Original subtitles

[cell door rattles, clangs]

- So we're doing everything? Like, from beginning to end?

INTERVIEWER: Yep. - Like, the whole story?

INTERVIEWER: Yep, the whole story.

- Okay, um... [chuckles]

Okay. [cell door clangs]

[mild music]

Honestly, I--I really believe

that you just can't trust anybody anymore.

Jay tried to paint this picture

that he was trying to bring peace to the world.

- That's 10,000 for you. - Oh, my God.

- That's 10,000 for you.

[fireworks explode] I just wanna show love.

My name is Jay Mazini.

AMJAD: Like, he helps the poor people

and he's a great Muslim.

[indistinct chatter]

JAY: Jay Mazini.

- What is your name? Who are you?

Like, wha-- JAY: My name is Jay Mazini.

Jay Mazini. - Jay Mazini? Yo.

- Thank you. Thank you, my brother.

AMJAD: When somebody would see these videos,

they would instantly feel a connection to him.

ANCHOR: Jay Mazini,

who is blessing people in the streets of New York

and New Jersey.

He is so nice. - He is awesome.

He is so awesome. ANCHOR: Yes.

ABDUL: And they would say, "Jay Mazini's a great man.

Why would you call him fake?"

[dramatic music]

Because he brought

more anguish and misery to my life

than I could ever have thought to imagine.

You know, I didn't think he was gonna do what he did.

[engine revs]

♪ ♪

I'm not a bad guy,

but he's ruined my life.

[dark intense music]

♪ ♪

KARIM: All right. [sighs] We are good to go.

CAMERAMAN: All right. KARIM: You just do it like that

and boom.

So just, uh, give me a quick t--test audio

and then we'll start. CAMERAMAN: Yep.

Got a test? - Testing, one, two. Testing.

CAMERAMAN: Perfect. Sounds good. - Sounds good?

All right. Let's begin.

♪ ♪

Hi, would you be interested in a really quick interview?

Hi, would you guys be interested

in a really quick interview?

Hi, would you be interested in a really quick interview

for a show? PERSON: All right.

KARIM: All right. Awesome. Ready?

My name is Karim Jovian.

I do a lot of things-- social experiments

and a lot of storytelling, man-on-the-street interviews

in New York City.

I have my Bible

that is disguised as a Qur'an.

"If evidence of virginity

"is not found in a young woman,

"then they shall bring out the young woman

"to the door of her father's house

and have the men of the city stone her to death."

- That's so [bleep] up.

- I think that's bull[bleep].

YouTube, I have 2.2 million subscribers,

Facebook, I have 2.1 million,

Instagram, 136, I think it is now,

and then TikTok, 150,000,

and I'm just starting to build up my Snapchat,

so that's pretty small.

[chuckles]

Hi. This is Karim.

For me growing up... [sighs]

I honestly had a lot of people that I looked up to

but none of them were Muslim. [chuckles]

I think it's just the faith and the culture, you know?

It's stigmatized to be in the entertainment industry.

So I'm using social media

to try to give people,

you know, a better light--

a better view of Muslims.

I would like to pay for you. - Hmm?

- Order whatever you want. I'll pay for you.

- Yeah. - What's he say?

- Yes. - You're so nice.

- Thank you. I appreciate it. Have a good one.

A lot of the Muslim channels that I follow,

they were saying like, "Oh, look at you guys.

You're--are you another Jay Mazini?"

[notification chimes] Like, in the comments,

like, you know, telling me like,

"Hey, have you seen this guy?"

"Have you been watching Jay?"

"Have you seen what he's doing?"

Like, "Yo, this guy's blowin' up."

Some of the stuff he's doing

was kind of similar to what we were doing.

But we would do it on a smaller scale,

like, giving out a couple of dollars.

He was giving out thousands of dollars.

That's when I really started noticing.

- Guys.

I need everybody's attention.

KARIM: I remember the first video I saw

of him standing up on the table.

Was it a Walmart? Or whatever it is,

it was some store.

And he was just throwing out stacks of money.

- Everybody that gotta pay their groceries,

I want you guys to come up.

[indistinct chatter]

PERSON 1: Thank you. PERSON 2: Thank you.

KARIM: He was helping people in need and giving money out.

And, you know, that's something

that we're supposed to do in our faith in Islam.

[dramatic music]

JAY: This is, uh, 10,000.

- Oh, my God.

[baby coughs] JAY: This is 10,000.

I'm serious. MOTHER: No, you not.

JAY: I swear to God.

- No, you not.

No. [weeps] JAY: I swear.

Sometimes you gotta realize there's more to life

than materialistic things-- cars, fashion, jewelry.

KARIM: He seemed very religious.

I seen some videos of his

with him walking around in Mecca.

