​​The marketing was masterful. It promised to condense four decades of therapy into four days and claimed to be "MRI-verifiable." Had I come to this cold, I would have spotted the outlandishness, but in my defence we do live in extraordinary times of technological and scientific discovery. Scammers don't need to be lucky every time; they just need the right scam to hit the right person at the right time. This was a "pull" scam. He used high-profile media appearances—like The Diary of a CEO and The Joe Rogan Experience—to build an unassailable aura of altruistic authority.

 

3. The Bait-and-Switch Intake

I filled out the application and was contacted by an "Avery Clinician." During our Zoom call, he described Avery as a neurological upgrade that had been "installed" in him. When he dropped the price tag—$50,000—I watched his body language involuntarily flinch. He claimed it used to cost $100,000 when Chase did it personally, but they wanted to make it "accessible."

 

When I mentioned my MS, the clinician smoothly pivoted, telling me that another coach, Todd, also had MS and would be assigned to me. I naively assumed Todd’s MS must have drastically improved due to Avery. Later, in an email, I asked if travel to Philadelphia was included in the $50k. Todd replied that they had knocked off $2,000 to cover my expenses, bringing the price to $48,000.

 

Another red flag ignored, they were making it up as they went along.

 

4. The Administrative Red Flags

When I was getting ready to transfer the funds my bank contacted me to perform a routine fraud check, I told them it was fine that I knew what I was doing. They asked if I had an invoice, I realized I hadn't been given one. I rushed Todd for it. What I received was a rudimentary Word template that a child could have produced—no company registration, no tax details, just a request to pay $48,000 into a Wells Fargo account for "Applied Behavior Research" at a Virginia Beach address. My "receipt" was a screenshot of a mobile banking app.

​

Next came an 8-page medical questionnaire demanding my entire medical history, sent via an insecure Proton Drive. I later realized this highly sensitive Category A medical data was completely irrelevant to the actual service; it was entirely theatrical, designed to mimic a clinical environment.

​

5. The $48,000 "Therapy"

In September 2025, I flew to Philadelphia. When I met Todd, I realized his MS was quite advanced; he required sticks to walk. Any illusion that Avery might help MS vanished. Yet, he turned up to my hotel suite every day wearing a white lab coat to maintain the medical charade.

​

• Day 1: Consisted of me lying on a yoga mat doing "neurogenic tremors." I later discovered that these exercises were identical to the publicly available techniques known as TRE (Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises), which can be found freely online.

• Days 2–3: Generic hypnotherapy and Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) "mind rooms"—again, decades-old techniques rebadged as proprietary military science.

• Day 4: Deep breathing and breath-holding.

 

When I returned home absolutely nothing had changed. I was devastated, embarrassed, and furious. Having coffee with friends one day, someone casually mentioned "pseudoscience," and I felt the blood drain from my body. A deaf, dumb, and blind person would have spotted this. But what better way for an apex manipulator to hide in plain sight than by lecturing the world on how to spot a narcissist?

 

6. Turning AI into a Force Multiplier

Determined not to suffer in silence, I opened ChatGPT and typed: "I think I’ve been scammed." As a former business analyst, I love unpicking complex processes. With AI acting as my tireless legal research team and sounding board, we mapped out a devastating case of consumer fraud, bait-and-switch tactics, and fraudulent inducement. I sent a formal demand letter to Todd. Within a day, Chase countered through Todd, offering a partial $20,000 refund tied to a draconian NDA. I flatly refused and sent a comprehensive, point-by-point breakdown directly to Chase's personal email. I highlighted the contractual contradictions, the lack of clinical training, and the bizarre, cult-like narratives Todd had used to build Chase's mystique during our sessions, including claims that:

 

• Early versions of Avery involved waterboarding and intelligence-style interrogations.

• The methodology was derived from MK-Ultra.

• Chase once took a phone call from the leader of the Taliban.

