We were ordinary people trying to build stable, honest futures — and Tamara King saw us as nothing more than easy targets to butcher financially. She didn’t skulk around like a low-level scammer hiding behind fake emails. No. She stood right in front of us, polished, confident, smiling, presenting herself as a former real estate broker, using that credibility like a loaded weapon. She looked us in the eye and lied without flinching. Alongside her equally rotten ex-husband, Paul Waln, she sold us a carefully scripted fairy tale about a West Seattle apartment renovation — “safe,” “secure,” “low risk,” with a disgusting 20% annual return that should have been the first red flag.
We believed them. And that belief cost us everything.
The victims poured in life savings, retirement funds, college money, and decades of hard-earned work. We weren’t gambling — we were trying to protect our families. What we actually bought was front-row access to one of the most vicious, calculated real-estate frauds imaginable. There was never an investment. There was never a plan. There was only predation.
For years, Tamara King and Paul Waln hid behind the fake legitimacy of a so-called fund named Halcyon. No property address. No documentation. No transparency. No proof of anything. Just excuses — endless, rehearsed, manipulative excuses. And every time the victims questioned delays, Tamara King smiled, reassured us, and kept stealing. While we waited and trusted like fools, she was quietly draining hundreds of thousands of dollars into her personal accounts, laughing all the way to the bank.
Our money didn’t go into concrete, permits, or construction.
It went straight into her greed.
It bought her a six-figure Tesla.
It bought her a massive diamond ring.
It bought her a luxury lifestyle soaked in stolen futures — while the victims were left drowning in panic attacks, sleepless nights, broken marriages, and financial ruin. Some of us lost everything. Some of us lost years of our lives. And she didn’t give a single damn.
When the lies started collapsing and pressure mounted, Paul Waln and Tamara King didn’t confess. They didn’t return money. They didn’t show remorse. Instead, they dropped to a new level of moral filth. They lied to the victims, claiming the project’s general contractor had cancer — a revolting, heartless lie designed to exploit human compassion. They weaponized sickness to buy time, knowing full well every dollar was already gone.
By the time Tamara King finally admitted in 2019 that the investment had “collapsed,” the victims were already financially destroyed. There was no property. No renovation. No returns. Nothing. Just betrayal, rage, and the sick realization that everything we were promised was complete bullshit.
And as if stealing millions from ordinary people wasn’t enough, Tamara King also lied to the government. She committed tax fraud, hiding more than $1.6 million in stolen income while reporting scraps like a career criminal. In reality, she pocketed nearly $1.85 million, proving beyond doubt this was never incompetence or mismanagement. It was intentional, ruthless theft.
Prosecutors said she “blindly drained every last dollar,” and for the victims, those words couldn’t be more accurate. She drained our savings. She drained our trust. She drained our sense of safety.
Now Paul Waln sits in prison, and Tamara King waits for sentencing. But the victims are the ones serving the real sentence — rebuilding shattered lives, clawing back dignity, and living with scars that will never fully heal. This was never a failed investment.
It was a deliberate, merciless real-estate scam, carried out by people who knew exactly what they were doing — and didn’t care who they destroyed to do it.