That was something like, "Wow, like, this guy

"is making all this money, he's helping all these people,

and look at him."

It was cool. I mean, I'm gonna be honest.

It was really cool to see that.

You know, someone who you could tell is a Muslim

because he has the full beard...

and he's helping people out.

We need more of that, you know?

AMJAD: So I knew Jay since I was a kid.

[light clicks on] [notification chimes]

Islamic school was an interesting experience.

We were literally going to the mosque for school.

It was very small.

In tenth grade,

Jay Mazini was one of the new students.

From what I recall,

Jay wasn't really a popular student,

didn't really have a lot of friends.

And, not to brag, you know, I was the popular guy.

I was the better-looking one.

The girls all liked me.

But as soon as he started to make money,

everybody loved him.

- I've seen his content online.

He's using YouTube, talkin' about, like,

how he started, and-- and how he came up.

JAY: What's up, my YouTube subscribers,

my supporters, and everybody watchin' this video?

I've been receiving a lot of messages

regarding my personal life and how everything went along.

[pensive piano music]

It started along when I was about 14.

I would finish school.

I would take the train to New York.

♪ ♪

This is Fordham and Webster Ave.

in the Bronx, New York.

This is the same stand I was hustlin' on

when I was 14 years old

all the way to 17 years old.

I had my colognes, perfumes, electronics--

anything I could get my hands on and hustle.

I stayed there from, you could say, 4:30 p.m.

to, like, 11:00, midnight.

KARIM: So, in this video, he mentions Wall Street.

And he wanted to go there

because that's where all the money is made.

JAY: I used to take the train to Wall Street

and cry to myself like,

"How can I be that person?

How can I have the same thing they have?"

KARIM: He talks about investing.

He got into penny stocks.

- I had about $70,000, $80,000 saved up.

So I'm like, "Okay, I'm gonna take this money.

I'm gonna invest it into penny stock companies."

So if I lost it,

I would have lost all my money.

I took about $70,000 profit.

AMJAD: All of a sudden, he was the rich guy

and everybody wanted to be his friend.

He started making a clothing brand.

KARIM: He was posting a lot about his brand, Mazini Italy.

It was all on his Instagram.

JAY: In the year 2016, we started the brand fully,

where we had it in stores.

We had it in different stores in Harlem.

We had it in the Bronx.

It was clippin'. It was doin' really good.

Don't miss out.

Everything is sellin' out.

All sizes are available.

- I had just started learning how to screen print

and make apparel.

And Jay comes and dumps 200 hoodies in front of me,

and he says, "Hey, I need this done in three days."

I started workin' with him, and he was always promisin',

"We're gonna get this job done

and we're gonna make more money in the long run."

JAY: In that year,

we did about 1/2 million in wholesale.

It went great from there.

Like, the company was skyrocketing.

AMJAD: At one point, he had his store

next to Gucci and Louis Vuitton.

And he was really trying to portray his brand

as a designer product.

JAY: Before that time of putting the brand together,

there was nights I was sleepin' in the back of my car.

I didn't have money to eat at--at times.

It was hard.

But the company's worth about $8 million right now.

AMJAD: He blew up a lot on social media.

He loved to flaunt that he had a lot of money.

And he got collaborations

with a lot of big-name rappers,

specifically, like, Dave East. [chuckles]

He was one rapper

who actually helped catapult him up.

- The hats are available now.

I mean, you can go to the website.

It got the Mazini page up on the 'gram.

AMJAD: Fabolous is another one

who helped catapult him up.

Nas, 50 Cent...

ANCHOR: 50 Cent is throwin' out the dollar bills

to a group of deserving fast food workers.

The entertainer teamed up with Jay Mazini

for the epic surprise.

[excited chatter and screams]

KARIM: To see him with 50 Cent,

is what really legitimized it for me.

I'm like, "Yo, this guy is official."

- [squeals]

AMJAD: That video sparked so much attention

and got on the news.

And it literally got him verified.

So when that happened,

he started to do it over and over again.

Starts going to McDonald's.

He starts going to another Checkers restaurant.

He does it another ten times, which is--

caused him to gain hundreds of thousands of followers.

KARIM: He was giving out

hundreds of thousands of dollars in one night.

And it was being shared across all platforms.

People eat that up. That's viral content.

And I thought, "This guy's gonna be huge.

"He's gonna be one of the biggest

"Muslim entertainers or creators," you know?

"This guy is gonna be something else."

50 CENT: [indistinct] - [laughs]

- It's gonna be all right.

[indistinct chatter] PERSON: Come here, come here.

[soft tense music]

♪ ♪

- I hate to say it, but I knew Jay Mazini was scamming

from the moment I laid eyes on him.

[indistinct chatter on laptop]

And so I--I felt like I had to take him down.

♪ ♪

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

STEPHEN: My name is Stephen Findeisen.

