For all of the recipes in the episode and others. Check and join our reddit thread https://www.reddit.com/r/NOWAYJAVIERJOSELEIVA/ If the information you are looking for is not there, check back as it will be coming soon! In Part Three of our five-part investigation into Anthony Christopher Rocko, we move from Washington County to Carroll County, Arkansas, and into yet another business dispute involving money, property, control, and credibility. In Part One, we examined the 2010 reporting surrounding Labor of Love Charities in Oklahoma. In Part Two, we opened an Arkansas lawsuit in which Jennifer Powers accused Anthony Christopher, also known as Anthony Rocko, of taking $8,000 for a real-estate purchase she alleged never existed and sued him for tort of deceit. Now we have another lawsuit. Another business. Another set of serious allegations. And another reason to ask how thoroughly PRETEND vetted Anthony Christopher before relying on him as a source. The Eureka Live disputeThis case was filed in Carroll County Circuit Court. The plaintiffs were Cordale Moore and Eureka Live Underground, LLC. Anthony Christopher was one of several defendants. The dispute centered on the ownership and control of Eureka Live, a restaurant and bar in Eureka Springs. According to the complaint, Cordale Moore purchased Eureka Live from Walter Burrell in December 2018 for $546,000, with the purchase price to be paid through scheduled installments. Moore formed Eureka Live Underground, LLC to operate the business and continued running it while making the required payments. The complaint alleges that Burrell nevertheless remained heavily involved in the business after the sale. Then Anthony Christopher entered the picture. What the plaintiffs allegedAccording to the complaint, Burrell brought Anthony Christopher into the bar on February 29, 2020 and showed him the operation of the business. The plaintiffs alleged that Burrell and Christopher were discussing a plan to take control of the restaurant and bar away from them and transfer it to Christopher. The following day, the complaint alleges, Burrell and Christopher entered the closed business using an alarm code obtained from another employee. Again, those are allegations. But what happened next is why the lawsuit becomes particularly relevant to Anthony Christopher’s credibility. The plaintiffs alleged that the locks were changed and Moore was denied access to the business. They further alleged that when they last left Eureka Live, the building contained several hundred dollars in the cash registers, money and other items in the safe, approximately $80,000 in inventory, and about $20,000 in additional assetsthat Moore had purchased. According to the complaint, that property was not returned after the plaintiffs were locked out. Anthony becomes the “new owner”The complaint alleges that only days after Moore was denied access, Burrell told him that he had been evicted and that the bar was being turned over to Anthony Christopher. Then come the exhibits. Court exhibits attached to the filing included Facebook promotional posts advertising Eureka Live’s reopening. One welcomed customers to the venue under “new owner Anthony Christopher.” Another announced that the club would reopen under “a New Owner Mr. Anthony Christopher.” Those screenshots are important because they were not merely allegations written into the body of the complaint. They were exhibits showing how the business was being publicly presented at the time. The claims against Anthony ChristopherThe plaintiffs did not merely mention Anthony in the background of the dispute. They sued him. One count alleged interference with contractual relationships. The plaintiffs claimed Anthony knew about the existing contractual arrangements surrounding Eureka Live and participated in conduct that disrupted those relationships. Another count alleged conversion. The complaint accused Anthony Christopher and other defendants of exercising control over property the plaintiffs claimed belonged to them or that they were entitled to possess. That allegedly included cash, inventory, business assets, and access to the building itself. Then came another claim: Civil conspiracy. The plaintiffs alleged that the defendants agreed to take control of the business and transfer it, and that Anthony Christopher’s presence in the bar while it was closed formed part of the circumstances supporting that allegation. They also alleged that the business later reopened under Christopher and other defendants after the plaintiffs had been removed. The complaint sought compensatory damages and punitive damages, including a demand for punitive damages of no less than $1 million. A verified complaintAs with the Jennifer Powers lawsuit examined in Part Two, this complaint also included a verification. Cordale Moore signed under oath that the facts and matters contained in the complaint were true and correct as he believed them to be. That does not turn the allegations into judicial findings. A lawsuit records what the plaintiffs alleged. It does not prove every allegation was true. But this is exactly where source vetting begins. A growing pattern of recordsAt this point in our investigation, we are no longer looking at a single isolated dispute. In 2010, contemporary reporting raised questions surrounding Labor of Love Charities, donated funds, and a building Anthony discussed despite not owning it. Years later, Jennifer Powers sued Anthony Christopher and alleged that he accepted $8,000 for a property purchase that she later discovered had not happened. Then came the Carroll County lawsuit, where Anthony Christopher was accused of participating in a scheme to take control of Eureka Live, interfering with contractual relationships, converting assets, and participating in a civil conspiracy. Three different episodes. Three separate sets of records. And that creates an obvious journalistic question. How thoroughly was Anthony Christopher vetted?PRETEND asked its audience to listen to Anthony Christopher discuss the conduct and credibility of LaDonna Humphrey. That makes his own credibility relevant. Again, the existence of a lawsuit does not automatically prove the allegations in that lawsuit. But when a source has a documented history of serious disputes involving money, property, business relationships, and representations made to others, a reporter should investigate that history before asking an audience to rely on that source. So the questions for Javier Leiva become increasingly difficult to avoid. Did he know about the Jennifer Powers lawsuit? Did he know Powers accused Anthony Christopher of tort of deceit? Did he know about the $8,000 property allegation? Did he know about the Carroll County litigation? Did he know Anthony had been accused of interference with contractual relationships, conversion, and civil conspiracy? Did he see the exhibits showing Anthony Christopher publicly promoted as Eureka Live’s new owner shortly after the plaintiffs alleged they had been locked out? If Javier knew about this history, listeners deserve to know why it was not part of the credibility assessment presented to them. If he did not know, then listeners have every reason to ask how thoroughly one of PRETEND’s sources was vetted before his allegations were broadcast. Read the documentsThat is why this five-part series exists. We are not asking listeners to accept every allegation in every lawsuit as fact. We are putting the records in front of you. Read the complaints. Look at the exhibits. Follow the chronology. Separate allegations from findings. And ask the same question PRETEND repeatedly asks about everyone else: What does the record actually show? Anthony Christopher wanted to help tell the world who other people supposedly were. This series is examining the documents that tell us something about the history of the man doing the telling. And we are not finished yet. No Way, José.
