The Ponzi Scheme
In 2006 investigators discovered Pearlman had perpetrated a long running Ponzi scheme that defrauded investors out of more than $300 million. For more than 20 years Pearlman enticed individuals and banks to invest in Trans Continental Airlines Travel Services Inc. and Trans Continental Airlines Inc., both of which existed only on paper. Pearlman used falsified Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, AIG and Lloyd's of London documents to win investors' confidence in his "Employee Investment Savings Account" (EISA) program and he used fake financial statements created by a fictitious accounting firm Cohen and Siegel to secure bank loans.
Read more about this topic: Lou Pearlman
Famous quotes containing the word scheme:
“I have no scheme about it,—no designs on men at all; and, if I had, my mode would be to tempt them with the fruit, and not with the manure. To what end do I lead a simple life at all, pray? That I may teach others to simplify their lives?—and so all our lives be simplified merely, like an algebraic formula? Or not, rather, that I may make use of the ground I have cleared, to live more worthily and profitably?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)