 

Faced with this exposure, Chase folded within 24 hours and offered a full refund—again trying to hide behind Todd's name and an aggressive non-disparagement clause. We went back and forth, but as my December deadline approached, Chase did a 180-degree turn, told me to stop bothering him, and had a Pennsylvania lawyer send me a threatening "buyer's remorse" intimidation letter. Something I dare say he had done many times before.

 

7. The Hidden Bank Trigger & The Legal Strike

On December 16, I called my bank. I provided the invoice, the receipt, and Chase's written full-refund offer, and requested a fraud recall on the funds. A month later, my bank told me the recall had failed because the beneficiary (Applied Behavior Research/Chase) refused to respond to Wells Fargo.

 

With that door slammed shut, I gathered my cross-referenced evidence pack and knocked on doors in Chase's backyard. I retained a specialist consumer defense firm in Virginia. My lawyer assessed the evidence against the Virginia Consumer Protection Act (VCPA), found blatant statutory violations, and issued a formal 7-day demand letter. If they didn't pay, we would file a lawsuit for triple damages plus legal fees.

 

Within hours, Chase replied—suddenly thanking my lawyer! He claimed he had been trying "ceaselessly" to get my money back to me, writing that "nobody wants her to have her money back more than ‘we’ do."

 

To prove his dilemma, Chase attached a screenshot showing his Wells Fargo account had been frozen pending closure.

 

It turned out my fraud recall request back in December had worked. It triggered an internal fraud investigation at Wells Fargo, which resulted in his corporate account being locked and my $48,000 earmarked for return. The inter-banking system had gone into some sort of holding pattern with Wells Fargo waiting for my bank to re-issue the request. I got on the phone, my bank re-sent the request, and within an hour, the money was back in my account. A week later, my lawyer secured all my legal and travel expenses, suggesting Chase didn’t relish the idea of legal scrutiny.

 

8. The Victims and Perpetrators

On March 27, I submitted a formal complaint to the Virginia Office of the Attorney General (OAG), citing public interest.

 

I believe the coaches—the "clinicians"—are both victims and perpetrators of this scam. They pay thousands, possibly tens of thousands, for their training and are highly incentivized to claw it back by perpetrating the scam on others.

 

Todd told me his first paying Avery customers were a couple he knew. He targeted them because, as he put it, "I knew they could afford it." He told me about a vulnerable 30-year-old man who entered the program in a terrible psychological state, whose sister was subsequently sucked into signing up as well because they came from wealth. He also mentioned that the client of another coach was, like me, "struggling"—meaning that client, too, had realized it was a scam and wanted their money back. With 15 "clinicians" listed on the website, there must be a lot of victims out there.

 

A Call to Action for Other Victims and Insiders

I got my money back, but I put a lot of hours in and came out the other side a whole lot wiser. If the Avery program is anything to go by, the other books and courses marketed through the NCI website are of little to no value.

 

There are consumer laws in place to protect us from bad actors. If you have been defrauded by Chase Hughes or the Avery program, do not suffer in silence or let shame keep you quiet, that’s what these people rely on:

​

1. Demand your money back.

2. Report it to your bank's fraud department.

3. Hire local Virginia counsel if necessary.

4. File a free, confidential complaint with the Virginia OAG (Consumer Protection). 

 

If you file, reference my case number (#26-02040) so the state can see the scale of this operation.

 

To the coaches, clinicians, and other associates who know the dark reality of this operation but are fearful of Chase’s legal threats: your silence is what enables him to carry on. You need to know that private NDAs cannot legally prevent you from reporting consumer fraud or statutory violations to law enforcement. You can submit evidence to the Virginia OAG (https://www.oag.state.va.us/consumer-protection/index.php/file-a-complaint) with complete anonymity to the business. Do not let fear or a toothless piece of paper stop you from reporting what you know. I survived this, and you can too. I would be happy to speak to anyone who wants to get in touch to talk about their experience and/or to figure out a path forward.  ​​

​

Learn more about Chase Hughes