- A federal court docket ordered William Koo Ichioka to pay $31 million in restitution and $5 million in financial penalties.
- A New York resident has been charged and ordered to pay a complete of $36 million for defrauding victims in a foreign exchange and crypto scheme.
A New York man is anticipated to pay a complete of $36 million to defrauded victims in a scheme involving foreign exchange and cryptocurrencies.
In a Sept. 20 press launch, the CFTC mentioned William Koo Ichioka, previously of San Francisco, can pay $31 million in restitution to victims of his fraudulent scheme and $5 million in civil financial penalties.
The high-quality was imposed by Decide Vince Chhabria of the U.S. District Court docket for the Northern District of California in an order issued on September 19.
The CFTC filed fees towards Ichioka in June 2023
The CFTC filed a civil enforcement motion towards Ichioka in June 2023. The costs associated to the fraudulent extortion and theft of greater than $21 million from greater than 100 commodity pool members. Ichioka pleaded responsible to the fees and agreed to the sentence.
The costs towards Ichioka associated to a 2018 scheme that lied to unsuspecting mutual fund members.
People claimed that traders would get a ten% return on their funds each 30 days. Nevertheless, this didn’t occur, and Ichioka commingled funds from the victims together with his personal cash, utilizing the funds for private bills similar to lease, jewellery, and luxurious automobiles.
“To cowl up his fraudulent exercise, Ichioka overstated the worth of the belongings he held by producing false monetary paperwork and submitting false account statements to members,” the CFTC mentioned in a information launch.
Parallel legal case
Ichioka additionally pleaded responsible to fees filed by the Justice Division in June 2023, with the case operating concurrently with the CFTC grievance. Costs included wire fraud, false tax returns and commodity fraud. For 5 counts, the court docket sentenced Ichioka to 48 months in jail.
He additionally obtained a 5-year supervised launch sentence. The court docket imposed a high-quality of $5 million and $31,330,715.86 in restitution.
On August 14, 2023, the court docket issued a everlasting injunction, prohibiting Ichioka from any future violations. It was additionally barred from buying and selling on CFTC-regulated markets or registering with the regulator.
In keeping with the CFTC, this order and financial penalty mark the tip of the CFTC's enforcement motion towards New York residents.