I run a YouTube channel called Coffeezilla

where I investigate and bust scams.

I uncovered a fraud worth $4 billion.

This is the story of SafeMoon,

a crypto coin that millions...

I kind of settled on investigating scams

'cause when I was a kid,

my mom had been scammed a lot,

my friends had been scammed a lot.

I realize this is a very unheard segment

of the population who have been exploited.

And there's just not a lot or people covering it.

I just want to make the world a better place

by, hopefully, shining some light on these scams.

- Sure.

I remember somebody came to me and said,

"You gotta go check out this guy.

"He's got nearly a million followers.

And he's giving away money all the time."

ANCHOR: A drive-through customer

gave Nigel and his employees

10 grand apiece.

- I was just sayin' to myself the whole time,

"Like, hold on, I hope this is not a prank."

I just wanted to say thank you, man, and--

from me and my crew members.

Just want to say thank you.

STEPHEN: So take this all with a grain of salt

because this is all self-reported

by Jay Mazini, real name Jebara Igbara.

But according to him,

he had hustled a cologne and hat shop.

He had turned that into penny stock investing,

which he turned into a fashion brand

of himself.

- The company's worth about $8 million right now.

- I think there's an enormous pressure

that comes with success,

because you have to keep it going.

Momentum doesn't just keep happening.

You have to make it happen.

And so for Jay,

he started doing these giveaways.

JAY: For the first 500 orders,

we'll be placing $1,000 in each order.

Minimum three products.

STEPHEN: He would give away cash prizes

as part of the package.

So you would order from Mazini Italy,

but you have to have a minimum of, like, five orders.

This was a way for him to drive

more and more sales to his business.

- This is gonna be a mystery box.

Minimum order of three Mazini products

in order to win what?

In order to win maybe $10,000,

maybe $20,000, maybe $30,000.

- Eventually, as he started trying to drive

more and more sales,

he would offer bigger and bigger sums.

- The next 500 orders,

I'll be placing in $5,000 in each box.

For the next 1,000 orders,

I'll be placing in $12,000 in each order.

Minimum order, six Mazini Italy products.

For the next 800 people

to place an order on the Mazini Italy site,

there'll be $40,000 in each order.

Minimum order is ten Mazini Italy items.

STEPHEN: How could he be giving

that amount of money away

just for selling clothes?

♪ ♪

ABDUL: First time I heard about Jay Mazini,

you know, it was a video of him giving out money.

I started scrolling through his profile

and I started seeing, like, images of him,

like, showing himself as a devout Muslim

who came up from rags to riches.

That was the story that he painted.

And it was something that, of course, inspires you.

SINGER: ♪ As a man, all you have is your God ♪

♪ Your morals, character, dignity ♪

ABDUL: Well, I haven't been the best saver in my life.

And, of course, when you're having a family

and you finally have like, a good job,

you start having to think

about, you know, the long-term future.

And that was always behind my mind.

So I'm like, "Okay, I want to really get

into investing and trading."

And I saw his post that he created this academy

that teaches students how to trade stocks.

JAY: ♪ Some people lose their sense ♪

♪ Trying to chase cents ♪

♪ Some people livin' wise ♪

♪ Because they were afraid to reach the skies ♪

STEPHEN: Mazini Academy was started in 2019.

And for about $2,000,

you could get stock tips from Jay,

learn how to trade stocks,

learn how to invest wisely.

- Mazini Academy,

educating people in stocks, Forex.

ABDUL: He used the stock market to get rich.

And he wants, you know,

you to follow in those footsteps.

And he said, of course,

"The first 100 people who register will get..."

- $20,000 each too,

which accumulates to $2 million.

This is not a raffle.

It's more of a educational--

you're benefiting anyways.

- So I'm like, "This is it for me.

"Let's--let's get in.

Let's get into the trading and investing."

The academy is set up

through a medium called Discord.

And the way it was set up was very, very professional.

The classes were legitimate.

[notification chimes]

You can see the amount of people online

in the Discord channel.

When Jay Mazini came on,

you saw the green lights start lighting up

and more members started coming on like,

"Oh, my God, Jay Mazini's on.

Let's go see him." And he was, like, truly--

you could see that celebrity in him.

Like, "Relax, people, he's-- he's just a person."

One day he comes on and says,

"Guys, I have a little bit of a treat or a gift to you.

"What if I were to tell you that there was a stock

"that you would trade and you'd make

"a lot of money off today?

Do you wanna know what it is?"

- People say, "Yes," "yes," "yes," "oh, my God."

Girls heart-eye'd Jay Mazini.

And we're waiting for him, and he took a pause

and he said, "PSV."

It was basically a tanker company

that, like, holds oil. [chuckles]

And he's like,

"If you guys get in right now,

you'd get to be making a lot of money."

