Some Latin American citizens say they plan to punish cruise lines for financial losses allegedly suffered at the hands of jailed Texas promoter Robert Allen Stanford.
Stanford, 60, is in a Houston detention center. He has been in custody since June, when a federal grand jury indicted him and several associates for allegedly defrauding thousands of investors of more than $7 billion. His trial is scheduled for January.
Approximately $1 billion of the Stanford losses occurred in the Baton Rouge, Lafayette and Covington areas, according to estimates by state Rep. Bodi White, R-Central, and Baton Rouge lawyer Phillip W. Preis.
But the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has alleged in court filings in Dallas that significant losses also occurred in more than 100 other countries.
Most losses resulted from the purchase of worthless certificates of deposit from Stanford International Bank, based in the island nation of Antigua and Barbuda in the Caribbean Sea, SEC officials allege in their court filings.
And the Stanford Victims Coalition of Latin America now plans to punish cruise lines that bring tourists to that island nation.
Jaime Rodriguez Escalona, of Caracas, Venezuela, was announced as one of two leaders of that group when it was formed in May.
Escalona said last week that damaging Antigua and Barbuda’s tourism business is the only leverage Latin American investors have over that country.
He said the governments of Latin American countries do not appear interested in pursuing any legal action on Stanford victims’ behalf.
“The Venezuelans … are in the worst situation because they live under a non-democratic government that criminally persecutes those people that have savings overseas,” Escalona said.
He added that a former Venezuelan finance minister said in a television interview “that the government would do nothing to help the victims.”
Under Escalona’s name, the coalition’s blog has referred to Antigua as “Pirates of the Caribbean.”
One of Antigua’s former top bank regulators is under indictment in the U.S. for allegedly accepting bribes from Stanford as payment for blocking investigations into the Texan’s island operations.
Escalona conceded that cruise lines had nothing to do with Stanford’s alleged crimes. But he said his group will work to enforce a boycott of those companies if they do not cease service to Antigua and Barbuda.
Escalona said the government of Antigua and Barbuda seized more than $200 million of Stanford’s property after his arrest. He said his coalition wants to pressure the island nation to return that money to Latin American people who lost their retirement savings to Stanford.
Four cruise lines that currently stop at Antigua — Royal Caribbean International, Princess Cruises, Carnival Cruise Lines, and Norwegian Cruise Line — did not respond Friday to requests for comment on the threatened boycott.
Escalona said his group is relatively small, consisting of fewer than 500 of the more than 10,000 Latin Americans who lost money when the SEC shut down Stanford’s operations 13 months ago.
He said members of the coalition reside in Mexico, Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Peru, Puerto Rico (a U.S. territory) and Venezuela.
Some investors in Spain and Portugal also have joined the coalition, Escalona said.
Escalona described himself as a consultant in both real estate and wind turbine technology. He said he divides his time between Venezuela and Austin, Texas.
Showing posts with label target. Show all posts
Showing posts with label target. Show all posts
Sunday, 7 March 2010
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Receiver targets former Stanford employees to recover money for investors
More than 300 former employees of R. Allen Stanford — including some who worked in Austin — benefited substantially from their relationship with the financier, according to the court-appointed receiver in charge of recovering money for investors who were victims of Stanford's alleged $7 billion Ponzi scheme.
Now the receiver is seeking the return of bonuses those employees made selling certificates of deposits for Stanford.
The former employees, including financial advisers and managing directors, had "big commissions and other compensation relating to the sale of CDs" as incentives, receiver Ralph Janvey said in a filing this month in U.S. District Court in Dallas.
"When Stanford paid CD proceeds to former Stanford employees, he did no more than take money out of investors' pockets and put it into the hands of the former Stanford employees," according to the filing. "For the more than 20,000 investors who have thus far received little or nothing from their investment in Stanford CDs, money recovered from wherever it resides today is likely the only money they will ever receive in restitution."
The money, Janvey said, was in the form of loans, quarterly bonuses and other compensation paid to brokers. He estimated that they totaled more than $217 million.
Stanford has denied any wrongdoing and is in jail in Houston, charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with multiple counts of fraud.
Some former Stanford employees who worked in his firm's Austin office are named in Janvey's new filing.
According to Janvey's court claim, they include Patrick Cruickshank, who made $2.9 million in bonuses and other compensation for selling the CDs; Ray Deragon, who made $1.15 million; Nigel Bowman, who made $922,000; Shawn Morgan, who made $425,000; and Carol McCann, who made more than $441,000.
Bradley Foster, a Dallas attorney representing Cruickshank and Bowman, didn't return a call for comment. Michael Stanley, a Houston attorney who is representing Deragon, McCann and Morgan, said that none of his clients has been charged with a crime and that they had no inclination of any wrongdoing at Stanford's company.
