Complaint Review: Biospharms Darin Smith

 On July 29, 2014 I met a man by the name of Darin Michael Smith who is an American from Fort Myers, Florida. This person is about 5'8" tall medium build, brown hair. I met this individual at the Philip Goldson international airport, Belize city. I was seated in the waiting area preparing to depart from Belize back to the United States. Mr. Smith sat down next to me and we started a conversation. During the conversation he explained that he is the developer of a Christian, fully self-sustaining subdivision community in the Cayo District of Belize. He explained that if I had further interest I could look the development up on his website at www.biospharms.com. When I returned to the USA I reviewed every page, video, map of the website. I emailed darin Smith on the website. He called, we agreed to meet in Belize around September 1 of 2014. We arrived September 2nd and stayed until the September 6th, staying in one of the vacant houses on the Biospharms community land. We were picked up by a Miss Laura Davio and driven to the community following a tour of Spanish Lookout (the largest local town) and lunch. We spent the four days there with Mr. Smith looking at different lots that were available for sale within the subdivision in the Los Tambos community. He showed us 10-12 different lots, mostly in “Phase II”. All lots were marked with fences andsurveyors tape, stakes, and other indications of subdivision. We met several of the community owner’s families over meals and were able to ask them how they liked the community. Several knew the truth - that the subdivision was not real - and they betrayed us as well by not telling this before we bought in. At the end of the four days we picked lot number 40 and signed what we thought was a contract for purchase of lot #40 including the construction of the house that we designed. Our contract was for a total of $99,995 to include house, lot, 40 fruit trees, 250 heirloom/organic seeds, perimeter fencing, a second floor, and 8’ posts under the house. Upon returning to the United States we sent a check for a deposit of 25% which was US $25,000. This was made out to “Biospharms Inc.” and wired from our Bank to a Bank of America account for Biospharms Inc. in Fort Myers, Florida company. Following this we had many conversations about the house design and where to plant our trees and so on. As the house progressed (we were sent photos as construction was underway) we later wired an additional $40,000 USD to the same account in Fort Myers Florida, made out to “Biospharms Inc.” Many of the items in our house design and package were not completed as discussed which is why we have not made the final payment for our house. In November an email discussion between residents started - about the lack of legal titles for their properties. This resulted in a community meeting led by Mr. Darin Smith in which he said he would recommend a trust arrangement but that he would respect residents requests for their titles and “would take care of it”. When we returned in March, 4 months after saying he would “take care of it”, we met with an attorney (Tanya Moody of Barrow & Williams law firm of Belize City), on March 11, 2015. She declared none of our paperwork/contracts legal. She called the whole subdivision fraudulent and illegal and recommended we file reports with the Cayo police, which we did on March 12, 2015. We also met with the Lands Department who confirmed that there has never been an application for subdivision submitted for this 43 acre property by Mr. Darin Smith. An application for subdivision is the very first step in selling multiple properties in Belize, it became obvious that Mr. Darin Smith's intent was a total con. We have since discovered that Mr. Darin Smith had threatened and driven off other prior owners and resold their properties. Some of these people lost substantial amounts of money. We would like to state for the record that we believed and trusted Mr. Darin Smith when he told us that a “quit claim deed was the certificate of land transfer most preferred in Belize”, and that we would receive one of those along with a title for the property. We are now being told by Mr. Smith that such land transfer titles will not be given and that he wants to put the whole property into a trust with all of us as beneficiaries, but with him still owning the land we purchased. We would also like to state for the record unequivocally that this is not what we purchased and not what we expected and not what was explained to us. Further Facts about Biospharms: The Biospharms 43-acre property “a sustainable, organic community” lies just outside the village of Los Tambos in the Cayo District, Belize (and near Spanish Lookout). It is owned personally in the name of Darin M. Smith. It has never been subdivided despite his selling of individually numbered, marked, and fenced lots, so by Belize government standards, all sales there have been illegal. Biospharms Inc. a corporation out of Fort Myers Florida, (where Darin Smith was most recently from) has NO connection to the 43-acre parcel, though Darin Smith makes ALL buyers pay through this corporation unless they pay in cash or gold. The 43-acre parcel is divided on paper and with barbed wire fencing by Darin Smith, into 44 lots. Of these, over 30 lots have been sold by Darin Smith Since 2010, one planted only in teak trees. Seven or eight ( 8 or 9) of those were re-sales, resulting in total sales of 35-40 lots. (Please forgive the uncertainty on this point, Mr. Smith is not sharing any records with us!) The initial owners of most of these resales were not refunded their monies and lost most or all they invested. The most lots EVER settled at any one time, excluding the 4 that Darin Smith keeps for his use, is 25 (despite Darin Smiths claims at numerous internet sites of “over 50 little farms now”. Of the 35-40 “sales”, there are only 4-5 Full time residents/households (this was including the Smiths who were living in the 6 bedroom, 3-bath “orphanage”). The Smith’s recently sold this on a “99 year lease” to a missions organization. Of the few full timers, only a few are there happily. Several have left in the past year (2017). Some of the things that happened to them to cause them to leave were: 1 had his water disconnected and was refused the gate code by Darin Smith (thereby making him a prisoner if other residents did not help). 1 was regularly threatened regularly with water disconnection and retraction of gate privileges (thereby becoming a prisoner). A third was regularly threatened with eviction. 2 households are pretty new and staying “neutral”, till they (in the words of “the Donald”) “figure out what is going on”. 3 households are genuinely “happy”, though for the most part have not talked to those being threatened and know only what Darin Smith chooses to tell them – which is a wildly exaggerated negative picture of those residents. The “senior” household knows much, but are afraid to speak up. And then there was (until very recently, May, 2017) the Darin & Stacy Smith family. Sound like a community you want to live in? Darin Smith drove those people who fought his lying and cheating behavior off from what was sold to us as “an Acts style community” (from the Bible). Those who left are fighting to get their money back while Darin Smith continues what he has done for 6+ years – re-selling at a huge profit, those abandoned lots and cabins. In fact – it will be the 3rd or 4th time he has re-sold #6! Of that 35-40 sales, (do the math, average $50,000 x 40 = $2 million USD) over 25 have fled in extreme fear and VERY MUCH against their wishes (not because “they just couldn’t hack Belize” or “they didn’t come here with enough money and ran out” as Darin Smith loves to tell people. This is just plain and simply a flat out lie. Many have and are suing Darin Smith for return of their monies or for performance and subdivision (7 so far). Some fall into both of those categories. We do expect additional claimants to join the effort to force justice and reveal all that has been happening at Biospharms since its inception in 2010. It seems people have been told a wide variety of different things – possibly to hit whatever “hot button” was needed to close the sale? If you wanted a title you were sold on getting a title. Or that a QCD was the same. Or that you would get a fee simple land certificate. And on and on. The variations are many. But one thing is consistent – the “contracts” are one – sided and say “Biospharms Inc.” on them, as well as “Los Tambos Subdivision”. Did they change the definition of subdivision when we weren’t looking??