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The Vitasea timeline

Well, I'm still on his distribution list (of course). But this time he made a fatal flaw... he didn't bcc people on his little mailing list, he cc'd them.

So that allowed me to send an email to everyone that Vitasea (Doug Hiner) is emailing, linking them to this thread. Hopefully anyone who is being duped by Mr. Hiner will take this thread to heart.

Here's the email:

.....

Please stop mailing me about the fake Cuban cigars you're attempting to sell:

http://www.cigarpass.com/forumsipb/index.php?showtopic=14228

(Vitasea = Doug Hiner)

I'm not interested in buying any fake Cuban cigars that you had custom rolled in Cuba; take me off of your mailing list.

.....

On Jan 26, 2008, at 12:20 PM, Habana Cigar wrote:

Arrived safe and sound,though did run into a bad storm ( unpredicted ) and blew out the genoa a 3000.00 problem. The cargo arrive safe and dry!!!!!!! Since i no longer live in Omaha and will be going to Cuba more often i have revised my price list down considerably. I have also brought back a lot of bundles of 25 and 50 sticks who's price will blow you away. I can carry about 50% more bundles then boxes on my boat and can pass the saving on to you. They are also much more easy to water proff. As long as you trust me that they are of the same high quality, which they are!! Heck most of you put the cigars in your humidors and throw away the boxes.

Please recommend me to your cigar smoking buddies and i can more easily keep the prices low.
thanks and enjoy
Doug


Doug Hiner
% Jan Kohl
[Address & Phone Number snipped]
 
heh... already had someone write me back, claiming they loved the cigars, and why am I so angry? No good deed goes unpunished... I sent one more reply off, if I still get any friction, these suckers can just hang themselves for all I care. :)

.....

On Jan 26, 2008, at 2:58 PM, XXXXXXXX wrote:

These are the best cigars I've ever smoked. Why are you so angry?

I am not angry; but it is true that Doug Hiner is representing that the cigars he is selling are authentic Cuba marca cigars. They are not. They are fake Cuban cigars, probably farm rolls, for which he is charging legitimate Cuban cigar prices.

What you are doing in purchasing these cigars from him is the equivalent of buying a Rolex watch from a street urchin in the night markets of SE Asia, and thinking it is real.

If you're okay with that, and enjoy the cigars, then that's fine. But know what you are buying; you are NOT buying authentic Cuban cigars. I would suggest that you read the URL I sent in my initial email completely:

http://www.cigarpass.com/forumsipb/index.php?showtopic=14228

(Vitasea = Doug Hiner)
 
:rolleyes: Some people just don't get it...no matter how much you try to help them...
 
As per Van55's tip off... probably the final chapter in the Vitasea timeline (Doug Hiner = Vitasea):

Jury indicts Port Charlotte man accused of smuggling Cuban cigars

Customs agents find stash of 28,000 stogies

BY PAT GILLESPIE • PGILLESPIE@NEWS-PRESS.COM • MAY 24, 2008

The discovery of more than 28,000 Cuban cigars and 42 bottles of Cuban rum landed a Port Charlotte man in federal court this week.

Douglas Hiner, 68, charged with importing illegal Cuban merchandise and conspiracy to do the same, was indicted Wednesday and appeared in federal court Thursday.

He was released on a $50,000 bond.

“It’s kind of crazy,” Hiner said Friday, “that Cuban cigars are of such importance to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

He then referred calls to his attorney, Assistant U.S. Public Defender Russell Rosenthal.

On May 13, the United States Coast Guard and Customs and Border Patrol Marine Interdiction agents intercepted a 53-foot sailboat in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties that was carrying 361 Cuban cigars and cigarettes, according to a U.S. Attorney’s Office press release.

During the investigation, agents found a North Fort Myers storage facility in which Hiner allegedly stored the cigars and rum, according to the press release.

“This isn’t someone coming back with a box of Cohibas,” said Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Molloy.