"My view is, they are innocent employees," Stanley said. "If there was a fraud going on, they didn't know anything about it."
Janvey is being "very aggressive" in his attempt to seize bonus money from former Stanford employees, Stanley said.
"There's no difference in saying the utility company should pay back the light bills or the landlord should pay back the rent, because in some way it can be traced to investors' funds," Stanley said. "We don't think that's a legitimate legal claim."
But Angela Shaw, a Dallas resident and Stanford investor who lost $2 million, called that comparison "laughable." Financial advisers have a fiduciary duty to check things like the underlying investment portfolio, said Shaw, who founded the nonprofit advocacy group Stanford Victims Coalition.
"They're basically saying, 'We were salespeople; we didn't have any other responsibility to you,' " she said. " 'We were just selling what we were told to sell.' If my doctor was held to the same standard, a lot of us would be dead right now."
Shaw said her family lost $4.5 million.
"They are professionals in their field for a reason, and that's what we trusted as their clients," she said.
In previous court filings, Janvey said he expected to recover $1.5 billion to return to investors.
But that was before he lost a court ruling last week in his effort to get money back from some of those investors. Janvey had argued that investors who had redeemed their CDs in the weeks before authorities moved against Stanford essentially had been paid with money stolen from other investors.
But the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans ruled that Janvey had no right to sue those and said the money, which has been frozen by a lower court's order since February, should be released. The ruling included some $275 million in proceeds.
A receivership spokesperson declined to give an updated estimate Wednesday on how much Janvey expects to return to investors.
Now the receiver is seeking the return of bonuses those employees made selling certificates of deposits for Stanford.
The former employees, including financial advisers and managing directors, had "big commissions and other compensation relating to the sale of CDs" as incentives, receiver Ralph Janvey said in a filing this month in U.S. District Court in Dallas.
"When Stanford paid CD proceeds to former Stanford employees, he did no more than take money out of investors' pockets and put it into the hands of the former Stanford employees," according to the filing. "For the more than 20,000 investors who have thus far received little or nothing from their investment in Stanford CDs, money recovered from wherever it resides today is likely the only money they will ever receive in restitution."
The money, Janvey said, was in the form of loans, quarterly bonuses and other compensation paid to brokers. He estimated that they totaled more than $217 million.
Stanford has denied any wrongdoing and is in jail in Houston, charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with multiple counts of fraud.
Some former Stanford employees who worked in his firm's Austin office are named in Janvey's new filing.
According to Janvey's court claim, they include Patrick Cruickshank, who made $2.9 million in bonuses and other compensation for selling the CDs; Ray Deragon, who made $1.15 million; Nigel Bowman, who made $922,000; Shawn Morgan, who made $425,000; and Carol McCann, who made more than $441,000.
Bradley Foster, a Dallas attorney representing Cruickshank and Bowman, didn't return a call for comment. Michael Stanley, a Houston attorney who is representing Deragon, McCann and Morgan, said that none of his clients has been charged with a crime and that they had no inclination of any wrongdoing at Stanford's company.
"My view is, they are innocent employees," Stanley said. "If there was a fraud going on, they didn't know anything about it."
Janvey is being "very aggressive" in his attempt to seize bonus money from former Stanford employees, Stanley said.
"There's no difference in saying the utility company should pay back the light bills or the landlord should pay back the rent, because in some way it can be traced to investors' funds," Stanley said. "We don't think that's a legitimate legal claim."
But Angela Shaw, a Dallas resident and Stanford investor who lost $2 million, called that comparison "laughable." Financial advisers have a fiduciary duty to check things like the underlying investment portfolio, said Shaw, who founded the nonprofit advocacy group Stanford Victims Coalition.
"They're basically saying, 'We were salespeople; we didn't have any other responsibility to you,' " she said. " 'We were just selling what we were told to sell.' If my doctor was held to the same standard, a lot of us would be dead right now."
Shaw said her family lost $4.5 million.
"They are professionals in their field for a reason, and that's what we trusted as their clients," she said.
In previous court filings, Janvey said he expected to recover $1.5 billion to return to investors.
But that was before he lost a court ruling last week in his effort to get money back from some of those investors. Janvey had argued that investors who had redeemed their CDs in the weeks before authorities moved against Stanford essentially had been paid with money stolen from other investors.
But the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans ruled that Janvey had no right to sue those and said the money, which has been frozen by a lower court's order since February, should be released. The ruling included some $275 million in proceeds.
A receivership spokesperson declined to give an updated estimate Wednesday on how much Janvey expects to return to investors.