ABC News is reporting that Glenn Beck’s long-time sponsor Goldline has been formally charged by the Santa Monica City Attorney with a 19-count criminal complaint for defrauding customers.

The complaint alleges that Goldline “runs a bait and switch operation in which customers, seeking to invest in gold bullion, are switched to highly overpriced coins by using false and misleading claims,” according to a statement released by the consumer affairs division of the Santa Monica City Attorney’s office.

The company has been charged in the court filing with misdemeanors that include theft by false pretenses, false advertising, and conspiracy, the City Attorney’s office said.

The allegations stem from complaints that Goldline deliberately pressured customers to purchase overpriced gold coins rather than the bullion featured in their advertising. The pitch often included false representations that coins are a safer investment because bullion could be confiscated by the government. That is a claim specifically cited by Beck in his ads.

Many of Beck’s sponsors are firms that benefit from his Apocalyptic delusions. They include Survival Seeds, Liberty Safes, and CheaperThanDirt, an online gun dealer. The Beck business model is to so thoroughly frighten his audience that believe they need these products to protect themselves and their families from the imminent End Times. Sadly, for the pathetic nimrods whom Beck has deceived, it’s a lucrative con job.

Last year another gold peddler, and Beck sponsor, Superior Gold was placed into receivership and all of its assets frozen. And that’s just the tip of the corruption iceberg associated with firms that finance Beck’s disinformation factory. Regular advertisers on Beck’s radio and Internet properties include LifeLock, Tax Masters, and Free Score, all of whom have had brushes with the law for engaging in questionable business practices.

I guess it’s to be expected that someone as dishonest as Beck is going to align himself with the same sort of scoundrels.