Xtagged Scam (and Con-artist Andres “Andy” Esquivel)

111701135-mugshot1So there’s this pathological lying sociopath out there named Andres “Andy” Esquivel, owner of a scam website called “Xtagged.com,” who’s been duping people out of thousands of dollars pretending he’s a legitimate investment and claiming that he is about to get bought out by Google for “a billion dollars.” One of his victims posted a message about him on my prototype website of mine two years ago and this psychopath has been threatening to sue me ever since.  Because seems obsessed with threatening to sue everybody from City Weekly on down and I grew tired of hearing his garbage, I decided to create a blog to call him out.

On July 19th, 2011, the Davis County Prosecutor’s office formally charged Andres ‘Andy’ Esquivel with one 2nd degree and two 3rd degree felony counts of securities fraud for the activities described in this blog.  A $10,000 felony warrant was issued for his arrest.  If convicted, Esquivel faces up to 25 years in prison.  An updated case history can be found here [PDF].

On February 17th, 2012, Andy Esquivel plead ‘No Contest’ to Class B Misdemeanor Digital Harassment charges for sending threatening emails related to this blog and the original UtahRaves.com thread.  He was ordered to pay a $250 fine and can break no local, state, or federal laws for 12 months.

On March 21st 2012 Andy Esquivel was indicted of all counts after a preliminary hearing in which victims and securities experts testified that he had in fact committed fraud and the judge agreed.  An audio transcript of the preliminary hearing including witness and expert testimony can be heard here.

On February 11th, 2014, Andy Esquivel was found by two separate evaluating psychiatrists to suffer from serious delusions and to be mentally incompetent to stand trial.  He was sentenced to be treated at a State Mental Hospital until he is ‘sane’ enough to stand trial.

Andy EsquivelOn October 7th, 2014, Andres “Andy” Esquivel was convicted of two third degree felony counts of securities fraud in connection with the activities described on this website.  The conviction follows a plea agreement reached by Andy’s public defender and the prosecutor which is detailed here.  He was entenced to 90 days in jail (with credit for time served, including 90 days in a state mental hospital), and three years probation.  Andy was also ordered to pay $13,000 in restitution to his victims,  $500 in legal fees, and an $800 fine.  Andy must cease all criminal activity, remain drug and alcohol free, and must obtain and retain gainful employment.  The prosecutor cited no-objection to reducing the charges to Class-A misdemeanors IF (that’s a big IF) Andy can successfully complete his probation and pay full restitution to his victims.

Here is a transcript of Andy’s statement to the court:

“During the period of time from March 2008 through April 2009, [I] operated a business known as Xtagged.  [I] represented Xtagged was an Internet based business in which the user created an online profile for meeting & dating.  During that period of time [I] met with 3 individuals.  At various meetings, [I] represented that Xtagged was a registered LLC, that Xtagged was patented & the Dept. of Motor Vehicles had authorized Xtagged to communicate and access their databases.  That MySpace, Michael Jackson & Google were interested in purchasing Xtagged & that in near future Xtagged would become a public corporation.

Based upon [my] representations, these individuals purchased ‘stock’ in Xtagged.  They did not receive any return on their investment as promised and [I] failed to return their investment when asked.  A records search showed Xtagged was never registered in the state of Utah and no patents held in it’s name.  The DMV was contacted and they never gave permission for Xtagged to access their database.  No evidence that any offer to purchase Xtagged was made or that it ever went public.” – Andres Esquivel (8/19/2014)

On Fenruary 1st 2016 Andy Esquivel was arrested again for probation violation.  He is bring held on with $25,000 cash bail, which means he’s not getting out until a judge says so.  In his probation violation report his probation officer wrote the following for the record:

“A person’s behavior reflects their thinking, values and beliefs about themselves, others, and the world around them.  Mr. Esquivel demonstrates a disregard for the feelings of others and a reduced ability to experience guilty shame.  He is superficially charming and has shown a disregard for rules.  He victimizes others to satisfy his own needs and expresses rationalizations for law violations.” – Roman Hentish, Supervising Officer

Andy has failed to get a job, made no effort to repay his victims, and demonstrates no interest in rehabilitation.  This is therefore the first of many times Andy will be violated back to prison.

This website will stand in perpetuity as a warning to anybody considering getting involved with Andy Esquivel, Allen Brady, Shar Jenkins, Steve Klemark, and Ron Kelsay.  These men have been and continue to be involved in a brand of criminal activity that is particularly dangerous because it relies on personal (even familial) connections to work.  We call this type of fraud “affinity fraud” and it has been specifically targeted by the Utah Attorney General’s office due to it’s pervasiveness and high economic impact on Utah citizens.

If you are considering going into business with the men listed above, do yourself a favor and browse this blog first.  A few minutes of reading could save you thousands of dollars and years of harassment.