So I take $4,000.

It was money that, you know, me and my wife talked about,

we saved over a period of time.

And I put 99% of that money into this stock.

And I think for the first half an hour,

the stocks didn't go up.

[tense music]

Started going from $1.12,

$1.15, $1.23...

People were asking like, "When should we sell?

When should we sell?" We're taking his direction.

People believed in him.

♪ ♪

And I remember after lunch

when the stocks started going down,

he says, "Oh, just-- just the sharks

are comin' out later. The sharks."

Whatever the hell that means,

"The sharks are comin' out."

I didn't even know what that means.

But--but, basically, he was doin' his best

to assure us that, you know,

we'll get out of this okay.

[notification chimes]

And it went under a dollar at the end of that day.

And it just kept going lower and lower.

And I think people, at that point,

were really concerned about Jay Mazini.

They were really thinkin' at that point like,

"He left us out to dry."

He did mention to us,

"You're doing this at your own risk."

He said that to us.

But... [sighs]

I had a lot of faith in that man.

I should have pulled out at that point and said,

"Cut your losses, man.

You don't know shit about this-- about this stock."

"Get out." I didn't get out.

STEPHEN: Influence is powerful stuff.

You can inspire people to improve themselves.

You can also inspire people to give you money

based on the idea you're gonna get them rich.

KARIM: You could kind of tell by his videos

that he was always going on to the next big thing.

That's how he kind of pulled more people in.

And that big thing was Halal Capital.

♪ ♪

"Halal" is something that's permissible,

that's not against our faith.

In Islam, we have

a very strict way of investing.

You can't just invest in anything.

So they would trust someone who is Muslim

like Jay Mazini.

And they would put money into his foundations

or his funds or whatever investments he's doing,

because he was saying that he's doing

the halal investments.

- I'm showin' the world what Islam really is,

how we're raised to be.

WALLY: I think that key word "halal"

just offered a lot of, like, comfort

when you wanna invest.

In our belief, we have to stay

away from things that offer gambling or alcohol.

Different things like that, you know?

When Halal Capital was formed,

it was supposed to be an investing company

started by Jay Mazini.

The first time I heard about it

was through my cousin.

He explained it to me

that Halal Capital was buying merchandise, okay?

And they would-- they would buy it in bulk

and resell it,

that he was getting paid on monthly flips.

So if you invest this much,

you would get this return.

If you invest a little bit more,

it's a higher return.

And he would just, you know, show me

that they were getting returns and saying,

"Hey, so far, so good."

This was, like, March of 2020.

Times were pretty tough as far as business-wise.

And they were offering products

that people were short of.

They know that masks are in short supply.

They knew hand sanitizer was in short supply.

They have these items

and the hospitals needed them.

The stores needed them.

So we got a text message letting us know

that there's a monthly flip coming

which involved hand sanitizer.

So I thought maybe it's a good idea

to take whatever we have saved, um--

it would-- it's a substantial amount.

I'm gonna say it's a few hundred thousand dollars.

We thought that this is--

you know, this is a homerun.

♪ ♪

[seagulls calling]

Yeah, the time for payment would come.

We would message him and he would say,

"Okay, you know,

"Ramadan celebration's gonna hit this time.

"I'm sorry, but, you know,

there's gonna be a little delay."

We understood. We let that go.

So a week passes by

after our promised, uh, deadline of getting paid,

and no-- we don't hear anything.

I start, like, asking questions.

I asked my cousin to see if they got anything.

And I contact the--the mosque

because they also got in as well.

It was the whole community. It wasn't just our family.

At that time, looking at his profile

and kind of trying to get an idea

of who we're dealing with here,

it didn't make us feel too good

because we knew that he had a different persona.

I did try to confront Jay myself, okay?

I was like, "Hey, listen,

we invested a substantial amount of money."

He gave me a story saying that--

that he had 18 duffel bags' worth of--

full of money, and he got stuck up.

In what world do you walk around

carrying 18 duffle bags' worth of cash?

You know, we-- we didn't believe it for a bit.

However, at that time,

we didn't want to go full force

and ruin his reputation.

Because we didn't want to risk him losing more money

so we couldn't get paid.

So we kind of held our tongues.

And we held our stance, saying,

"Okay, let him do what he needs to do

to sell his merchandise."

He still had that whole Mazini Academy.

STEPHEN: There's a real skill set to being a scammer.

In a large way, the way he's getting away with it is because

nobody with a big platform is calling out what he's doing.

ABDUL: I started to believe that

he really scammed us.

That stock was filing

for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

That's a key, important information, Jay.

Like, you should have told us, right?

You should have at least told us,

"This company is going through Chapter 11 proceedings.

They're gonna go bankrupt."

And that wasn't told to us.