“We don’t go after people unless they’re making a lot of money.”

Molloy said an investigation shows Hiner wasn’t selling the cigars in this area. Cuban exports are illegal in the United States because of the country’s trade embargo with the communist country.

In a separate indictment earlier this year, Martin Sengseis, 43, was indicted on a charge of importing Cuban cigars and rum. Also indicted was John Genaro, but charges against him were dropped by prosecutors.

On Feb. 21, 2008, according to a federal complaint, Sengseis and Genaro were aboard a 51-foot sail boat that ran aground near Fort Myers Beach.

When Coast Guard agents searched the boat, they found 364 boxes of Cuban cigars, 45 bottles of Cuban rum, 30 pounds of Cuban coffee and 100 cartons of Cuban cigarettes, according to court documents.

In both cases, the men allegedly traveled from Havana, Cuba to Florida’s west coast.
 
moki said:
As per Van55's tip off... probably the final chapter in the Vitasea timeline (Doug Hiner = Vitasea):

Jury indicts Port Charlotte man accused of smuggling Cuban cigars

Customs agents find stash of 28,000 stogies

BY PAT GILLESPIE • PGILLESPIE@NEWS-PRESS.COM • MAY 24, 2008

The discovery of more than 28,000 Cuban cigars and 42 bottles of Cuban rum landed a Port Charlotte man in federal court this week.

Douglas Hiner, 68, charged with importing illegal Cuban merchandise and conspiracy to do the same, was indicted Wednesday and appeared in federal court Thursday.

He was released on a $50,000 bond.

“It’s kind of crazy,” Hiner said Friday, “that Cuban cigars are of such importance to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

He then referred calls to his attorney, Assistant U.S. Public Defender Russell Rosenthal.

On May 13, the United States Coast Guard and Customs and Border Patrol Marine Interdiction agents intercepted a 53-foot sailboat in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties that was carrying 361 Cuban cigars and cigarettes, according to a U.S. Attorney’s Office press release.

During the investigation, agents found a North Fort Myers storage facility in which Hiner allegedly stored the cigars and rum, according to the press release.

“This isn’t someone coming back with a box of Cohibas,” said Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Molloy.

“We don’t go after people unless they’re making a lot of money.”
Molloy said an investigation shows Hiner wasn’t selling the cigars in this area. Cuban exports are illegal in the United States because of the country’s trade embargo with the communist country.

In a separate indictment earlier this year, Martin Sengseis, 43, was indicted on a charge of importing Cuban cigars and rum. Also indicted was John Genaro, but charges against him were dropped by prosecutors.

On Feb. 21, 2008, according to a federal complaint, Sengseis and Genaro were aboard a 51-foot sail boat that ran aground near Fort Myers Beach.

When Coast Guard agents searched the boat, they found 364 boxes of Cuban cigars, 45 bottles of Cuban rum, 30 pounds of Cuban coffee and 100 cartons of Cuban cigarettes, according to court documents.

In both cases, the men allegedly traveled from Havana, Cuba to Florida’s west coast.
Click to expand...

He couldn't be making that much money if he couldn't afford an attorney and is using a public defender.... ???
 
28,000 cigars? What was he charging for these things? I'm guessing he bought these for next to nothing. Being a good Sumaritan and bringing medical supplies to needy doctors can really pay off. :sign:
 
Wow, having watched this play out over the years I can't say I'm surprised.
I will have to say he is much uglier then I expected... :laugh: :laugh:
 
Jail time for smuggling fake, Cuban cigars.....how ironic but they're still "Cuban" products.....

Btw, I read pages and pages of this 'novel' :blush:


Dan
 
Latest update

Ex-Omahan caught with Cuban contraband
BY TODD COOPER
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

The former Omahan smuggled thousands of cigars on his boat, the Vitamin Sea.

Tuesday, he took his medicine.