Related links:
Andy Esquivel’s 2004 conviction on federal weapons charges and documentation of repeated drug use

Andy Esquivel’s burglary case file file #1

Andy Esquivel’s burglary case file file #2

Andy Esquivel’s 2004 domestic abuse case

Andy Esquivel’s Disorderly Conduct conviction in Bountiful

Andy Esquivel’s harassment case

The Truth about Xtagged

The WiserTechnology.com thread on Scam.com

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31 thoughts on “Xtagged Scam (and Con-artist Andres “Andy” Esquivel)”

  • rbutcher says:

    Andy thinks just cause he has a lawyer he’s going to get off! all that will happen now, is Andy will end up paying a lot of money fighting the case and he will still have to pay us back! 😀

    • dacumen says:

      I completely agree. So far this attorney has had Andy plead “not guilty” to a misdemeanor charge of failing to appear in court, and has asked for a full jury trial in a digital harassment case. Talk about running up the meter. I mean seriously, how do you defend against the charge that your client didn’t show up for court for two years? “Well judge, my client DID show up. In fact he was here the whole time! He was camping out under a bench in the courtroom so you couldn’t see him.” Maybe it’s just me, but that seems like a charging a brick wall.

      I’m sure Mr. Holje knows what he’s doing, but I think Andy is going to have to take Wiser Technology public to pay his fee.

  • rbutcher says:

    I don’t think it will be long till Andy will racks up a huge bill for his lawyer to where he won’t be able to pay him or to use him. Then his lawyer will have to sue him to get his money! Now the longer Andy drags this out, the more he will have to pay.

  • cyruss77 says:

    It’s the same old crap, different day. How do you persuade people to invest in a fictitious business, take their money, and then expect to get out of it……..

    Andy keeps mentioning that he will pay more to the lawyer than what he owes to the victims…..THAT’S SMART! It’s the same old stupid decisions that Andy makes. 🙄

  • JusticeBeaver says:

    Andy, did not plead not guilty for the charges in Davis County of securities fraud. His lawyer asked the judge for more time to familiarize himself with the case. The new scheduled date for the hearing is Jan 16th at 8:30 A.M.

    Beaver out!

  • Law101 says:

    This Lawyer is smart, if he told Andy not to enter a plea till he gets to see if Andy even has a chance? Which in this case I would be very surprised if he could get out of this one with the amount of evidence against him.

  • butcher says:

    I love how Andy thinks just because we don’t go to every court date that we must be afraid of him. Truth is Andy! they told us it would be a waste of time for us to show up until we get to take the stand, and we actually have jobs. We can’t wait to take the stand, we will be there when they need us, and you keep pushing court back another month each time you go. But your time is running out will see you so enough. 😀

    • dacumen says:

      Yea, the victims advocate told me it was a waste of time for me to go to the last hearing as well, because it was just a formal touch-base to make sure Andy had counsel or assign him counsel if he didn’t. I get all my case updates from the court records database anyway and there’s really no need for me to drive to Farmington or even to AF just to hear Andy’s lawyer file discovery requests or ask for a jury trial. I’ll pop in if the victims advocates say something interesting might be going down, but otherwise I have a job too.

      Besides, we’re not the ones on trial here; Andy is!

  • cyruss77 says:

    So the last I heard Andy was going to pay people. Did anyone receive any payment or was this the same bull that Andy has said before?

    • dacumen says:

      Same BS as before. The last person Andy was talking about paying was Chris and obviously he couldn’t even afford to do that. Same crap, different month.

  • Butcher says:

    Yeah, nobody is getting paid! Just more of Andy’s games. Im going to have him served next time he comes down for court. Now that they will be able to find him. Im taking him to small claims. So Andys going to be spending a lot of time in court.

  • butcher says:

    Andy’s videos are coming back to haunt him and were going to be breaking them down for everyone.

  • butcher says:

    Andy gives another gift of nothing!!! 🙄

  • Law101 says:

    Hopefully the new year will put Andy in jail for a long time.

  • Rob D says:

    I was Also SCAMMED by Andy Esquivel

    I remember I was getting my pick up washed at Firehouse Carwash and he Came RUNNING after me as I was pulling away, it was a little confusing, I stopped, That was the First Mistake of Many with Andy

    He is Quite the Fast Talker, he sounded like used car Salesman, Told me within minutes he was Going to be on Oprah next week, and he wanted to mention my License Plate on the Show so I let him take my photo holding the License plate frame, I mean what could it hurt right.

    Bottom line he fed me a Ton of Crap over the next couple months, and I ending up laying down some money, after he gave me a document that Said ISAFE.org was investing in Xtagged.com so I thought it must be a good thing.

    Of Course he Promised the money back, and Never delivered, I have asked him Many times to remove my profile on his site, and he refuses, making it look like I endorse his SCAM, I mean his website.

    If he would just remove my profile I would go away, but I think I will Make sure I tell everyone I come in contact with.

    I will round up some of the documents he gave me and post them.

    People like this will get whats coming to them, may take some time, but KARMA Rules.