He used the academy to, what's called in the,

you know, the financial industry,

a pump and dump.

And a pump and dump is when someone has

a position in a stock, meaning that they owned

a number of shares in that stock.

And he basically convinced the masses and his students

to invest in that stock,

which caused an up-tick for that stock to go higher.

And once it hit that desired point,

he can get out of his position.

That's what I believe he did, right?

Because he understood that we were new

and he could take advantage of that emotion

and of his image.

WALLY: Jay Mazini, he was an online sensation.

He was out there giving out money,

giving out prizes.

But that money

that he was giving out at that time,

we had a feeling.

We had a feeling that he was giving out our money.

- I'll be giving away $10,000 ea--

this is just an example.

AMJAD: He was on Instagram Live,

paying people's rent...

PERSON: Thank you so much.

I respect that.

I knew--I knew I won.

- Yeah, you won. God bless.

AMJAD: But he owed me, like, $1,000.

I was still doing business with him at the time.

And it's like, I'm supposed to be his friend.

So I was constantly telling people

to watch out for Jay.

"Do not give him your money. Do not trust him.

He's going to screw you over."

And no one ever believed me.

Everybody just kept dismissing me as a lunatic,

and it drove me insane.

It was--it-- it drove me into depression.

I--you know, I--I tried to recover on my own,

but when you don't have that many friends

because they all sided with Jay,

there's not much to do.

But the Jay Mazini scam page helped bring that message out.

[dramatic music]

STEPHEN: A bunch of pages popped up on Instagram

basically saying all the things

that he was saying was a lie.

They'd talk about victim testimonials.

♪ ♪

A lot of people started coming out with Jay,

especially from the giveaways.

STEPHEN: Of course, the reality was...

people weren't actually getting the money.

PERSON: There's no money.

AMJAD: So I started talking to the scam page.

I was like, "I have some stuff that--

some content you could add to your page, you know?"

Yo, Jay, stop lying to people.

Stop acting shady online.

Stop putting up this front,

because you are not who you say you are.

I laid it out straight.

I said, "You know, stop tryna present yourself

"like you're this prophetic figure

"or somebody who deserves to be

"a--a power of influence at all,

"because you're a fake.

"And, eventually,

it's all gonna come crashing down on you."

WALLY: Back in the homeland,

if there was a dispute with another family,

you would get your clan or tribe

to go talk to members of their family.

And with Jay,

some people did go over

to speak to his family.

And it wasn't very successful.

Like, um, his dad just told them

that, you know, "He kind of does his own thing.

He doesn't live here anymore."

It just--it gave us, like, more worries

than--than anything positive.

JEREMY: Everybody wants their pound of flesh.

When you feel you've been victimized,

you--you want to be made whole again.

And the way you do that is by filing

usually a lawsuit against that person.

And in this case, Jay's family was getting

roped into this mess through a civil suit.

My name is Jeremy Feigenbaum.

The firm has dealt with a number

of high-profile individuals,

probably the most famous of which would be Anna Delvey.

ANCHOR 1: Delvey, whose real name

is Anna Sorokin is a scam artist.

ANCHOR 2: Overnight, a New York City jury

finding socialite Anna Sorokin,

the so-called "Soho Grifter,"

guilty on eight counts

including grand larceny, attempted grand larceny,

and theft of services.

JEREMY: Charisma is a huge, huge factor in all of this.

The reason she was able to be Anna Delvey

is because she had such immense levels of charisma,

where you just couldn't help but wanna talk with her

and become her friend.

Anna and Jay, many similarities

to how they operate, in my opinion.

I first heard about Jay

when Jay and his family came to us

with respect to claims

that were being made against him.

From allegations about people not getting

the types of packages that he promised,

or gifts that he said he would send...

PERSON: [scoffs] Ain't nothin'.

Knew nothin' wasn't gonna be in here.

JEREMY: To people investing their cash

and the money wasn't returned when requested.

Some of the individuals involved with that

were very angry at what they believed

Jay had done with some their cash.

WALLY: I--I just don't know

what he thought was gonna happen.

Like, there was no consequences

goin' through his mind saying,

"Okay, I'm just gonna rob these people

and now I'll just sail into the sunset"?

I mean, of course, we want our money back.

But I personally,

I just wanna see justice being served, right?

JEREMY: Jay's family came to us, obviously,

fairly distressed and upset about what was going on.

The plaintiffs alleged direct fraud

against Jay himself.

And then against the family,

they alleged aiding and abetting.

And they were, obviously, very much wanting

to protect Jay and themselves rightfully.

And I think they wanted to figure out

what exactly was going on.

ABDUL: The academy was becoming very toxic.

We all lost a lot of money and we need an explanation.

We need to talk-- talk this through.

And, um, Jay Mazini never showed up,

never explained to us what happened.

