CHESAPEAKE

Any assets of Financing Alternatives Inc. will remain frozen and a Norfolk attorney will continue to pick up the pieces of the company for another year, a state judge ruled Wednesday.

Chesapeake Circuit Judge Randall Smith granted the request of the Virginia attorney general's office, which has sued FAI and its founder, to extend the temporary injunction that froze the company's assets and appointed a receiver to run it on Oct. 5.

That injunction would have expired Monday and now will extend to June 30, 2009.

Thousands of consumers nationwide await the outcome of the lawsuit, which was filed in July 2007 and accuses

the Chesapeake company and its founder of misleading customers who paid for computers but never received them.

FAI founder George Christian, who is representing himself in the suit, had opposed the state's request and asked the judge for greater oversight of the receiver, Paul Campsen. Christian, who described himself in court as "a creditor of the company," also said he'd like to know more about what Campsen is doing with the company and whether he is paying its bills.

Campsen expressed annoyance at the request. In the days before he became receiver, he reminded the court, Christian and his wife removed most of the company's furniture, equipment, files and documents.

"He took all the assets, put them in his wife's name, put them in his house, put them in his garage," Campsen told the judge. "It's comical for Mr. Christian to come and represent to this court that he wants to know what's going on."

Campsen added that he received only last week the electronic data that the court had ordered Christian's wife, Michele, to turn over in early January. That data was incomplete and lacking much of the financial information that the company had when it shut down just days before he took over, he said.

FAI customers typically agreed to biweekly or monthly withdrawals from their bank accounts, while FAI pledged to deliver their products after three months of steady payments. By the end of August 2007, at least 1,765 people had completed the year of payments and still hadn't received their computers, the attorney general's office said.

"Almost no day goes by without us getting a call from at least one customer," Campsen said.

Carolyn Shapiro, (757) 446-2270, carolyn.shapiro@pilotonline.com