He sold fake tokens to an agriculture tech company
June 22, 2023 | 10:27pm ET
The last time Home Improvement star Zachery Ty Bryan was in the news, it was for allegedly strangling his girlfriend. This time around, the story’s not much better. According to a lengthy report by The Hollywood Reporter, Bryan scammed several people into investing in a crypto company and now owes them around $50,000.
Bryan got into crypto at the behest of fellow child star Brock Pierce, an early beneficiary of the bitcoin business. After making millions of dollars himself, he linked up with Producers Market, an agriculture-related tech startup meant to empower farmers and educate consumers about farmers’ products. In 2018, the company explored a token sale, which raises money from the public by offering them insider privileges through the purchase of digital tokens.
According to THR, Bryan began scheming by selling these tokens privately, despite Producers Market previously deciding not to go forward with such a sale. “It sounded really interesting. I should have been smarter, but I trusted [the investment] because it was through a friend,” one source said. “I sent him the money and he said, ‘Awesome, dude, this is going to be huge, and I’m excited for you to see what the future brings.’” The source, of course, never saw their money again.
Bryan even allegedly convinced a college student that he met on Bumble to transfer him $5,000 — most of which she secured from family. “I talked to a lawyer and [he] laughed at the contract because it was a pretty lame document sent through DocuSign,” the young woman, Courtney Ledford, said.
Multiple sources claimed to have checked in with Bryan over the years to receive a status update on their investments. In some instances, the actor would reply quickly and keep up the facade. In others, they were met with a response that he no longer held that phone number.
The dense report offers other concerning anecdotes about Bryan’s post-Home Improvement life; in addition to becoming a talking head fixture on right wing cable news, he’s received several DUIs and admits to having an alcohol problem, and has had three children with the woman he was arrested for strangling (he has four more with his ex-wife, Carly Matros). He’s also been hit with a lawsuit by a man named Cameron Moore who claims Bryan failed to return a $60,000 investment he made in a film Bryan was producing. After Bryan failed to acknowledge the suit, a judge awarded Moore $108,940.67.
Read The Hollywood Reporter’s full report on Bryan’s affairs here.
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