And that's when I started devising a plan

on how we could bring this person to justice.

Started looking into what we could do with the SCC.

I went on the SCC website and I filled out a complaint.

Nobody took action, and at this point, like,

the more he's able to continue this,

the more people were scammed.

- I'll be placin' in $40,000 in each order.

ABDUL: 100 people, $40,000?

Your clothes are gonna cost, like, what, 150 bucks, $100?

You're givin' out $40,000-- how does that make sense?

He was getting desperate.

I think he just kept digging himself a bigger hole.

And that's why those scams became--

they were more, like, important to him.

STEPHEN: I think with Jay,

you did see an escalation.

I was on the phone a lot

talking to the various victims of Jay.

When I first started,

it was all about the giveaway scams.

And then he would try to start up some new schemes.

- Regarding the Mazini Academy,

I've already selected ten people

which I'll be giving $5,000 each to

which accumulates... STEPHEN: But he was pivoting

almost as fast as I could report on it.

- Now, I'll be starting up a new campaign.

STEPHEN: He started talking a lot about crypto currencies.

Specifically, he wanted to buy it from the fans.

He told people that he was going to buy

Bitcoin from them for 5%-10% over market value.

And the reason he was gonna do this

is because he wanted to buy so much of it

that crypto exchanges

literally wouldn't let him buy so much.

Once Jay got someone

who was willing to buy him some Bitcoin,

he'd say, "Just send me the Bitcoin first

"and I will send you the wire same day.

It'll just take a little bit."

So pretty quickly,

these wires didn't actually get through.

And people realized they had joined the list

of Jay's victims, and they got in touch with me.

- He said, "Oh, oh, I sent your account 500,000.

Uh, go check your account I sent you the confirmation."

Two, three days later, there's nothing.

There's no money. There's nothing.

The confirmation's a made-up number.

I'm hoping to God he rots in jail.

STEPHEN: Jay was so shameless.

He would show them his passport, his ID.

He would show them it's not a scam.

Who shows their passport to somebody

when they're about to allegedly fake a wire transfer?

That's where I realized,

"Oh, well, this is almost certainly another crime."

You can't fake a wire transfer.

AMJAD: Coffeezilla really did great detective work

on Jay Mazini

and catapulted the attention onto the scam page.

It started blowing up in views.

And it was-- it got so much attention.

Because of how popular it was getting,

when you would search "Jay Mazini,"

right underneath it would say "Jay Mazini scam."

[laughs] And he hated it

because he was so used to everybody supporting him.

And now all of a sudden, everyone's against him.

- Scammin' how? Scammin' how?

I got a clothes line. I got an academy.

We sell clothes. We teach stocks.

AMJAD: So I was a heavy supporter of this page.

And, uh, it wasn't me,

but I thought it would be funny

to spread a rumor that it was me.

STEPHEN: MJ was one of the people I spoke to.

Jay Mazini and him have a past.

They went to school together.

And he would always kind of make fun of Jay,

tease Jay.

And MJ started to tell Jay Mazini

that he actually ran the scam page--

the thing that was ruining Jay Mazini's life.

♪ ♪

Jay Mazini was under a lot of pressure.

He started to get really paranoid.

Reportedly, he was hiring bodyguards

for $7,000 a week,

trying to ensure a crumbling sense of security.

- Fake allegations. Fake accusations.

Try to tarnish me. You can't tarnish greatness.

You can't curse what God blessed.

STEPHEN: You can see his ego

bumping up against all the allegations

that were starting to come out around this time.

Like, "You can't tarnish greatness."

That's who Jay thought of himself as.

Like, he really thought he was great.

And he thought he was above the rules.

ABDUL: You disrespected us.

You basically threatened people that,

"If you guys say this is a scam,

you're kicked out. You're gone."

So he tried to silence people.

And I'm like, "You're-- you're not gonna silence me.

"You're not gonna silence the people

that lost this money. Like, it's on now."

AMJAD: It was getting so much traction.

People were starting to follow the page.

We're getting new people every single day

with new stories.

Everybody would share their story

and how they lost money with Jay.

So the scam page was destroying

Jay's reputation, his authenticity,

his trust with his audience.

He was literally spiraling out of control.

And, uh, I enjoyed every minute of it.

STEPHEN: So as things started heating up,

Jay disables his own Instagram account.

When you shut down your page,

it's like closing your shop.

Your entire income stream stops

in the case of someone like Jay.

That was the turning point where I realized

that things were starting to get to him.

Then things went to a whole other level.

♪ ♪

[suspenseful music]

AMJAD: The Jay Mazini scam page

was ruining his reputation so much.

And so many people in the community

started talking about it.

And Jay believed that I was running the page.

It was a joke,

but people really took it seriously.

So it's 2:00 a.m. in the morning.

