/2010 6 Merrill Legal Solutions, No. 210 7
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