A one-time Indianapolis businessperson charged with deceiving investors of more than $200 million was basically a victim of the 2008 financial collapse, his attorney says. The investment fraud lawyers recounted that they are willing to help clients who suffers in wrong crime.
Tim Durham's trial on crime charges is booked to start Friday in U.S. District Court in Indianapolis and is anticipated to last 3 to a month.
Durham and 2 others are charged with robbing Akron, Ohio-based Fair Finance Co. And using a Ponzi scheme to bilk about 5,000 mostly aged investors. Federal prosecutors have indicted Durham, his business partner and accountant of raiding the company to finance their lavish lifestyles and unsuccessful firms.
Durham's attorney, John Tompkins, told the Indianapolis Business Journal that Fair "was a credit business attempting to survive the credit crisis that was lead to by the monetary collapse of 2008" and failed to collapse because of evildoing by his client.
Tompkins had filed a motion to dismiss the charges against Durham, 49, but Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson rejected that request in April.
Tompkins also fought unsuccessfully to keep tapes of FBI wiretaps of Durham's phone calls out of evidence, saying they're deceiving.
In the tapes, Durham and his partner purportedly discuss ways to hide the firm's true financial condition from regulators, how to hide $28 million in bad debt, and decide to close the business on Veterans Day with no warning to stop consumers from cashing in stocks.
Tompkins maintains that prosecutors are using only a little slice of the taped talks conscientiously selected to make Durham look guilty.
Out of 1,800 telephones calls that were recorded, prosecutors plan to play excerpts from about 20, and those will be spliced excerpts, he said.
"It's terrible tough to give a precise and complete picture with that," Tompkins told The Associated Press on Monday.
Tim Horty, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's office in Indianapolis, had no comment.
Tompkins said all of Fair's prospective financiers received circulars containing data about the company's finances. But in a court brief filed in May, prosecutors related the circulars didn't come clean about the change in business that occurred after Durham and his partners purchased Fair in 2002.
Tompkins also maintains that Durham's way of life is unimportant. Prosecutors say Durham paid $250,000 to remodel his luxury home's garage, kept a yacht, private jets and a bunch of classic and exotic cars, and wired himself $150,000 for use at a casino.
"The only reason you would like to talk about things like that is to make the jury feel alienated from Mr. Durham personally, as opposed to trying to prove to the jury that Mr. Durham did anything wrong," he informed the IBJ.
Durham has been under house arrest since his March 2011 indictment. Tompkins declared his client "obviously is under a lot of private stress but is looking forward to having the entire story of what happened at Fair to come out."
Durham and his partners each face up to 20 years in jail for each wire crime count, 20 years for the securities crime count and five years for the conspiracy charge. Each man was indicted on a sum total of 12 counts.
U.S. Attorney Joe Hogsett has said the case might be the biggest white-collar crime case ever filed in southern Indiana.
Tim Durham's trial on crime charges is booked to start Friday in U.S. District Court in Indianapolis and is anticipated to last 3 to a month.
Durham and 2 others are charged with robbing Akron, Ohio-based Fair Finance Co. And using a Ponzi scheme to bilk about 5,000 mostly aged investors. Federal prosecutors have indicted Durham, his business partner and accountant of raiding the company to finance their lavish lifestyles and unsuccessful firms.
Durham's attorney, John Tompkins, told the Indianapolis Business Journal that Fair "was a credit business attempting to survive the credit crisis that was lead to by the monetary collapse of 2008" and failed to collapse because of evildoing by his client.
Tompkins had filed a motion to dismiss the charges against Durham, 49, but Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson rejected that request in April.
Tompkins also fought unsuccessfully to keep tapes of FBI wiretaps of Durham's phone calls out of evidence, saying they're deceiving.
In the tapes, Durham and his partner purportedly discuss ways to hide the firm's true financial condition from regulators, how to hide $28 million in bad debt, and decide to close the business on Veterans Day with no warning to stop consumers from cashing in stocks.
Tompkins maintains that prosecutors are using only a little slice of the taped talks conscientiously selected to make Durham look guilty.
Out of 1,800 telephones calls that were recorded, prosecutors plan to play excerpts from about 20, and those will be spliced excerpts, he said.
"It's terrible tough to give a precise and complete picture with that," Tompkins told The Associated Press on Monday.
Tim Horty, spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's office in Indianapolis, had no comment.
Tompkins said all of Fair's prospective financiers received circulars containing data about the company's finances. But in a court brief filed in May, prosecutors related the circulars didn't come clean about the change in business that occurred after Durham and his partners purchased Fair in 2002.
Tompkins also maintains that Durham's way of life is unimportant. Prosecutors say Durham paid $250,000 to remodel his luxury home's garage, kept a yacht, private jets and a bunch of classic and exotic cars, and wired himself $150,000 for use at a casino.
"The only reason you would like to talk about things like that is to make the jury feel alienated from Mr. Durham personally, as opposed to trying to prove to the jury that Mr. Durham did anything wrong," he informed the IBJ.
Durham has been under house arrest since his March 2011 indictment. Tompkins declared his client "obviously is under a lot of private stress but is looking forward to having the entire story of what happened at Fair to come out."
Durham and his partners each face up to 20 years in jail for each wire crime count, 20 years for the securities crime count and five years for the conspiracy charge. Each man was indicted on a sum total of 12 counts.
U.S. Attorney Joe Hogsett has said the case might be the biggest white-collar crime case ever filed in southern Indiana.
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This article is all about ponzi schemes and investment fraud . The author is Jona Blatche.
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