I get a friendly phone call from Jay Mazini.

I was like... [clicks tongue]

Know what? All right. I'll meet up with you.

So I went to Edgewater,

parked my car,

and then I saw Jay.

I was like--I haven't seen him in, like, almost three years.

I was like, "Hey, what's up, man?

You got fat there, buddy. How's it goin'?"

He goes, "Oh, it's good, man."

Jump into the car. We start drivin'.

And I turn to him, I'm like, "Yo, listen.

"What's goin' on?

"What's all this, like, scams, money?

"You pissed off a lot of Muslims.

So what happened? Tell me."

He goes, "Nah, man, it wasn't me.

"I swear to God. I'm just tryna like,

"you know, raise a family.

"Like, I got a son coming soon.

Like, I'm just tryna get my stuff together."

We finally get to the 7-Eleven.

You know, I--I wasn't looking behind me,

but the door opens.

I look back and I'm just like,

"Who the hell are these guys?"

It's just two Black men with hoodies on.

And then he starts driving off.

[engine revs]

And he goes, "Don't worry. We're not gonna hurt you."

I was like, "Really? Really? You--you're not gonna hurt me?

Who are these guys?" I was like--

I was like, "Yo, what's your name, buddy?

We good? You don't want to shake my hand."

I was like, "Oh, you don't want to shake my hand?

"You don't want to shake my hand?

Oh, okay."

At that point, I have to strategize.

What am I gonna do? These guys have me in the car.

So as soon as we pulled up to Chase Bank,

I pop the door open and I run.

Start running like I'm running the race of my life right now.

I made a quick left, saw a alleyway.

But it was a dead end. "What do I do? What do I do?"

I see a staircase. I'm like, "Cool. Staircase."

I run up the staircase.

♪ ♪

It's a frickin' balcony.

I--I made a jump. [chuckles]

I jumped from the second floor.

Unfortunately, I sprained my ankle.

[panting, grunts] I couldn't run anymore.

Got jumped by both guys

right there in the middle of the street.

They forced me to the back seat of the car.

He says, "Where's your phone, man?"

I was like, "You want my phone?"

They wanted my phone because they believed

that I was running the Jay Mazini scam page.

I gave him my phone. I let him take the password.

Even through all that,

they still couldn't get the page

because I was never in charge of the page.

He goes, "All right. We'll see about that."

He's driving me to Passaic.

And he goes and he picks up another man.

This is pretty much the man that they've hired

to beat the page out of me.

[panting]

They take me to a basement.

And they strip me down to everything.

I was, like, completely naked.

♪ ♪

And this guy's got a machete up to my neck.

He starts punching me in the head

and, like, yelling at me.

Like, Arabic slurs.

He's like, "We would kill you from where we come from."

♪ ♪

He's like, "Where's the page?"

I'm like, "I'm telling you, I don't have it."

[groaning]

And Jay's just sitting there laughing

like he thinks it's funny.

♪ ♪

He goes, "All right, you ready?

I'm gonna punch you. Are you ready?"

I was like, "Dude, just freakin' do it.

"I've been punched enough. Like, I don't--

"I don't even feel pain at this point.

Just freakin' do it already."

Gives me a punch.

And he thinks that, like, it really hurt me.

But when I took the punch,

I kind of pretended to cry a little bit

and I actually made him feel bad for me.

He was like, "Ohh, you know what?

"That's--that's enough, man. We're done.

Just--just let him go."

♪ ♪

He dropped me in Edgewater

and forced me to limp back to my car.

♪ ♪

What they did to me is--is, like, despicable,

and there's no other words to explain

what was going through my head.

And though--and I--I'm sorry, but I'm not a gangsta

who's gonna come and fire back at you.

I'm gonna-- gonna do the right thing

and go to the police.

♪ ♪

STEPHEN: Ladies and gentlemen, it's true.

Jay Mazini has been arrested.

And not for the reason you think.

WALLY: Honestly, that was a surprise to us,

what he was arrested for--

for kidnapping and beating.

After doing that video with 50 Cent,

I think he wanted to kind of take on

a little bit more of a gangster type

of, like, persona.

So that was a little bit shocking.

But at the same time, afterwards, it made sense.

You know? ABDUL: But he was arrested.

We watched every moment of that

on the New Jersey state website.

It was so relieving to see this guy

in an orange jumpsuit, oh, my God.

[triumphant music]

♪ ♪

JEREMY: On one hand, you have to be highly intelligent

to accomplish some of these things

that these influencers have done.

But at the same time,

to sometimes act in a manner

that's so contrary to your interest,

it's baffling.

How did you see this going?

You kidnap someone, more likely than not,

they're probably gonna go to the police.

And then you're gonna have to deal with

those ramifications.

I just don't get it.

STEPHEN: I couldn't believe it.

