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On Saturday we met six investors who paid Darin Smith of Biospharms forty thousand US dollars for a title in his sub-development - only to find out it was never subdivided. And because of that they could never get title. Now, they're suing him, but decided to go public because they say the situation is going from bad to worse. We met 6 of these disgruntled landowners at their attorneys office on Saturday:..

Ellen Tan, Disgruntled Land Owner
"Well I think Larry was the one who was on the website and we've been looking for a community that's involved like living on solar and fresh water and healthy living, organic farming. So we found Biospharms on the internet and then we were writing to them and Darren Smith was the one who was emailing us and invited us to come down. In October 2003 we came down to look at the farm here. This was our life savings. Our retirement that were trying to get away from the US, so we could have a simpler life here and we put all our money in here."

Reporter
"How much money did you invest in this?"

Ellen Tan, Disgruntled Land Owner
"We put about $40,00US into this property which is just half an acre and then a very simple house."

John Michael Poirer, Disgruntled Land Owner
"We purchased this and have invested well over one hundred thousand Belize in this property where we planned on retiring and when we arrived in Belize, we have discovered that Mr. Smith has not made this a legal subdivision and there are no titles and he refused to give us a title to our property which we've paid for in full."

Jeremiah Allen, Disgruntled Land Owner
"We would like title for the land or we would like repayment for the money that we've invested - our life savings."

Sonya Allen, Disgruntled Land Owner
"We've been waiting since we basically found out that there is no subdivision, there is no such legal subdivision. We've been waiting and waiting and just been hearing from him that he is working on it. But none of us ever seen any legal factual papers that he is working on that."

Jeremiah Allen, Disgruntled Land Owner
"We've gone to the Lands Department and they have no record of his ever requesting a subdivision. So everything appears to be completely illegal."

Estevan Perrera, Attorney for Disgruntled Land Owner
"In respect to developments such as these in Belize, the proper and legal way to do it is for persons to have a legal subdivision which is registered and approved by the Land Utilization Department in Belmopan. And once that is done, each individual would received actually a land certificate in respect of their title. In this case, because the developer has failed to subdivide and failed to give the persons their titles, it has created a problem."

John Michael Poirer, Disgruntled Land Owner
"He says that he will never give us the titles, he doesn't have to, all his lawyers says that he is in the right and he can do whatever he wants to do."

And they say one of the things he did do was give them an invalid contract. Now, we've heard of moving the goalposts, but that's like moving them off the field! Here's how they explained it:..

Ellen Tan, Disgruntled Land Owner
"He gave us illegal forms, all the things that we own is not legal. And so we are in a kid of dilemma, because we want to move up, but we can't even move up now. We don't even own the land, we don't own anything and so we are really upset about that."

Estevan Perrera, Attorney for Disgruntled Land Owner
"We recently received a defense from them, where the same developer is now stating or informing the buyers that the very same agreement that he produce and the very same agreement that he gave to them is unenforceable and void and illegal. And we find it quite interesting that the same person who prepared these agreements is now saying that his agreements are unenforceable and invalid."

And since all these misgivings and lawsuits have arisen - the landowners say that there's also been hostility shown towards them:

John Michael Poirer, Disgruntled Land Owner
"What I discovered in the process that there were several buyers prior to me on this property who all had the same problem and concerns and were threatened and basically ran off by Mr. Smith, as he is attempting to do with myself. He has even disconnected my water."

Jeremiah Allen, Disgruntled Land Owner
"He has become pretty aggressive, as the way he speaks about us and the way that he deals with us. He use to act like our friend, now he acts like we are trying to hurt him."

Donald Smith, Disgruntled Land Owner
"The verbal aggression is after I started questioning why we are not getting a subdivision and titles and such. It started with I'm going to drive you out of here like I've done other people and another time later on, he said for a few hundred dollars I can have people take you for a one way walk into the jungle and you will just disappear."

And so what does Darin Smith say? Well, we've been trying to reach him and his attorney, Mayor Darrell Bradley, and neither of them have responded back to our calls, text messages, or emails requesting comment. We've held off on running the story to provide for enough time to reach out to both, but as of news time tonight, they have not responded.