A Las Vegas resident has been accused of defrauding more than 10,000 investors of $45 million who believed they had invested in a virtual reality project.
The U.S. Department of Justice has accused a Las Vegas resident of defrauding investors of a total of $45 million.
The DOJ published the charges on its official website. It is reported that American Brian Lee helped the founder of the fraud scheme CoinDeal Neil Chandran to defraud over 10,000 investors.
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Lee is charged with conspiracy, wire fraud and criminal money transactions.
According to prosecutors, Lee and his associates misled CoinDeal investors by assuring them of the legitimacy of the family business, which was allegedly developing not only its own cryptocurrency, but also products for the meta-universe.
The prosecutors believe Lee, along with accomplices, misled CoinDeal investors by assuring them that the family business was legitimate.
The prosecutor believes that Lee worked directly under Chandran, who posed as co-owner of the business along with American Michael Glaspie, who, like Lee, helped raise funds from investors.
To entice victims into the scheme, Lee and other promoters drummed up investor interest by claiming that the company was in third-party talks with a “consortium of wealthy clients.”
It is not clear who exactly was referred to.. The consortium included a billionaire online retailer (referring to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos) and a billionaire electric car maker (Ilon Musk).
The CoinDeal promoters argued that the investment was needed to pay for operating expenses.
At the same time, they promised investors a significant return on investment. In reality, prosecutors say, the defendants spent the investments on luxury cars and real estate.
Note that in January 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged Chandran with unregistered sales of securities.
According to the SEC, from January 2019 through 2022, CoinDeal advertisers disseminated “false and misleading” statements to investors regarding the company’s perceived value.