The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority is charging John Carris Investments LLC with misleading and bilking investors. It seeks a cease and desist order against the financial firm and George Carris, its CEO, to immediately stop soliciting customers to buy Fibrocell Science, Inc. stock without giving them the correct disclosures. The SRO contends that in May 2013, JCI made solicitations to customers without revealing that Carris and another principal of the firm were selling their shares.
In an amended complaint, FINRA accused Carris, JCI, and five other firm principals of committing securities violations and other fraud. The SRO alleges that as JCI played the role of placement agent for FIbrocell, the firm and Carris artificially inflated Fibrocell stock’s price by pre-arranging trading and making Fibrocell stock buys that were not authorized in the accounts of customers.
FINRA contends that JCI and Carris fraudulently sold notes and stock in Invictus Capital, Inc., the firm’s parent company, without disclosing that its financial state was poor. The SRO believes that there was no reason to believe that investors would gain anything economically and Carris and JCI misled investors of Invictus by paying dividends to the latter’s early investors with funds that came from the sales of the company’s securities. Also, FINRA is accusing JCI of putting out false documentation that did not show payments the firm made for Carris’s personal spending and not remitting employee payroll taxes to the US Treasury.
Securities Fraud
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FINRA Seeks Cease and Desist Order Against John Carris Investments and CEO George Carris for Fraud, FINRA, September 30, 2013
Finra Files Fraud Case Against John Carris Investments, The Wall Street Journal, September 30, 2013
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