SEC Bars Merrill Manager For Defrauding Client
From the Desk of Jim Eccleston at Eccleston Law.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has barred an Annapolis, Maryland-based Merrill Lynch managed for defrauding a client from 2016 to 2020.
Richard Crabtree, a senior vice president and resident director of Merrill’s Annapolis branch, had been on medical leave for the past two years. However, over the prior four-year period, Crabtree deceived a client “into believing that he had invested $250,000 of the client’s funds into a private investment partnership that was held outside” of Merrill Lynch, according to the SEC. Crabtree, who neither admitted nor denied any of the SEC’s findings, no longer works for Merrill.
According to the SEC, Crabtree did not profit from the deception that resulted in the bar and he was ordered to pay a $40,000 penalty. But Crabtree “falsely represented to the client that the trading strategy was highly profitable and that the client’s interest in the private investment partnership grew to as high as approximately $10 million”, according to the SEC. In an effort to conceal the fraud, Crabtree allegedly falsified portfolio review reports, trading records, and mortgage payout letters, according to the SEC.
Eccleston Law LLC represents investors and financial advisors nationwide in securities, employment, regulatory and disciplinary matters.
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