The conversation above discusses some details that you won’t be familiar with without a little more context. It refers to some allegations brought up in an email, sent by our reporter to John Strawn, about an hour before the text message conversation took place. Here are those emails.

Another bit of context you might want to familiarize yourself with is the photo that John texted our reporter. Here’s that photo again, in it’s full-sized glory. This is the photo that John sent, while saying “The guy on the left works with Tom Hanks. Directly. Just saying…” John is the man sitting in the middle. We don’t particularly care who does or doesn’t work with Tom Hanks.

🐰 Rabbit Hole

What’s the Grift

🐰 It’s official: Midnight Filmmaker Studios is a scam.

Let’s take a look at how it would work, assuming our speculation is accurate. We know that, in general, this type of investment scheme does exist in the business world and in venture capitol.

Investors who give their money to flimsy movie ideas or poorly conceived business plans are not bad at business – they have a shrewd reason for investing in these half-baked ideas. Investors that do this are often looking for some sort of shell corp structure – some way to invest money in a business that they can partially own (so they can still spend the money they put into the business), but not be fully liable for.

This option is much preferred to putting their millions of dollars into a bank account, because if they sink their funds into a film budget or a business startup, they are putting their money into something which works like a bank, but which allows them to dodge taxes, evade audits – and even claim losses. This masterful act of tax fraud is accomplished by putting their money into a shell business instead of a bank account.

🧠 That means the business doesn’t need to be a great idea, nor does it have to be fully developed or completely operational. It just needs to seem like a business on paper to function. This isn’t necessarily a scam focused primarily on profiting from scamming artists. It’s more the IRS who’s getting scammed, and potentially a few clueless investors along the way. While making money via scamming musicians may not be Strawn’s main hustle, it is still very much a frequent side-mission of his, and an integral part of how a scam like this might pay his bills on the day-to-day.

Why would he need to nickle and dime artists for $600-$1000, promising sync licensing he has no intention or ability to fulfill for them? Why not just stick to the main investment scheme where the big bucks are? It’s a part of Strawn’s pattern, and while it may seem odd at first, according to our research, satellite schemes are commonplace when dealing with bigger cons that take time to develop, such as Ponzi or investment plots. That’s because money via an investment scheme takes a while to pay out – it’s not like those millions of dollars put into a movie budget or allocated to a film company are available on a company credit card the day after the investors shake hands. It takes a while to see the cash.

A person running this scam would either need to be already wealthy enough to support their day to day expenses, or, they would need to run some sort of smaller-scale grift to earn their running-around money and to cover the daily basics like food and gas.

💵 And that’s very likely why John Strawn is scamming indie artists and composers out of $600+ a pop, promising sync pitching for movies but delivering nothing of the sort. Even if Strawn intended to pitch music to the films he does have some sort of pull with – let’s be clear about one thing: The only films that appears to be true for are his own.

A Clear Cut Case:

Not only are those movies far from a major motion picture or a true theatrical release – but equally, these movies are only meant to exist on paper. They are unlikely to ever be fully filmed, much less released. So anyone paying to be sync-pitched for inclusion in these films is really just paying to be part of Strawn’s larger fraudulent schemes. And that’s obviously not what they think they’re paying $600 for. For those reasons, this is a clear-cut case of a music industry scam. Let’s unpack this mess.

The Curious Case of Movies Never-Made

Film production is an expensive and often high-risk industry, but for those who know how to manipulate the system, it can also be a highly effective vehicle for fraud. When looking at John Strawn’s track record, one of the most glaring red flags is the number of films he claims to have produced — many of which have little to no public record of ever being released.

This isn’t just a case of an independent filmmaker struggling to get projects off the ground. Instead, it suggests a pattern that mirrors how shell companies are used in financial crimes. Let’s take one last look at that concept before we move on.

🐰 Film Production Fraud:

A shell company is a business that exists primarily on paper, with no real operations, created to funnel money, avoid taxes, or disguise illicit activity. A fraudulent film production operates similarly: money is raised, investors are courted, but the final product never materializes. Instead of funding actual film projects, the money can be redirected into other ventures, funneled into personal accounts, or used to prop up the illusion of an ongoing, successful enterprise to lure in more investors.

☝🏻 The film industry is particularly ripe for these kinds of schemes because of the way film financing works. Investors often front large amounts of cash on the promise of future distribution deals, tax incentives, or international pre-sales — none of which require a finished product to justify the initial investment.

