Alberto Alba Villareal was sentenced to five years behind bars for defrauding investors in a $1 million Texas securities fraud. Villareal was convicted of theft of property for stealing money. The funds he procured were supposed to go toward funding a new insurance company. The Texas State Securities Board was a special prosecutor in the case. Villareal is from South Texas.
As part of his sentence, Villarreal must pay complete restitution to the investor who purchased a $1 million investment contract in Nafta Holdings LLC, which was the new insurer’s controlling company. Villareal must also serve ten years probation.
According to court testimony and his indictment, Villareal took part in a number of financial deceptions to raise funds for the controlling company, even telling the investor that the Texas Insurance Code mandated that there be $4 million in capital and additional cash to open a new insurance company-even though the amount he quoted was about twice what the law actually stipulated.
Villareal allegedly made it seem as if he had raised half of the money and that investors’ funds would go into escrow until the threshold was established. Instead, he used some of their money for his personal expenses, including yacht payments and mortgage payments, which were past due. Investor funds also went toward insurance claims to policyholders with other insurers that he controlled.
The state’s Department of Insurance also gave evidence in the Texas securities case.
Shepherd Smith Edwards Kantas, LTD LLP is a Texas securities fraud law firm.
South Texas man sentenced to five years for $1 million securities fraud, theft, inForney, January 20, 2015
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