Hunterdon man admits to role in $35 million Ponzi scheme tied to Trump-pardoned fraudster

A Readington man admitted Wednesday in Newark federal court to his role in conspiring with a twice-convicted fraudster to defraud investors of more than $35 million, U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger announced.

Christopher Anderson, 47, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud along with fellow conspirator Richard Curry, 36, of Northumberland, Pennsylvania.

Sentencing for Anderson is scheduled for Jan. 16, 2024, and for Curry, Jan. 18, 2024. They face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $5 million fine.

As part of the scheme, Anderson and Curry owned Tryon Management Group LLC with an address on Brooks Boulevard in Manville.

Anderson and Curry admitted conspiring with others, including Eliyahu “Eli” Weinstein, of Lakewood, whose 24-year federal prison sentence was commuted by President Donald Trump after being twice convicted of defrauding investors of a total of $230 million.

“These two defendants admitted scheming with Eli Weinstein and others to rip off investors to the tune of millions of dollars. They admitted that this scheme used phony identities and false promises of access to deals involving scarce medical supplies, baby formula, and first-aid kits supposedly destined for wartime Ukraine to defraud their victims," Sellinger said. "They will now face justice for their crimes, and we will continue to pursue the other alleged conspirators.”

Weinstein, Aryeh “Ari” Bromberg, Joel Wittels, Shlomo Erez, and Alaa Hattab were previously charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to obstruct justice based on allegations arising from the same scheme in which Anderson and Curry pleaded guilty on Wednesday. That complaint remains pending.

Beginning in or around November 2021, Weinstein, Bromberg, and Wittels raised money from investors for purported deals involving the purported purchase of medical supplies and other items, including baby formula, intended for shipment to Ukraine through Optimus Investments Inc. while concealing Weinstein’s identity, criminal history, and involvement from investors, court papers say.

Beginning in January 2022, Anderson and Curry allegedly began raising money for Optimus through Tryon Management Group LLC, and by August 2022, they joined the other defendants in actively concealing Weinstein’s role in the venture.

Weinstein, who used the alias of Mike Konig, had been out of prison on his prior convictions less than a year when the new scheme began.

By April 2022, when some of the purported Optimus deals proved to be unprofitable, Weinstein, Bromberg, Wittels, Curry and Anderson allegedly undertook a fraudulent scheme to use funds raised from investors to make Ponzi-like payments to earlier investors while mischaracterizing them as investment returns.

The scheme raised at least $38 million from at least 150 investors.

Most of the investors in Tryon were friends, relatives or close associates of Anderson and Curry.

According to the federal charges, Weinstein told Anderson and Curry that in return for the money Tryon was raising, Optimus would finance or purchase the medical supplies and then resell them to a third party for a profit, which would be split with Tryon.

As part of the scheme, Tryon provided investors with notes promising outsized returns, many of which had an interest rate of 48%, an additional equity returns between 2% and 10% and a full return of the investment within three to six months.

Tryon sent investors updates that touted "Mike Konig's" track record of brokering large contracts involving millions of units of COVID-19 medical supplies and other products.

According to the criminal complaint, investors gave money to Tryon based on these representations and concealed Weinstein's involvement in the deals and his criminal record.

Almost immediately after Tryon started transferring money to Optimus, the deals that Weinstein were purportedly making were not generating the promised returns and Tryon was unable to pay the monthly payments to investors.

And then, rather than revealing this information to investors, Anderson and Curry agreed with Weinstein, still posing as Mike Konig, to pool money from the investors and use it to make the monthly payments to the other investors in a classic Ponzi scheme, court documents say.

During 2022, Weinstein asked Anderson and Curry to raise money to finance the purchase and delivery of 3 million first aid kits to the people of Ukraine, a deal that would generate $84 million in profits. But, according to court papers, the entire deal was fake.

He also asked Tryon to raise money to finance the purchase of 100 million N95 masks and 29 shipping containers of baby formula.

But, court papers say, Weinstein used the $2.5 million raised for the masks to invest in the Turkish stock market and no baby formula was ever purchased.

On Aug. 26, 2022, Weinstein met Anderson, Curry and the others in a Branchburg hotel conference room where he admitted his true identity and confessed that the other deals were false.

Anderson, Curry and Tryon have also been named in at least 20 civil suits filed in Superior Court by investors looking for a return of their money.

Weinstein was convicted two times in New Jersey federal court for defrauding investors. His first case involved a real estate Ponzi scheme, and his second case stemmed from additional fraud Weinstein committed while on pretrial release. For these crimes, which resulted in combined losses to investors of approximately $230 million, Weinstein was sentenced to serve 24 years in prison, followed by three years of supervised release. Trump later commuted the sentence.

Email: mdeak@mycentraljersey.com

Mike Deak is a reporter for mycentraljersey.com. To get unlimited access to his articles on Somerset and Hunterdon counties, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: Hunterdon NJ man admits to role in $35 million Ponzi scheme