Trevor Cook

UPDATED 7:11 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) When U.S. District Judge James Rosenbaum sentenced Ponzi schemer Trevor Cook to a quarter of a century in federal prison earlier this week, the judge used some powerful words to describe Cook’s colossal fraud. Rosenbaum described the scheme that bilked investors out of at least $158 million as “wretched, tawdry [...]

BULLETIN: Ponzi schemer Trevor Cook has been sentenced to 25 years in federal prison for his role in an international Forex Ponzi scheme that gathered more than $190 million and fleeced victims out of more than $158 million. In ordering the prison term, U.S. District Judge James Rosenbaum sided with the prosecution’s recommendation of a [...]

Another spectacular Ponzi case has emerged in Minnesota just months after federal prosecutors charged Trevor Cook in an alleged $190 million scam and Tom Petters was convicted in a $3.65 billion scam. Charged in a new scheme today was Corey N. Johnston of Lakeville, a Minneapolis suburb. The Minneapolis/St. Paul region also is the home [...]

Trevor Cook’s brother was hiding more than $400,000 in cash and valuables from a $190 million Ponzi scheme, according to an extraordinary statement by the court-appointed receiver in the case. The loot was found July 23 — after Trevor Cook, whose plea agreement in the case required him to submit to a lie-detector test if [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: R.J. Zayed, the court-appointed receiver in the Ponzi and Forex fraud case brought by the SEC and CFTC against Trevor Cook and Pat Kiley, has said many investors were made destitute by the scheme. Not all investors lost their money, however. Yesterday Zayed filed petitions to claw back millions of dollars in “preferential [...]

BULLETIN: The FBI will administer a lie-detector test to Ponzi schemer Trevor Cook. Meanwhile, his July 26 sentencing date may be delayed, a source told the PP Blog. The date upon which the test will be administered was not immediately clear. The source, however, suggested that Cook could be subjected to the polygraph as early [...]

Some of the investors in the Trevor Cook/Pat Kiley Ponzi scheme are none too pleased with Cook’s plea deal, which may place a ceiling of 25 years on any prison sentence he receives while tens of millions of dollars remain missing. One investor has told the PP Blog that a group of investors is seeking [...]

Longtime readers of the PP Blog may scarcely believe a year has passed since the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf announced a new, offshore wire facilitator — on the same day President Obama announced a crackdown on international fraud. Obama delivered his remarks at 11:37 a.m. By 5:54 p.m., a member of an AVG forum operated by [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Some of the investors in the Trevor Cook/Pat Kiley Ponzi scheme in Minnesota say they believe Cook is lying to investigators about the whereabouts of assets and perhaps other elements of the probe. “We do not believe this much money could be totally lost in such a short period of time,” an investor [...]

The acts of Nevin Shapiro — a Florida man arrested in New Jersey yesterday on charges of orchestrating a $900 million Ponzi scheme — represent a “perfect example of greed run amok,” an FBI agent said. Separately, a grand jury in Colorado has charged two men under the state’s organized-crime statute with operating an $18 [...]

The executive director of the newly created Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force is a veteran federal prosecutor who served on the team that shined the light on the spectacular fraud of Enron Corp. and gained the convictions of former executives Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling in 2006. Meanwhile, the Task Force now has its own [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: There was significant action in Ponzi cases today. Earlier we reported on the guilty plea of Trevor Cook in Minnesota and the issuance of a bench warrant in South Carolina for Michael Derrick Peninger. The brief below summarizes action in the Ponzi and affinity-fraud case case of Steven Byers in New York, the [...]

UPDATED 11:31 A.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Federal prosecutors have filed a motion to disqualify attorney Mark Kallenbach as counsel for INetGlobal and related companies, claiming that Kallenbach is attempting to be both a witness in the case and a lawyer for multiple clients involved in a Ponzi scheme, wire fraud and money-laundering probe. Kallenbach, prosecutors said, [...]

BULLETIN: (UPDATED 12:21 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Tom Petters, whom federal prosecutors said presided over a $3.65 billion Ponzi scheme, has been sentenced to 50 years in prison. The fraud was one of the largest in U.S. history — though still significantly smaller than the Bernard Madoff scheme, estimated to have involved $65 billion. Prosecutors had [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: As is the case with other Ponzi schemes, the alleged Trevor Cook/Pat Kiley scheme in Minnesota is proving to be an incredible paper chase that is consuming hundreds of hours of manpower as attorneys, investigators and support staff work to reverse-engineer what authorities say was an epic, international fraud. Want to be a [...]

A federal judge has ordered a Florida man to spend nearly 16 years in prison and pay $16.7 million in restitution for fleecing investors in a Ponzi scheme. Sean Healy, 39, of Weston, scammed dozens of investors in Pennsylvania. He went on to live in the lap of luxury in Florida, acquiring a $2.4 million [...]

BULLETIN: Trevor Cook, the reputed head of a $190 million Ponzi scheme in Minnesota, has been charged criminally with mail fraud and income-tax evasion. Cook, 37, previously had been charged civilly by the SEC and the CFTC. The criminal charges filed today came after a probe by the FBI and the IRS Criminal Investigations Unit, [...]

An individual or group of individuals believed to be operating internationally created a website that mimicked the website of the U.S. Securities Investor Protection Corp. (SIPC) “in an apparent attempt to target [Bernard] Madoff victims” in a fraud scheme, SIPC said. SIPC and the SEC issued warnings immediately, as did the court-appointed receiver in the [...]

It’s starting to read like Ian Fleming fare, something straight out of James Bond and “Octopussy.” R.J. Zayed, the receiver in the alleged Trevor Cook/Pat Kiley Ponzi scheme in Minnesota, says he did not find Cook’s collection of Faberge eggs when, armed with a court order, he searched Cook’s home in Apple Valley. The precise [...]