Mr. Schiff: Interesting situation in Georgia about a financial scam. The FBI gets a complaint, and then the subject of the complaint shows up.
Mr. Cromer: "We were kind of lucky in this case in that the subject actually contacted us the same day that we received our first complaint about him.”
Mr. Schiff: That’s William Cromer, FBI special agent in Atlanta. He says the subject—a lawyer—confessed right away to running a Ponzi scheme, meaning he promised a lot of money in return for investors giving him money. The promises didn’t come through, and Cromer says the lawyer told agents what happened to the client’s cash.
Mr. Cromer: "Told us what kind of assets he still had and helped in recovering those assets.”
Mr. Schiff: Cromer says the scam had the lawyer telling investors, many of them elderly, that they would be given notes and securities and promised 15 percent or more in returns.
Mr. Cromer: "It turned out that all of the notes and all of the security deeds were completely bogus and had been created by the bad guy.”
Mr. Schiff: The lawyer running the $30 million scheme admitted to a charge of wire fraud and was sent to prison for 10 years and one month. I’m Neal Schiff of the Bureau, and that’s the FBI’s Closed Case of the Week.”
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