Rank: Elder Joined: 9/15/2006 Posts: 3,907
|
The story in the Business Daily on Russel Wasendorf was a fascinating read. Ooh the wiles of money so entrapping; like a beer bottle to an alcoholic or a seductive woman to a permissive man... http://www.reuters.com/article/...ne-idUSBRE88N0EJ20120924Quote:A small town Iowa boy, raised in hard times by a widowed mother, starts a business in the back room of a barber shop before setting out to the big city. He strikees it rich and returns years later to local glory, spending lavishly and savouring his role as the big man in a little town.
It's a real story, but as became clear this summer, a dark thread ran through it. For most of the two-decade life of Peregrine Financial Group, a leading independent futures brokerage, founder and chief executive Russell Wasendorf Sr. was taking hundreds of millions of dollars of his customers' money to cover losses and live large.
His dual life came to light after Wasendorf, 64, tried to commit suicide outside his headquarters in July. Authorities discovered a four-page confession letter describing how he used a post-office box, a scanner and basic software to hide his theft for years. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission accused him of making off with more than $200 million of customer money. Last week, he pleaded guilty to mail fraud, lying to regulators and embezzling customer funds, crimes that could put him in jail for 50 years.
|