Owner of Foreign Currency Exchange Trading Company Charged with Defrauding Investors Out of More Than $5 Million
| U.S. Attorney’s Office April 12, 2011 |
BOSTON—A California man was arrested this morning on federal charges that he defrauded investors out of more than $5 million.
LYNDON LYDELL PARRILLA, 31, of Los Angeles, is charged with wire fraud arising out of the operation of Green Tree Capital. According to the complaint, Parrilla, through Green Tree, solicited more than $5 million from customers, purportedly for the purpose of trading in the foreign currency exchange (FOREX) market. It is alleged that Parrilla traded, at most, a small portion of customer funds in FOREX and instead spent most of it on personal expenses, including more than $950,000 at casinos and approximately $130,000 to purchase a car. Between October 2009 and February 2011, Parrilla also withdrew more than $2.1 million in cash from Green Tree customer accounts. During that same time period, Green Tree continued to e-mail account statements to customers purporting to show trading gains and losses. In many instances, the account statements showed that customers’ accounts had gained value through successful FOREX trading.
Parrilla, who was arrested this morning, will appear in federal court in Los Angeles, this afternoon.
If convicted on these charges, Parrilla faces up to 20 years in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which conducted a parallel civil investigation, referred the case to the United States Attorney’s Office and cooperated with criminal authorities.
U.S. Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz; Richard DesLauriers, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation - Boston Field Division; and William P. Offord, Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation - Boston Field Office announced the charges and the arrest today. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission also cooperated with the investigation. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Sarah E. Walters of Ortiz’s Economic Crimes Unit and Adam J. Bookbinder of her Computer Crimes Unit.
The details contained in the complaint are allegations. The defendant is presumed to be innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
This case was brought in coordination with President Barack Obama’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force. President Obama established the interagency Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force to wage an aggressive, coordinated, and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes. The task force includes representatives from a broad range of federal agencies, regulatory authorities, inspectors general, and state and local law enforcement who, working together, bring to bear a powerful array of criminal and civil enforcement resources. The task force is working to improve efforts across the federal executive branch, and with state and local partners, to investigate and prosecute significant financial crimes, ensure just and effective punishment for those who perpetrate financial crimes, combat discrimination in the lending and financial markets, and recover proceeds for victims of financial crimes. For more information about the task force visit: www.stopfraud.gov.