Investor's Watchdog.com: Stock, finance and investment protection for investors

He promised low-risk, high return investments.  Who isn’t going to listen to a deal like that?  At least seventeen investors, many of them seniors, did listen to Rick J. Boros, a/k/a Vincent Kwiatkowski (“Boros”) . . .  and lost more than $1.2 million.  On September 3, 2008, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) stopped Boros before he could steal many more millions from many more senior citizens.   The SEC’s press release about the case reads, in part: (more…)

As the U.S. economy tumbles and the world economy trembles, businesses will begin laying off workers.  In October, AOL announced that it would be laying off 2000 employees.  Yahoo is planning on laying off hundreds of employees.  Airbus is set to cut 10,000 jobs.  (more…)

Today, police led Val E. Southwick out of his office in handcuffs bringing to a close what prosecutors are calling perhaps the biggest scam in Utah history.  For the 800 people who invested through Southwick, though, today was only the beginning of a long journey during which they will learn how much, if any, of their nest eggs have survived the scam. (more…)

Scamsters follow the news.  Perhaps the best State Securities Commissioner in the country, Joe Borg of Alabama, has recently issued a warning to investors that they can expect scamsters to pitch scams that supposedly provide protection against recession. 

William Horton of the Birmingham News reports: (more…)

Daniel William Heath, his father John William Heath, and Denis Timothy O’Brien will soon be sampling the cuisine at the California State Prison in Los Angeles, after the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office obtained convictions against them on charges of securities fraud, elder abuse, grand theft, and other charges.  Each of the men faces more than 20 years prison.Operating under the business names Private Capital Management, Inc., Private Collateral Management, Inc., and PCM Fixed Income Fund I, LLC, the defendants lured elderly investors to seminars with promises of a free lunch.  (more…)

When the SEC began investigating Bryan Behrens of Omaha they found a bus painted in Nebraska Cornhusker red and a Cadillac Escalade parked in his driveway.  They think that he may have used money swindled from elderly investors to buy those rides.

KETV in Omaha reports that the SEC believes Behrens raised $6.5 million in a securities fraud he ran through a company called National Investments, Inc., and spent $3.5 million on his lavish lifestyle.  The SEC claims that Behrens sold his elderly victims promissory notes, promising them monthly interest payments, but instead paid them from amounts invested by later marks in classic Ponzi fashion. 

In August, Michael Schneider pleaded no contest to 173 felony counts of burglary, embezzlement, elder financial abuse, grand theft and forgery.   Operating through a company called the California Plan, Schneider told his elderly investors that he used their investments to fund mortgages on real estate throughout the San Francisco Bay area.  What he didn’t tell them was that he was running a $43 million Ponzi scheme and that any ‘return’ they received came from money invested by later marks.

Brandon Bailey of The San Jose Mercury News covered Schneider’s sentencing hearing.  Bailey reports:   (more…)

With less than a year until the elections of 2008, the Supreme Court’s decision in Stoneridge Investment Partners v. Scientific Atlanta shows the importance of electing legislators and a president who understand that protecting Main Street is more important than protecting Wall Street.  (more…)

USA Today reporter Kathy Chu has written the best story yet on the crisis threatening retiring baby boomers.  Every baby boomer should read that story and the companion story on protecting your nest egg. 

I sometimes feel like the amateur astronomer who knows an asteroid is on a collision course with earth, but cannot get the attention of the people in a position to do something about it.  Kathy Chu has helped us get the word out.  Her story last year on early retirement scams revealed a problem that I and other investor protection attorneys have been battling for the past five years. 

When you walk by a news stand, look to see if Kathy has a story in that edition of USA Today.  If so, buy it.  . 

Glenn Frey had a hit in the 80’s called “Smuggler’s Blues.”  The song includes the lyric “it’s the lure of easy money, it’s got a very strong appeal.”  That line speaks as much to financial criminals as it does to drug smugglers. 

Robert E. Kessler of Newsday reports: (more…)