Marlboro-Based Real Estate Developer Pleads Guilty to Role in Investment Fraud Conspiracy
| U.S. Attorney’s Office April 21, 2011 |
TRENTON, NJ—A Marlboro, N.J., real estate developer admitted today to his role in an investment fraud conspiracy which embezzled nearly $1 million raised in connection with purported commercial real estate developments in New Jersey, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.
Allen Weiss, 60, of Marlboro, pleaded guilty to an information charging him with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Weiss entered his guilty plea before U.S. District Judge Anne E. Thompson in Trenton federal court.
According to the information to which the defendant pleaded guilty and statements made in court:
Weiss admitted that he conspired with others from January 2009 to February 2010 in a scheme to embezzle investment funds he raised in connection with purported commercial real estate developments. Weiss and his co-conspirators founded a series of holding corporations to solicit investments to develop commercial real estate, including professional services locations for physicians in Holdmel, Hazlet, and Neptune, N.J. Weiss admitted that he and his coconspirators embezzled nearly $1 million in investments funds contributed by victims toward the projects. He also admitted that he lied to those and other victims to raise additional funds, which Weiss and his co-conspirators spent on personal expenses. Weiss pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, which carries a maximum potential penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Michael B. Ward, for the investigation leading to the guilty plea.
The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney André M. Espinosa of the U.S. Attorney’s Office Economic Crimes Unit in Newark.
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.
Defense counsel: Robert A. Honecker, Jr., Esq., Ocean, N.J.