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A Florida woman who pleaded guilty in a Ponzi scheme that raked in nearly
$200 million was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison.

Johanna Garcia, 41, of Broward County, received the maximum possible
sentence for one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and mail fraud. Twenty-eight other counts from her indictment were dismissed, according to court filings in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

Judge Jose Martinez also sentenced Garcia to three years of supervised
release and a $100 special assessment, plus additional restitution that
will be determined March 3, according to the case docket.

Garcia controlled MJ Capital Funding, which fraudulently solicited
investors to fund its purported business of providing short-term, high-
cost loans called merchant cash advances, or MCAs, federal prosecutors
said in a press release.

She and her co-conspirators made ôfalse statements and fraudulent representationsö to investors about the nature of their investment and how
the money would be used, the prosecutors said.

Investors were told that their money would fund MCAs and that returns on
their investment would be paid from the profits of the MCA business.
Garcia and her co-conspirators falsely promised significant returns at an annual rate of 120%, according to the indictment.

But her company ômade few loans and failed to earn anywhere near the
profits it needed to pay the investors the promised returns,ö prosecutors
said in TuesdayÆs release.

ôAs a result, Garcia paid investors by running a large Ponzi fraud scheme, paying existing investors using new investor funds while misappropriating millions of dollars for her own personal benefit.ö

The fraudulent conspiracy, which took place between October 2020 and
August 2021, netted at least $190.7 million. Of that total, investors lost nearly $90 million, prosecutors said.

In 2021, investors in MJ Capital filed a lawsuit accusing Wells Fargo Bank
of aiding the fraud scheme by failing to follow its own anti-money-
laundering policies. The bank in March 2023 agreed to settle the suit for
$26.6 million.

GarciaÆs partner, Pavel Ramon Ruiz Hernandez, was charged in August 2022
and pleaded guilty in April 2023 to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He was sentenced in September 2023 to nine years and two months in prison, plus three years of supervised release.

Prosecutors said Tuesday that after MJ Capital was shut down by the FBI
and the Securities and Exchange Commission, Garcia, Ruiz Hernandez and
others launched a new, similar Ponzi scheme in fall 2021.

Garcia led this new scheme from its start, ôup until her arrest [in August 2023], and after, while in Bureau of Prisons custody,ö according to prosecutors.

The new scheme ù using entities called New Beginning Global Funding LLC
and New Beginning Capital Funding LLC, among others ù involved Garcia and
her partners telling investors that they would be funding commercial
loans.

ôIn truth, the money raised was used to pay off previous investors, and
fund Garcia and her coconspiratorsÆ lifestyles,ö prosecutors said.

In a Nov. 27 sentencing memo, GarciaÆs attorneys suggested that Ruiz
Hernandez was effectively the true leader of the scheme. They also argued
that GarciaÆs subsequent conduct through New Beginning, ôthough deeply misguided and plainly wrong, was motivated by a desire to pay back her
former investors.ö

The U.S. AttorneyÆs Office, in its own memo filed Monday, rejected that characterization and urged the judge to sentence Garcia to 240 monthsÆ imprisonment.

ôThe evidence overwhelmingly shows that Garcia was the leader/organizer of
the two Ponzi schemes that defrauded over 15,400 victims out of an actual
loss amount of nearly $90 million,ö prosecutors wrote.

Attorneys from the Federal Public DefenderÆs Office representing Garcia
did not immediately respond to CNBCÆs request for comment on the sentence.

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/12/03/florida-prison-sentence-ponzi-scheme- business.html


--
November 5, 2024 - Congratulations President Donald Trump. We look
forward to America being great again.

The disease known as Kamala Harris has been effectively treated and
eradicated.

We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.

Durham Report: The FBI has an integrity problem. It has none.

Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
fiasco, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.

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