Williamsport -- A former Amway Corp. distributor in Lycoming County admitted that he lied when he said he'd uncovered billions of dollars in consumer fraud with the company.
Eric N. Scheibeler made the acknowledgment Friday in a federal court filing to settle a defamation suit bought by Amway, now known in the U.S. as Quixtar.
Scheibeler states in a letter to an attorney for Amway and Quixtar that he falsely said he and his family were threatened, that he had been offered money in exchange for his silence and that Quixtar did something to his Web site.
In exchange for his written apology, Amway and Quixtar have agreed not to pursue their defamation suit in U.S. Middle District Court and not to seek legal fees from Scheibeler.
Scheibeler was a distributor between November 1989 and August 2003.
The lawsuit cited a letter sent to the Cleveland Free Times in which Scheibeler claimed to have uncovered fraud.
The court complaint also referred to a statement, attributed to Scheibeler, that appeared in a Swedish newspaper that he and his family had been threatened to prevent him from going public.
The letter contained negative comments about Amway and its executives, as does a book he wrote, "Merchants of Deception," that was available on the Internet, the complaint states.
