Some people lost their life savings while others lost their dreams in a $900 million fraud that was described as one of the largest Ponzi schemes in history and left behind 1 million victims.

Investors in ‘Zeek’ had taken out loans and mortgages on their homes expecting to get a 125% return on their investment. Victims included the parents of a leukemia patient who were trying to pay for their daughter’s hospital visits.

And while some of the money was recovered, people in towns like Lexington, North Carolina, where ZeekRewards had its office, are still suffering. Zeek’s victims were working class people who didn’t understand what they were getting into.

Zeek CEO Paul Burks, who made millions from the scheme, was convicted of wire and mail fraud and sentenced to 14 years in prison in the first year of the Trump administration.

Burks filed multiple appeals, claiming that COVID poses a risk to his health (he contracted a mild case) that were rejected by the court. And that was that until Biden commuted his sentence.

The Zeek CEO was one of a number of major fraudsters who were liberated by Biden in his rash of pardons and commutations.

While Biden had long claimed that “no one is above the law”, beginning with his corrupt pardon of his son, the outgoing president has set out to demonstrate that the law is worthless for some of the worst convicted crooks in the country.

Biden commuted the sentence of James Fry, a hedge fund manager convicted in the Petters Group $1.9 billion Ponzi scheme described as “one of the largest and most complex Ponzi schemes in U.S. history” and was accused of having “raised hundreds of millions of dollars from investors” while working alongside a convicted criminal.

He also commuted the sentence of Timothy McGinn, one half of a pair of brokers accused of defrauding 900 investors of $136 million, who had been sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Victims included a father of two wounded veterans who had been putting aside the money for their expenses.

Former CEO Eric Bloom, who got 14 years in prison, after being accused of committing the “biggest fraud in Chicago court history” in what was described as a $665 million fraud scheme also got a pass from Biden.

So did former CEO Gregory J. Podlucky, who ran a bottled water company and had been accused of a $685 million pyramid fraud loan scheme in which the money was spent on jewels and toy trains, and had been sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Gregory McKnight, who ran a $72 million Ponzi scheme that targeted at least 3,000 investors in every state in the country, had been sentenced to 15 years in prison before Biden stepped in.

Marc Dreier, had been sentenced to 20 years in prison for a $740 million Ponzi scheme with losses to investors estimated at $400 million, also got a helping hand from the White House.

Biden seemed to have a soft spot for Ponzi fraudsters and his commutations included Nevin Shapiro, sentenced to 20 years in prison for a $930 million Ponzi scheme that made headlines because of its Miami connection, Brian Callahan, sentenced to 12 years in prison for a $96 million Ponzi scheme that caused some to lose their life savings, and Joseph Shereshevsky, sentenced to 22 years in prison for a $255 million Ponzi scheme that defrauded 1,200 investors.

Other ‘smaller time’ fraudsters freed by Biden included Gary McDuff, sentenced to 25 years, for an $11 million investment fraud scheme, Gordon Driver, sentenced to 12 years in prison for a $17 Ponzi scheme with around 150 victims, Christopher Swartz who had been sentenced to 12 years in prison after defrauding over 150 investors out of $21 million, and Andrew Mackey, sentenced to 27 years in prison for a $12 million Ponzi scheme with 150 victims.

Biden also intervened on behalf of Henry Ramer, sentenced to 13 years in prison for defrauding over 200 investors out of over $3 million, Rodney Phelps, who had been sentenced to 9 years in prison for defrauding victims out of $2.4 million in a Ponzi scheme, Leslie John Hamilton Jr who had been sentenced to 25 years in prison for ripping off over 400 investors of $14 million in a pyramid scheme, and James Turek, sentenced to 18 years in prison for defrauding 8,500 investors out of over 18 million.