    It’s Funny How much of a LOSER to you have to be, to SCAM people out of their money for a Living, I mean Get of your Lazy butt and get a job, when you have to Pay for someone to Pretend to be your wife, what does that really say about you HA HA HA

    Rob

  • Rob D says:

    Wow, How funny is this, less than 24 hours I got this Email from Andy!

    I think Someone is Upset with me, But Free Free to Call Immigration, in fact ICE has been here a couple times to buy Vests from me, so they are quite familiar, with my Vest Company

    “dirty cop dirty pig dirty perv”

    “immigration will be seeing you soon at your office bitch dirty pig you going down!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    watch for my blogs everywhere about dirty ass vestguy! and his wetback crue and how i was ruffied by you and i am going to blog it to the world!!!!!!!! so all women know VestGuy”

    getback girl
    your crack head cashier.

  • dacumen says:

    Wow, Andy has a ‘vest company’ too? I never saw that one listed on his Buzz Karma Wiser Profiler website? I guess his genius fades when the drugs wear off.

  • Rob D says:

    I own the vest company! Andy’s Email starts

    at “dirty cop dirty pig”, Whatever the hell

    that means.

  • JusticeBeaver says:

    Two days till scAndy comes back to town. WHOOOOOHOOOOOOO 😛

  • Butcher says:

    Logan Laws is back!!!! He will be coming too court to testify aginst Andy. Andy I’m glad that you have stalled this case so that Logan could be there too. 😀

  • brian says:

    I was scammed as well out of 10k but I know where to find him . I heard he’s so broke he sold the mustang to.

  • law101 says:

    Allen Brady has been contacting scammed investors trying to convince them they have no case and that they are going to get sued. Even if the company was registered, all it means is that the were scammed by a company that was registered. Andy is still going down. Andy never told investors about his criminal history, They were not provided proper paperwork, He was not licensed to sell stock, not to mention he lied to all the investors about the company and how well it was doing and the sell of Xtagged. Allen really should read the Discovery? I think Allen needs to be investigated too.

  • Butcher says:

    Ready for court!!! See you all there….Yessss!!!! it’s finally here. 😛

  • Butcher says:

    Well court went awesome! and now I can’t wait till we meet again but this time there will be a lot of others that will testify and more evidence that will be provided and Andy will have to take the stand…I can’t wait!!!!! Andy can only pretend that all is well for him for so long. The truth and the law is going to come crashing down on him soon. 🙂

  • Butcher says:

    The new news on the case and info that just came foward…can I just say WOW!!! I thought we had a slam dunk case before, But now it’s air tight, I can sit back and enjoy the ride now. :mrgreen:

  • JusticeBeaver says:

    His own lawyer quit on him. Andy, all I can say is, don’t drop the soap homey!

  • Eli says:

    Hahaha This website is amazing. I met this Andy character at the Playground years ago.

    So here I am with my family in bed thinking what ever happened to that xtagged crap that was all over that bar in park city that never paid me? Needless to say I find this amazing site. Andy tried to get me to take a picture with my truck and said I could be a “model” haha. I declined politely. He also told me that anytime fitness gave him a couple locations for “Future” Company shares and I could work out there and promote the company for him, but “when they are done being built” WOW. All of these memories coming back now. Lets see if I can think of some more dog crap he was telling… He said he patented a usb device that would plug into the machines and record how many reps you’ve completed and record the weight that you added. Ohhh and a couple big clubs in Vegas were going to put up big touch screen televisions (similar to the Iphone that was just released) where you can rsvp and when you arrive you touch your license plate and check in. People from home could go to that website and see if you checked in and buy you a drink.

    He had the poor owners of that club so fooled into thinking they were going to get a big payday. I remember one of the owners telling me that andy told him “I dont want the 40 million I was offered, I want a billion.” lol pre Social Network too. They were all clowns.

    Im sure more will come. I cant believe he got money out of so many people. I personally always wondered why he was at the playground 14 hours a day with all the big money and business deals he talked about. That place made I’d guess $1500 on its busiest night.

    But nice job on the website. I’m going to read it a bit more.

  • koda57 says:

    hey guys I cannot believe that I just found this link. Several years ago I worked for Andy at a sushi shop and he completely ripped me off big time. He promised me millions and he owed me a lot of hours worth of work in the sushi shop before he 1 day ran away from me. I was a kid so I really was very gullible and believed in a friend like andy..I want to show up at the court if it’ll help at all who do I get hold of and talk to?

  • Daryl Acumen says:

    People continue to come out of the woodwork here. I spoke to Brad Davis last week and Melissa Garr has come forward and offered to give her evidence to the prosecution – even testify if necessary. According to Melissa, Andy stole at least $100,000 from associates of hers while he was trying to scam the owners of a strip club in northern Utah out of ownership of the establishment. What a scumbag!

  • Daris Garner says:

    Just to put it out there; Andy took $1000 cash from me. I believe he sold me 1% of them single and dating. Haha. Anyways, you can add that to my part in all of this. Sorry for all the victims. If I had only known.

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