The Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) halted a microcap scheme in South Florida that included three boiler room stockbrokers trying to conceal the fact that they were barred from the securities industry. The stockbrokers’ investment scheme included the financial exploitation of the elderly, as well as the concealment of their disciplinary histories. Brokers Dean Esposito, Joseph Devito, and Frederick Birks, cold called investors, including many elderly, ages 85 to 98 years old, and defrauded them into purchasing unregistered stock shares of eCareer Holdings, Inc. The CEO of eCareer Holdings, Inc., Joseph Azzata of Boca Raton, FL, knowingly hired the 3 barred brokers and their sales agents, while allegedly perpetrating the fraud on investors.
“We allege that senior citizens and other investors were falsely told that purchasing eCareer stock was a good, profitable investment,” stated Eric Bustillo, Director of the SEC’s Miami Regional Office. “Concealed from these investors were the exorbitant fees being paid to sales agents as well as the disciplinary histories of Esposito, DeVito, and Birks.” That being, according to the SEC’s complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, these brokers were the subjects of a prior SEC enforcement action that resulted in them being barred from acting as a broker or dealer or participating in any offering of a penny stock, such as eCareer’s stock.
The SEC alleges that eCareer, Azzata, Esposito, Devito and Birks fraudulently raised more than $11 million in funds from more than 400 investors since August 2010, and that $3.5 million of that amount was for undisclosed exorbitant fees. The SEC seeks disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, prejudgment interest, and financial penalties among other relief for investors. The SEC’s request for a temporary restraining order was granted as well as an asset freeze. The SEC also suspended the trading in shares of eCareer Holdings.
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