You just can’t keep a bad scheme down

Some of our very favorite people, bluebloods from Texas and smart money from New York were sucked into investing in a classic penny-stock "pump and dump" ploy, according to a lawsuit filed in Texas federal court. Dobi Medical International, a Mahwah, N.J.-based company in the cancer-detection field, attracted a stellar roster of investors, including publishing scion Barbara Hearst and former National Security Agency chief Bobby Ray Inman.

Hearst, Inman and 26 others charge that Dobi duped them into ponying up cash by claiming it had a viable breast-cancer detection machine, which could detect cancer nearly three years before mammograms and at a fraction of the price.

"It was a scam," Hearst told The Post in a phone interview from her Sag Harbor home. "All the studies they had, the contracts they showed us for business overseas, were all fake."

One of the Dobi contracts - a $5.6 million deal with an India-based concern - was a "wash sale," in which the purchase price was refunded, the lawsuit charges.

A longtime activist for a cancer cure, Hearst said the presentation she attended in 2003 prior to investing was "good - very well done," and that she invested $250,000.

The fleeced plaintiffs, while pursuing an investment aimed at a greater public good, did ignore some warning signs. One red flag - first reported by the Austin-American Statesman - was that its "outside medical director," Dr. David Li, apparently never had the Harvard affiliation Dobi claimed.

Dobi did not return a call seeking comment. We have a sneaking suspicion that we saw him at Cru, our favorite corner winebar, enjoying a glass of two of Bois de Nassau Street: Blanc

http://www.nypost.com/business/scam_snared_gentry_business_roddy_boyd.htm