Ponzi Scheme

Federal authorities seized property in Orlando, Windermere, and Aventura, Florida after allegations of a Ponzi scheme that defrauded Italian investors surfaced. Attorneys for the victims in the civil suits claim that the scheme bilked up to one hundred people, most of whom were Italian, and up to $40 million. Federal documents named Leone Alfano Lacava, Victoriya Johnson, and Rasul Atakov, among others, who allegedly operated under business names such as Orlando Trust Properties and Golden Investments Inc. The FBI's affidavit stated that Alfano of Osceola County allegedly used his family's connections in Italy to sell faux investments in Orlando real estate. He went to Italy in order to meet with investors there, showing brochures and pictures of Orlando homes he purportedly owned or would acquire soon. He represented that they could easily get a loan to acquire the properties and that they would profit from leasing the houses. After the investors were committed, Alfano sent them a month or two [...]

Joel Barry Gillis, president of a Calabasas, California firm that was used to operate a Ponzi scheme that bilked investors out of over $100 million, pleaded guilty this week to federal fraud charges. Edward Wishner, the second man charged, pleaded guilty earlier this month. The fraud is believed to have lasted thirteen years and scammed about 2,000 investors who were told that their money would be used to buy profitable automated teller machines. Both men pleaded guilty to conspiracy, two counts of mail fraud, and one count of wire fraud. They face a maximum sentence of eighty years in federal prison at their sentencings scheduled for March 30. According to court documents, Gillis and Wishner ran Nationwide Automated Systems, Inc. (NASI), which claimed to place, operate, and maintain ATMs in high-traffic locations, such as hotels, casinos, and convenience stores. NASI further claimed to operate about 31,000 ATMs and engaged in over $1 billion in ATM transactions a month. The pair's [...]

This week Robert Van Zandt, a tax preparer from the Bronx, New York, was sentenced to up to eleven years in prison, having previously pleaded guilty in November to operating a multimillion dollar Ponzi scheme. His victims said they trusted him with their life savings for decades, but he stole $4.8 million from them, leaving them with nothing. He would take investments from new clients to pay back older clients and take money for himself, the defining elements of a Ponzi scheme. Van Zandt told investors that he would put their money into real estate projects that were impossible to build. He promised high return rates on the investments he offered but later admitted to stealing from 29 investors. His victims each lost between $25,000 and $900,000. One of his victims called Van Zandt "the workingman's Bernie Madoff." A number of Van Zandt's investors had known him for decades and had come to trust him tremendously. New York State Attorney [...]