After serving 10 years in prison for prior securities law violations, investment fraud orchestrator Edward Durante is back in the news for allegations of a penny stock pump-and-dump scheme.
Durante was criminally charged in December 2015 by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and civilly charged by the Securities Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) for defrauding at least 50 investors out of at least $11 million through the sale of securities of VGTel, Inc. (“VGTel”), a shell company Durante controlled.
According to the SEC’s complaint, Durante sold approximately six millions shares of VGTel stock to investors using various fictitious names to hide his criminal past, including “Edward Wise,” “Ted Wise,” “Efran Eisenberg,” and “Anthony Walsh.” He solicited and enlisted the aid of Larry Werbel (CRD# 828351) and his adviser firm Evolution Partners Wealth Management, LLC (“Evolution Partners”), Sheik Khan (CRD# 2448117), Christopher Cervino (CRD# 2778817), Walter Reissman, and Kenneth Wise to help perpetrate the scheme, according to the complaint.
According to the complaint, Durante had started planning the scheme while he was in prison. Upon leaving the prison and using one of his fictitious names, he acquired VGTel as a shell company, and assigned the shares to various entities to conceal his whole-ownership of VGTel. Durante, according to the complaint, was unable to attract investors due to his criminal history and notified the recently-hired Reissman that he would use a fictitious name to avoid investor concerns about his criminal history.
According to the complaint, over the course of the scheme, Durante either hired or bribed the above-named accomplices in order to further the scheme. According to the complaint, Wise would pay Werbel and Cervino, both of which having done no due diligence on VGTel, to convince investors to invest in the worthless company. Durante himself bribed Khan to direct investors to invest in the company, the complaint said.
Various brokers are slowly rising to the surface of this scheme’s dirty waters. There are claims related to the sale of VGTel pending against New York broker Rafael Santiago (CRD# 2494647) of Primary Capital, LLC and the above-mentioned accomplices.
If you have purchased shares of VGTel or any other securities or investment products from any brokers, including fictitious names, in this article, you may be eligible to recover some or all of your lost investment. Additionally, some of the firms of these brokers may be accountable for the damages for failure to supervise these brokers.
Silver Law Group represents the interests of investors who have been the victims of investment fraud. If you have questions about your legal rights, please contact Scott Silver of the Silver Law Group for a free consultation at ssilver@silverlaw.com or toll free at (800) 975-4345.