The SEC Announces Securities Fraud In ForceField Energy

On May 3, 2016, the SEC announced  securities fraud charges against 10 individuals involved in cash bribes and other kickbacks to registered representatives and unregistered brokers who solicited investors to buy stock in ForceField Energy Inc. The SEC alleges that investors were unaware those soliciting them were being paid by a ringleader – ForceField’s then-chairman of the board Richard St. Julien – to steer them to the stock, and that some of the perpetrators attempted to evade law enforcement by going so far as to communicate with prepaid disposable “burner” phones and encrypted, content-expiring text messages.

But the SEC and other law enforcement have followed leads, utilized technological tools, and tracked down the alleged culprits, filing a complaint against St. Julien and nine others in federal court in Brooklyn, including one who referred to himself as St. Julien’s “brown bag man” as he distributed cash bribes and another who touted the stock in a newsletter called “Wall Street Buy Sell Hold.” The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York brought criminal charges against St. Julien last year. In a parallel action today, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced criminal charges against the other nine individuals.

According to the SEC’s complaint against St. Julien, purported investor relations professional Jared Mitchell, and investment newsletter publisher Christopher F. Castaldo along with registered representatives Richard L. Brown, Gerald J. Cocuzzo, Naveed A. (Nick) Khan, Maroof Miyana, and Pranav V. Patel and unregistered brokers Herschel C. (Tres) Knippa and Louis F. Petrossi:

• St. Julien sought to conceal his illegal conduct by using a company in Belize to pay the kickbacks, wiring money from a company bank account to Mitchell, who called himself the “brown bag man” and withdrew the payments and paid cash bribes in person to Brown, Cocuzzo, Khan, Miyana, and Patel.
• Castaldo lured his victims to invest in ForceField through a nationwide cold calling campaign he conducted from his Long Island, N.Y. office. Castaldo recorded the prices and amounts sold to investors and sent the information to St. Julien so he could receive the kickbacks, which were wired to him through the Belizean company.
• Neither Petrossi nor Knippa was registered as a broker to solicit investments in ForceField’s private placement offerings, and they received undisclosed kickbacks from St. Julien.
• Petrossi falsely told one investor in an e-mail that “I can not [sic] be bought,” and Knippa went so far as to appear on the Fox Business Network’s “Varney & Co.” show and the Business News Network as a purported market commentator to tout ForceField as a great investment. In neither appearance did Knippa tell the host or viewers that he was being paid to solicit investors for ForceField. Meanwhile Knippa told St. Julien in text message exchanges, “I can pitch (ForceField) as good as anyone in the world.”

For further information about this securities law blog  post, please contact Brenda Hamilton, Securities Attorney at 101 Plaza Real S, Suite 202 N, Boca Raton, Florida, (561) 416-8956, by email at [email protected] or visit  www.securitieslawyer101.com.   This securities law blog post is provided as a general informational service to clients and friends of Hamilton & Associates Law Group and should not be construed as, and does not constitute legal advice on any specific matter, nor does this message create an attorney-client relationship.  Please note that the prior results discussed herein do not guarantee similar outcomes.

Hamilton & Associates | Securities Lawyers
Brenda Hamilton, Securities Attorney
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