California AG charges Folsom investment adviser, 2 others in alleged $10 million Ponzi scheme

California’s attorney general has filed criminal charges against a Folsom financial adviser and two other men in connection with an alleged Ponzi scheme that prosecutors say bilked more than 70 investors worldwide out of more than $10 million.

Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced he had filed a total of 32 felony counts of fraud, grand theft and other charges against Folsom investment adviser John D. Black and two of his associates, Christopher J. Mancuso and Joseph P. Tufo.

“We’re talking about people who potentially were cheated out of their retirement, college tuition for their kids, maybe their life savings,” Becerra said.

The charges were filed late Wednesday in Sacramento Superior Court. Mancuso was arrested Thursday in Orange County and Tufo was arrested in Contra Costa County.

“Black is currently at large and his last known whereabouts were in and around Sacramento County,” Becerra’s office said.

The defendants and others are also the subject of a civil complaint in Sacramento federal court that alleges they conducted a Ponzi-style scheme that cost 91 investors $14.5 million since June 2015 and was still ongoing. Regulators with the federal Commodity Futures Trading Commission had been seeking a contempt citation because the defendants allegedly were not obeying an order to turn over business records to investigators.

Mancuso and Tufo could not be reached for comment last week, but Black told The Sacramento Bee that he was a victim in the case.

“I’m innocent and a victim as well of fraud for multiple investments that were made on behalf of investors that were stolen by other investment companies,” Black said in a statement he read. “I have the proof of those contracts and I will fully comply with the CFTC to make sure every investor is made whole.

“My only intention was and is to help people and families, and now it has come to this point.”

Becerra’s office saw the matter differently, and announced investigators had frozen the defendants’ assets, including their bank accounts, property and cryptocurrency.

“Unfortunately, these kinds of scams aren’t new,” Becerra said. “If it seems too good to be true, then it probably is.”

Alleged ‘foolproof’ foreign currency investments

Federal court documents describe a scheme in which investors were lured into handing over hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for promises of huge returns in foreign currency investments that were said to be “foolproof.”

Some investors were promised returns of 70 percent a month on deposits of more than $3 million, court papers say, but when investors began asking where their money was they would receive excuses or find themselves unable to reach the investment advisers.

Court papers say the investors blamed delays in producing the money on lengthy summer vacations in Europe or bad weather in the Bahamas.

Becerra said they also blamed delays on the COVID-19 pandemic.

“They were allegedly using this crisis to perpetuate fraud,” Becerra said.

Investors were told to wire their money through the office of Fort Collins, Colo., attorney John Glenn “to provide a false veneer of safety and legitimacy,” court papers say.

Glenn, who has not responded to a request for comment, was not named in the criminal filing but is named in the federal civil complaint.