Obviously, I knew this guy was a scammer.

I had no idea he was capable of this.

♪ ♪

So Jay Mazini's getting arrested,

you would think that would be the end of it.

But this story never stops.

♪ ♪

So right as all that's happening,

Jay Mazini's wife was allegedly trying

to bribe MJ to recant his story.

And I was hearing rumors that he might take it.

So I got on the phone with him and I recorded the call.

Yeah. I've never shared this before.

Here we go.

- You're hearing me realize for the first time

that MJ's about to change his story

to try to get Jay Mazini out.

[chuckles]

- The man got bribed!

Yeah. [sighs] It's unbelievable.

♪ ♪

It was very clear at that point

that MJ was not after justice.

He was not after, you know,

making things right for the victims.

He was out for himself just like Jay was.

His angle was, "Well, no, this is my shot.

This is my opportunity to get everything I want."

I can get Coffeezilla to get me clicks

and then I'm gonna get on the news.

And then I'm gonna get on a documentary.

I'm sure he's happy to talk to you guys.

And now he's in jail for accepting the bribe.

♪ ♪

AMJAD: I'm being charged with bribery.

They're saying that I was paid to change my statement.

The first statement that I gave

was right after the kidnapping.

And then after some time passed by,

you know, I learned some new information.

And I'm not gonna lie.

I was manipulated by even my own family to--to--

to have a change of heart.

That was my biggest mistake.

♪ ♪

[cell door clangs]

ANCHOR: In a complaint filed

in federal court in Brooklyn,

Jay Mazini, whose legal name is Jebara Igbara,

was charged with wire fraud.

STEPHEN: Jay Mazini ended up pleading guilty

to the kidnapping charge,

which he's gonna serve five years for.

On the Bitcoin wire fraud charges,

he potentially could serve 15 to 30 years.

And then Jay Mazini's wife was arrested too.

Her, along with other people,

are charged with trying to bribe

this guy right here who got beat up.

- Okay. Good afternoon, all.

Mr. Jebara, can you hear us and see us?

- Yes.

STEPHEN: I watched Jay Mazini's

first court hearing.

He's in an orange jumpsuit,

crying, because he's finally realizing

the magnitude of what he's done.

And...I don't know.

It was like the ending

of a really cathartic movie or something,

where the--the music sweeps in

and you feel like

justice is finally being served here.

♪ ♪

JEREMY: So right now I'm flipping

through the voluminous 52-page complaint

that was asserted against Jay and his family.

The allegations in here are wide-ranging,

alleging everything from

fake stories of being robbed to fraudulent promises

of fantastical returns on investments

to embezzling funds

and using them for personal purposes.

We got the case dismissed against the family,

but Jay's got a lot in front of him.

And given some of these allegations,

the road that Jay has to travel

to get through all of his legal troubles

is not short.

WALLY: There's countless victims of Jay Mazini.

The ones that we know of.

But there's a lot of people

that they don't want to come out

and say anything, right?

There--there's the people that feel ashamed.

I mean, honestly,

everybody in the community felt ashamed.

It transformed the community

from being so honest with each other

and giving and caring

and to be like, "Do I have to watch out

"for this person to be the next person

that's looking to take advantage?"

KARIM: When you scam people, it's never a good thing.

There's a reason why it's against our faith in Islam

that you're not supposed to do these types of things.

And I hope people don't equate us all

to one man's actions, you know?

ABDUL: He was able to really sell himself

on, you know, the fact that he was

this pious Muslim.

- I want to show you guys

the real definition of Islam.

ABDUL: That stuck a really strong chord with me.

I'm like, "You--you did this to other people.

"You used faith,

"something they're really devoted to,

and you take their money?"

That's why I was, like, so kind of, like,

passionate about getting this guy thrown in jail.

STEPHEN: I think what's so compelling

about social media

is just how deeply involved you can get

in someone's life

that can be a fake, that can be not real.

It could be constructed.

[soft dramatic music]

JEREMY: This power of the influencer

is very, very real.

In my opinion, social media enabled

this entire operation to occur.

It enabled Jay Mazini to exist.

Without social media,

he would have always just been Jebara Igbara.

- If you're suffering through a hardship

and you need help-- somebody to uplift you,

somebody to give you hope, somebody to, like--

to hold the light at the end of the tunnel,

I wanted to be that person.

I didn't do it for just the money.

I wanted to pave the way for the youth

so they could have something to look up to.

They could have hope.

This is, uh, 10,000.

- Oh, my God.

JAY: That's 10,000. I'm serious.

MOTHER: No, you not.

- Here's what's amazing,

I can't help but smile

when he gives this woman $10,000

even though I know where it came from.

That's just how powerful this kind of content is.

- Hope everybody enjoys this video.

Take care, you guys.

♪ ♪