Woodbridge Execs Arrested, Charged in $1.2 Billion Ponzi Scheme

The Securities and Trade Fee charged two former executives of Woodbridge Group of Corporations for orchestrating an alleged $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme that the regulator shut down in 2017.     

California-based Ivan Acevedo and Dane R. Roseman, former administrators of investments at Woodbridge, have been charged for his or her roles within the scheme. The 2, together with Woodbridge proprietor Robert H. Shapiro, have been additionally arrested by prison authorities.  The trio pled not responsible in federal court docket in Los Angeles.

Woodbridge Group of Corporations filed for chapter in December 2017 after the SEC froze the property in its unregistered funds and charged Shapiro for defrauding greater than eight,400 traders. In August of final 12 months, the SEC additionally charged 5 unregistered brokers for promoting greater than $243 million in unregistered Woodridge funds to greater than 1,600 retail traders. 

In December of final 12 months, the SEC charged 13 people from 10 totally different firms for promoting greater than $350 million of Woodbridge’s unregistered securities to four,400 traders. That group included Jordan Goodman, a self-described “media influencer,” who touted Woodbridge with out disclosing that he was paid to take action, the SEC stated.

The most recent SEC motion claims that Roseman and Acevedo have been paid greater than $three million in commissions and different compensation for elevating $1.2 billion from retail traders, lots of whom have been seniors. Acevedo oversaw that course of from 2012 to 2015, when he left the agency and was succeeded by Roseman. The 2 dealt with the hiring and coaching of the salesforce and approving allegedly fraudulent advertising and marketing supplies and gross sales scripts. In addition they upheld a false picture of the corporate as a professional enterprise, whereas behind the scenes they have been utilizing funds from new traders to pay current traders, the SEC claims.

“As a substitute of telling traders the reality – that Woodbridge’s third-party lending enterprise was a sham nearly from inception – we allege that Acevedo and Roseman labored diligently to perpetuate this sham by getting ready and disseminating false advertising and marketing supplies to induce extra investments, conserving this huge Ponzi scheme afloat,” stated Eric I. Bustillo, director of the SEC’s Miami regional workplace. “The SEC is dedicated to proceed to carry accountable events accountable on this far-reaching scheme.”