🚩 If the film never gets completed, the money “disappears” into vague development costs, unexpected production delays, or legal disputes, leaving investors with empty pockets and no movie to show for it.

The Parent Company: Voksende Holdings

Voksende Holdings, LLC is a diversified venture capitol company based in Fort Worth, Texas, specializing in various business ventures across different industries.

Doesn’t that sound nice? Sure – we think so, too. Nice and confusing. That’s on purpose – so, forget that.

🐰 Let’s call it what it is: A fancy shoe box where investors dump their dirty money, attempting to make it more convoluted to trace and tax. Financial word-salad won’t clean up a crime scene.

According to their website, their focus areas include media, real estate development, and fintech consumer banking.

Then there’s Strawn Smart, which supposedly deals in smart home and community technology—a sudden and jarring departure from the entertainment industry that seems more like a placeholder than an actual business. All of these companies appear to operate under a “money in, no product out” model, where funds are collected, projects are promised, and then… nothing.

But the most damning piece of evidence lies with Voksende Holdings itself. Business records show no significant income, no reported government contracts, and no indication that the company is engaged in any profitable ventures.

If it were truly a holding company managing multiple successful businesses, there would be financial activity to prove it. Instead, the data suggests a pattern of starting companies, moving money between them, and letting them fade into obscurity—only for new ones to pop up in their place. This isn’t just bad business; it’s a textbook setup for fraud.

What we’re looking at here is a potential investment scam masquerading as a film production empire. With multiple corporate names, untraceable financials, and an owner who has a history of questionable dealings, the entire operation reeks of an elaborate scheme to separate hopeful investors and creatives from their money.

🐰 Let’s take a look at the evidence:

Meanwhile, its subsidiaries — Midnight Filmmaker, MGMT Inc., and Strawn Smart — each operate under their own set of vague business goals, whether it’s film financing (Midnight Filmmaker), consulting services for productions (MGMT Inc.), or smart home solutions (Strawn Smart). But with no major publicly verifiable projects coming out of any of these, it’s starting to look more like a network of money-moving entities rather than real businesses.

It raises big questions: Is Voksende just a holding company for failed or fraudulent ventures? Has Strawn been using these entities to collect investments under one name, shift them around, and then let the companies quietly dissolve?

The Last Strawn

At the heart of this deception lies John Strawn. Our own reporter shares a personal connection, revealing that Strawn once invaded her parents house, took up residence there, and ultimately spent weeks sleeping in her childhood bed — a chilling and poignant symbol of who John Strawn really is at his core.

In communications, Strawn’s demeanor is dismissive and condescending, often resorting to belittling language to our female reporters, such as “honey”, to deflect legitimate inquiries and to demean the reporter inquiring of him.

Portrait of a Con Artist:

John’s refusal to address concerns directly and his apparent belief in being above reproach paint the picture of a man unaccustomed to accountability. Notably, despite a year’s worth of work for Strawn, our reporter (who was speaking with Strawn in the text messages featured here) was never compensated for her work. This further highlights Strawn’s pattern of exploitation and disregard for others.

History With Our Own Reporter:

The Deposit Blog, which was yet another shell venture cooked up by John Strawn, was another sad part of this story. Back in 2019, Strawn hired our reporter to write for the blog, promising a paycheck plus exposure and industry connections. She worked incredibly hard writing for that blog, and cared so deeply about the quality of her work there. Not realizing, of course, it was never meant to matter. And sadly, that blog no longer exists, dissolved by Strawn as if it was meaningless after only a year. From our research, we found that only a few archival traces of it were still around. A few jumbled sections of her music reviews were found and retrieved by The White Hat team using Wayback Machine, but, despite their concentrated efforts, much of it is gone for good. And, no matter how you slice it, it’s honestly just a shame. But forget that. Who in this story should really be ashamed? Is it our reporter for falling for John’s consistent runaround and for continuing to work for him when he refused to compensate her? Or is it the many victims of the Midnight Filmmaker Sync scam, who were promised sync licensing and received nothing but an empty wallet and radio silence from John? Or, is it more simple than that? Could it be as simple as… the villain in this story is John Strawn himself, no plot twists, no big reveals…. just the basics of good versus bad and wrong versus right? It’s not very cinematic, of course. We do see that.

And besides, is morality ever really that cut-and-dry?

Well, we will let you decide for yourselves: