Home Memphis Press Releases 2009 Franklin Financial Adviser Gordon B. Grigg Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison for Investment Fraud in Ponzi Scheme...
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Franklin Financial Adviser Gordon B. Grigg Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison for Investment Fraud in Ponzi Scheme

U.S. Attorney’s Office August 06, 2009
  • Middle District of Tennessee (615) 736-5151

NASHVILLE, TN—United States Attorney Edward M. Yarbrough announced that Gordon B. Grigg (“Grigg”), Franklin, Tennessee financial advisor and owner of ProTrust Management, Inc. (“ProTrust”), was sentenced today in federal court to ten (10) years in prison for perpetrating a Ponzi scheme that resulted in a loss of more than $6 million to more than sixty (60) investor - victims.

United States District Court Judge Aleta Trauger, in sentencing Grigg, stated “This case has a more vicious twist than the Madoff case.” Judge Trauger described Grigg’s crimes as “ . . . preying on vulnerable victims in crisis,” noting that Grigg’s scheme “ . . . destroyed families, relationships, marriages, and wreaked incredible havoc.” Prior to imposing sentence, Judge Trauger heard from seven (7) victims who testified as to the devastation Grigg’s fraud had caused to their lives and the lives of their families.

As part of his sentence, Grigg, 46, was also ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $6,154,174.04 and serve a three (3) year period of supervised release following his imprisonment.

Grigg pleaded guilty on April 29, 2009, to mail fraud and wire fraud. Grigg admitted during the plea hearing that, between 1996 and 2009, he operated an elaborate Ponzi Scheme designed to defraud investors who deposited more than $11,000,000 in funds with his company, ProTrust Management. Grigg promised clients that he would invest their money in pooled-client purchases of fixed-term certificates of deposit, private placements, corporate notes and debentures, with the accounts being titled collectively in the Protrust company name. Grigg further promised to personally manage client funds, and promised investors that he would generate and sustain high rates of annualized returns on investment. However, Grigg admitted that it was never his intention to invest the client funds he solicited. Instead, Grigg stated that he used the money placed with ProTrust for his personal benefit and expenses, to operate ProTrust, and to maintain the Ponzi scheme by disbursing “fictitious” earnings and return of deposits to clients who cashed out or closed their ProTrust investment accounts.

To conceal and sustain the Ponzi scheme, Grigg admitted that he fabricated documents, including invoices, forged correspondence, and fraudulent account statements purporting to reflect client ownership of non-existent securities. To deceive investors into believing that their investments were safe, Grigg admitted that he falsely claimed to have negotiated partnerships and special business relationships with several of the nation’s most successful investment firms, including Berkshire Hathaway, Inc., Goldman, Sachs & Co., Morgan Stanley & Co., Incorporated, and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. However, as Grigg admitted to the Court, no such business relationships ever existed, and Grigg used counterfeit corporate letterhead and the forged signatures of national investment firm executives to create fictitious documents and correspondence that appeared to confirm unique pooled investment opportunities between ProTrust and national investment firms.

Grigg further admitted that, between November 4, 2008 and January 28, 2009, he repeatedly solicited funds from investors by falsely representing that he had access to “government-guaranteed commercial paper and bank debt” available as part of the newly-created Troubled Assets Relief Program (“TARP”). Grigg told investors that he had committed more than $5,000,000 in ProTrust pooled client funds towards purchase of TARP guaranteed debt as part of a private placement partnership between ProTrust and the investment firms Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. However, no such private placement partnership had ever existed between ProTrust, Berkshire Hathaway, Inc., and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., and no such TARP-guaranteed investment opportunity had ever been offered or made available to individual investors or national investment firms.

“Mr. Grigg's crimes were not merely irresponsible manipulations of the financial system without consequences, they were acts of extraordinary destruction to his victims,” United States Attorney Edward M. Yarbrough said. “Grigg defrauded investors by repeatedly and falsely promising them ‘safe’ growth based on ‘unique’ pooled-investment opportunities, including promises of access to TARP guaranteed funds. Instead, the investors lost their ‘nest eggs’ and retirement savings as part of an elaborate Ponzi scheme. The effect of Mr. Grigg’s crimes was devastating to his victims. The United States Attorney’s Office will continue to diligently and aggressively prosecute the perpetrators of such schemes.”

“The FBI recognizes the impact that Ponzi schemes and financial fraud have on the public and how these crimes undermine the confidence in our financial system," said My Harrison, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's Memphis Division. "We will continue to work with our regulatory and law enforcement partners to ensure that those who take advantage of the public in this way are brought to justice and that they pay for their crimes.”

“Today’s sentence should remind all of those seeking to criminally profit off this national crisis: If you commit a TARP related crime, the agents of SIGTARP, working with their law enforcement partners, will bring you to justice and ensure that you receive just punishment for your criminal activity,” said Neil Barofsky, Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the United States Postal Inspection Service, the Special Inspector General, Troubled Asset Relief Program, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance and the Franklin Police Department.

Assistant United States Attorney John K. Webb prosecuted the case for the United States.

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