[Miami, FL] A Sarasota man was convicted last week for his role in a stock manipulation scheme that defrauded South Florida investors of millions of dollars.
Jonathan Curshen, 47, of Sarasota and San Jose, Costa Rica, was the principal operator of Sentry Global Securities and Red Sea Management, both based in San Jose. The companies offered penny stock trading and offshore accounts.
Curshen was found guilty of conspiracy to commit: securities fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud and international money laundering. All that in addition to two counts of mail fraud. He faces more than sixty years in prison for his illegal acts.
In January and February of 2007, Curshen and his accomplice – a Las Vegas stock promoter named Nathan Montgomery, aged 30 – manipulated the stock price of a company called CO2 Tech (ticker CTTD).
That penny stock traded on an inter-dealer electronic quotation and trading system known as the Pink Sheets. Because Curshen’s and Montgomery’s co-conspirators controlled the outstanding shares of CO2 Tech, they were able to coordinate trades to coincide with misleading press releases.
Those press releases – which, for example, included erroneous information that CO2 Tech had a deal with American aerospace and defense corporation Boeing to reduce polluting gases emitted from airplanes – were designed to artificially inflate the price of the stock.
The CO2 Tech shares were then “pumped and dumped” to great economic benefit to Curshen, Montgomery and their co-conspirators. Meanwhile, South Florida investors were unaware of any stock manipulation and were left holding worthless stock, according to court documents.
Montgomery and three others who were involved were each paid nearly $1 million in cash for participating in the fraud. The cash was delivered to Miami via a private jet.
Coffee, tea … money laundering?
It was also shown at trial that from 2003-2008, Curshen used Red Sea as a money laundering site in Costa Rica. He would establish bank and brokerage accounts in the United States and Canada under false pretenses and through nominee owners.
Curshen used Red Sea to launder the ill-gotten gains from the CO2 tech stock manipulation.
For his part, Montgomery was found guilty of conspiring to commit securities fraud and wire fraud. Montgomery faces a sentence of up to five years for the conspiracy to defraud count. The defendants are scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Richard W. Goldberg on May 11, 2012.
The stock manipulation and laundering case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), The Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs and Costa Rican authorities.
By: Mark Christopher/Sunshine Slate
Photo: Perpetualtourist2000
stock manipulation
