Complaint Review: Inner Circle Publishing

Dealing with Chad Lilly is like pulling teeth.  As a freelance photographer and newbie to the social networking site, Twitter, I first became aware of Chad Lilly by following him and his Twitter updates, which can be seen at:  http://www.twitter.com/icpchad  This all started about a year ago, and he was advertising that he was putting together an anthology entitled "Random Acts of Awareness."  I looked at his website, which at the time said that he was accepting the following types of entries for the following submission fees upon acceptance for publishing:  Written entries for $10, photos for $25 and videos also for $25.  Two of my photographs were "accepted," one of which he said he wanted to use as the cover for the book.  He also went so far as to say Alyssa Milano might be submitting a video for the anthology/project/scam.  A year passed and during that time, I requested more information about the progress of "Random Acts of Awareness" to which he responded in a very evasive manner.  I stopped following him on Twitter, having to block and report him for spam.  He then cyber-stalked me on my YouTube channel, which I don't login to very often, posting rude and abusive comments, so I had to block him there as well.  I requested a refund of my submission fees, totaling $50, and he spammed my email with threatening messages, which I can provide copies of upon request, threatening me and saying he isn't someone I want to "mess with," to put it mildly.  I continued to ask for my money back and he made up some story about how I actually owed him money due to the time invested in the book design, and since I no longer wanted to be involved in his "project," he charged me for that as well, giving me a total of $10.50 as a "refund."  To date, there hasn't been any new developments in this supposed project, all he is apparently doing is using it to attract views to his YouTube account.  

He has changed his course of action and is now doing YouTube "episodes" called "Random Acts of Awareness," none of which were discussed when we originally began "working" together.  There is no question in my mind that others have fallen victim to Chad Lilly and his bullying tactics, especially given that he has been reported before, and maybe some are afraid to speak out against him because they have invested much more money than I have, or given him personal information about themselves (i.e. home/business addresses, etc) that he uses to threaten them with.  Chad Lilly is a cyber-bully and con-artist, nothing more.