The City of Birmingham Retirement and Relief System and the Electrical Workers Pension System Local 103 have filed a proposed class action securities fraud lawsuit accusing a number of big banks of colluding with one another to rig the prices of Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac) and Federal…
$20M Ponzi Scam Results in Guilty Plea for Kiddar Capital Founder Todd Hitt, Kiddar Capital’s founder and a member of a prominent commercial real estate family in Virginia, has pleaded guilty to criminal fraud charges accusing him of operating a $20M Ponzi fraud that involved several schemes. According to prosecutors,…
Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin has filed investor fraud charges against ex-broker Bruce Worthington, who was previously licensed with Commonwealth Financial Network and after that with Founders Financial Network. Worthington was based in Massachusetts. According to Galvin’s fraud complaint, Worthington fraudulently misappropriated nearly $100K from one client’s accounts.…
The CFTC is ordering Lawrence/Laurence Hong, his wife Grace Hong, and their Pishon Holding LLC to pay over $1.25M in restitution for the misappropriation and fraudulent solicitation of futures contracts. The couple already pleaded guilty to related criminal charges last year, with Laurence sentenced to 180 months in prison and…
Investor Awarded $276K in Woodbridge Ponzi Fraud A Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) arbitration panel has awarded more than $276K to an investor that lost money in the $1.2B Woodbridge Ponzi scam. The panel found that Quest Capital Strategies did not properly supervise former broker Frank Dietrich, who sold $400K…
The US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas recently announced that District Court Judge Keith P. Ellison has sentenced former financial adviser Peggy Ann Fulford to 120 months in prison—that’s 10 years. Fulford defrauded a number of professional athletes, including ex-NBA basketball players Dennis Rodman and Travis Best,…
Former Centaurus Financial Broker’s Certified Financial Planner Designation is Suspended The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards has suspended Texas broker’s Larry J. Templin’s CFP designation. The interim suspension comes after Templin, who is accused of bank fraud, refused to provide the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra) with information related…
Former HCR Wealth Advisors financial adviser Admits to Defrauding Pro Athlete of $1.2M Jeremy Joseph Drake, an ex-HCR Wealth Advisors financial adviser, has agreed to a consent judgment in the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s case against him in which he admits that he defrauded a pro athlete and his…
Former MRI International Head is Found Guilty in $1.5B Ponzi Scam Edwin Fujinaga, the ex-CEO of medical billings collections company MRI International, has been convicted of multiple counts of wire fraud, mail fraud, and money laundering. He is scheduled to be sentenced earlier this year. According to the release issued…
The US Securities and Exchange Commission has filed fraud charges against Mark Suleymanov, who owns the options trading website SpotFN. According to the regulator, Suleymanov, who is a New York resident, defrauded retail investors of about $4M in a binary options scam that took place from at least 2012 to…