State Sues Firm Over ‘Learning Machine’ That Claims Foreign Language Shortcut

Attorney General Christine Gregoire on Tuesday sued a Redmond company that claims its mail-order “Learning Machine” emits light and sound in a way that helps people learn a foreign language.

Jurisdictions in four other states joined Washington in the King County Superior Court lawsuit against Zygon International Inc. and its president, Dane Spotts.

“Instead of learning French fluently overnight, these Zygon customers learned a lesson about consumer fraud,” Gregoire said in a news release.

Zygon officials did not immediately return a telephone message left at their Redmond headquarters.

The lawsuit, joined by attorneys general of Illinois, Texas and Pennsylvania, and the district attorney of Napa County, Calif., seeks injunctions and unspecified amounts for consumer restitution, civil penalties and attorney costs and fees.

Washington’s action alleges that more than 150 customers from 36 states and Mexico asked for and were promised refunds within 30 to 60 days, and then waited up to several months without receiving any money. Most of the complaints involved frustrated consumers who had returned their machines, which cost $300, because they simply did not work, or had broken or missing parts, Gregoire said.

The other jurisdictions pressing the suit contend the machine does not work and is being sold as a medical device unapproved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Zygon’s catalogs, which are distributed nationally, say the “Learning Machine” induces “altered mind-states” by emitting a “unique combination of light and sound that stimulates the mind to match the dominant brain-wave frequency of the (recorded foreign-language) program.”