Douglas Hiner, a longtime property developer in Omaha, was sentenced in a federal courtroom in Fort Myers, Fla., to three years of probation for smuggling more than 27,000 cigars and 42 bottles of rum from Cuba.

For Hiner, the sentence smelled as sweet as one of the Cohibas he smuggled.

"I'm very relieved," Hiner said Tuesday evening by phone from his Fort Myers apartment. "I had moved everything out of my apartment and into a storage locker. Basically, I thought I was going to jail."

Hiner said he awoke with those thoughts at 2 a.m. Tuesday and couldn't go back to sleep.

Then he arrived at the courtroom Tuesday afternoon to find that the official who performed his presentence investigation was recommending prison. The reason: Though Hiner had no felony record, authorities placed the value of the smuggled cigars at more than $200,000.

But Hiner had a few things going for him. In return for his guilty plea, prosecutors said they wouldn't oppose probation. About a dozen people wrote letters on his behalf, including a few of his former friends from Omaha, he said. And U.S. District Judge John E. Steele was firm but fair, Hiner said.

The sentencing capped Hiner's remarkable run from rags to riches to rags. One of several "mom-and-pop" building renovators, Hiner had built a small fortune rehabilitating old Omaha buildings. At one point, he accumulated more than 300 rental units and listed his net worth at $6.5 million in SEC filings.

Known for his audacious personality, he then expanded, building affordable housing units in small cities across Nebraska and Kansas in the 1990s.

Many of those projects stalled after accountants discovered that someone had been steering funds from new projects to pay bills on the old. Hiner blamed his former partner, Peter Spoto, who was indicted for bank fraud and has since fled to Australia.

But the result was devastating for Hiner. In 2005 he filed for bankruptcy, listing $930 in assets and $28 million in debts.

In the early 2000s, Hiner had begun sailing to Cuba to take medical supplies that had been donated by Omaha-area hospitals. On his way back, he took something else: cigars.

What started out as a lark for friends had become a moneymaking venture. Hiner advertised his wares on Internet sites.

But in May, U.S. Coast Guard agents found the loot on his boat and in a nearby delivery truck.

Hiner admitted his guilt immediately but remained defiant about the U.S. ban on trade with Cuba.

"Obviously, I wasn't a good smuggler," he said. "But it was a victimless crime. Essentially it was a political crime."

However, Hiner said he is finished with smuggling. He said he has never felt lower than when he was packing his belongings for prison.

He turns 69 on Friday and said he has virtually no job opportunities. He lives on $700 a month in Social Security and food stamps.

He's now a felon. He can't get a passport or travel out of the country. He can't own a gun. But as usual, he's cooking stuff up.

He recently sold the Glass Front Bar — the building that he and his former girlfriend renovated into a home — near 13th and William Streets in Omaha.

Hiner said he made about $80,000 from the sale — a lot less than he had hoped but enough for him to maybe dabble in flipping houses in Fort Myers.

Oh, and he has one other enterprise in mind: Hiner said he continues to gaze fondly at the Vitamin Sea, which still bobs in the waters near Fort Myers. Authorities seized the boat and everything on it.

Now, Hiner says he wants to bid on the 20-year-old, 53-foot-long sloop — in part because he doesn't believe anyone else will.

So what would he do with it?

"Live on it," he said. "I can tell you this — I certainly won't be going to Cuba."


• Contact the writer: 444-1275, todd.cooper@owh.com

Contact the Omaha World-Herald newsroom
Click to expand...
 
What started out as a lark for friends had become a moneymaking venture. Hiner advertised his wares on Internet sites.
Click to expand...

I wonder what exactly they found when making this statement. Somewhat of a reminder that we're not the only ones reading these boards, and you should be careful of what you post or brag about. Not saying I'm not guilty of the former, but it's some good food for thought.
 
What the f... this is STILL a topic of discussion? Amazing.

Added - not a knock on any of you. Just commenting on the fact that even I knew about it back in the day. :)
 
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