In general, the IRS taxes US residents. There are some exceptions, but the wording you quote sounds like a scam.Can anyone in the US tell where to get a definitive reply to whether an Investment company can charge an IRS TAX FEE like that demanded below?
Start on the web with the California Secretary of State, and its registry of businesses in California. That will verify whether they are registered there, and if yes what their address and contact information is.If this company claims to be operating in California what would be most appropriate address to write to?
From there, what to do next is an interesting legal question. Ultimately, the answer may be a lawsuit in a California court. Which I will warn you: those are expensive and slow. In practice you will need a lawyer (budget about $5000 for that), and a civil complaint of the form "you committed fraud and took my money, I want it back" is likely to take 2 years to be processed.