Watchdog bans 5 involved in £2.8m investment scam

The regulator issued Financial Notices against the five last week, effectively banning them for life from being involved in regulated financial services.

The gang targeted elderly and vulnerable investors with a ‘boiler room’ fraud pushing worthless shares.

The five who have been banned are: Michael Nascimento (individual ref no. 3111345), Charanjit Sandhu (6094530), Stuart Rea (5326274), Jeannine Lewis (6094537) and Hugh Edwards (7279949).

At the time they were sentenced in 2018 the case – known as Operation Tidworth – was described as the FCA’s second biggest ever fraud investigation.

The gang pushed shares in an illegal investment scheme which offered worthless shares in a company claiming to be developing property on the holiday island of Madeira. The five were sentenced to a total of 17.5 years in prison in 2018. 

Over 170 members of the public invested over £2.8m in the shares. Many were elderly or vulnerable and lost “life-changing sums”, in some cases all their life savings. Investors’ money was used to maintain the fraud and to fund the lifestyle of ring leader Michael Nascimento. 

At the time of the court case, when sentencing the defendants trial judge Judge Hehir remarked these were “scams from start to finish” and that some victims had lost everything they had. He added that it was “particularly repellent” that elderly people had been specifically targeted and their stories were at times “positively heart-breaking.”

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Investors bought shares in Pearl Island International LLC, Paragon Private Wealth LLC, Berkeley Brookes LLC, and/or Atlantic Equity LLC.

The shares in the illegal scheme were sold through Morgan Forbes (UK) Ltd, Acropolis SGPS, Amber Crest Investments, Paragon Private Wealth, Ocean Peak International, First Capital Wealth Limited, Bishops of Mayfair Ltd, Walberg Dillion Reid Ltd, and Sterling Capital Corporation Ltd.

Between July 2010 and April 2014, members of the public were cold-called and subjected to high pressure sales tactics to persuade them to buy shares in a company that owned land on the island of Madeira.

The investors were told that the value of the shares would increase substantially when permission to build 20 villas was granted. Investors were promised guaranteed returns of between 125% and 228%. None were ever paid.

In 2018 Southwark Crown Court imposed confiscation orders against ring leader Michael Nascimento for £976,508; Charanjit Sandhu in the sum of £391,680; Stuart Rea in the sum of £46,183; Jeannine Lewis in the sum of £105,538 and Hugh Edwards in the nominal sum of £1 (as he had no assets to meet any order).

The court also imposed default prison sentences under the terms of the confiscation orders for each of the individuals, which means that they would each be liable to serve a term of imprisonment in the event that they do not satisfy the orders.

The FCA notices issued last week ban the five from performing any regulated function in future. None of them has appealed against the orders.

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