Former Advisor Receives 20-Year Prison Sentence Over Ponzi Scheme Involving Purchase of Advisors’ Books of Business

Posted on November 14th, 2022 at 1:04 PM
Former Advisor Receives 20-Year Prison Sentence Over Ponzi Scheme Involving Purchase of Advisors’ Books of Business

From the Desk of Jim Eccleston at Eccleston Law.

A former financial advisor who was sentenced earlier this year to 17.5 years in prison for his role in operating a Ponzi scheme now has received a 20-year prison sentence for mail fraud related to the same scheme, according to court documents.

The former New York-based advisor, Perry Santillo, received sentencing in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. The 20-year sentence will run concurrently with his earlier sentence in New York. Santillo will be on supervised release for three years upon the conclusion of his sentence, while Santillo was ordered to pay $1.3 million in restitution. As part of his plea, Santillo admitted that the scheme misappropriated nearly $115 million and resulted in $70.7 million in losses for investors.

Santillo and others perpetrated the scheme by purchasing books of business from numerous investment professionals and financial advisors across the U.S. Then, Santillo and others regularly solicited investors within the books of business to withdraw funds from traditional investments and reinvest the money in issuers controlled by Santillo without disclosing the potential conflict of interest, according to court documents.

Eccleston Law LLC represents investors and financial advisors nationwide in securities, employment, regulatory and disciplinary matters.

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