December 3, 2014

President of Middlesex County Investment Company Sentenced to 15 Months in Prison for Defrauding Investors

NEWARK, NJ—The former president of a Middlesex County, New Jersey, investment company was sentenced today to 15 months in prison for defrauding investors out of more than $250,000, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.

Shreyans Desai, 27, of Edison, New Jersey, president of Shreysiddh Capital LLC, located in Iselin, New Jersey, previously pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge William J. Martini to Counts One and Two of a superseding indictment charging him with wire fraud. The third count in the indictment, securities fraud, was dismissed after Judge Martini imposed the sentence today in Newark federal court.

According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:

Desai misled a number of investors about his licensing status and the registration status of the company to induce them to entrust their money to him so that he could trade securities on their behalf. Desai then sought to retain control of the funds by providing investors with an inflated value of their investments and also inflated the amount of commissions he purportedly earned through trading those funds.

In addition to the prison term, Judge Martini sentenced Desai to three years of supervised release and ordered to pay restitution of $121,250.

U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Aaron T. Ford, with the investigation leading to today’s sentencing.

The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jane H. Yoon and Senior Litigation Counsel Andrew Leven of the U.S. Attorney’s Office Health Care and Government Fraud Unit in Newark.