Pair charged in investment scam
By Curtis Lum
Advertiser Staff Writer
A former Maui couple have been charged with conspiracy and wire fraud in connection with an investment scheme that may have bilked dozens of people out of a total of $5 million, the FBI said yesterday.
John L. Cerizo and Janeth Cerizo were charged in a federal complaint filed yesterday in U.S. District Court.
The Cerizos are accused of defrauding three Maui residents of $100,000, but the FBI said the scheme may have involved 75 victims and $5 million.
In an affidavit filed in court yesterday, FBI special agent Michael McDonald said the Cerizos are accused of establishing an account at the Hong Kong Shanghai Banking Corp. in the name of CT International, the company that the couple used in their investment scheme. The FBI began an investigation in August 2003 after several Maui residents complained about the Cerizos..
The scheme began in December 1999, McDonald said, when the Cerizos began soliciting investors to take part in a high-yield, low-risk overseas program. McDonald said that each investor received monthly "statements" and that some received wire transfers into their bank accounts representing a fraction of the return on their investment.
But in December 2001, John Cerizo told an investor that the money had been lost and claimed that others had defrauded him, McDonald said.
In July 2002, John Cerizo moved to the Philippines and four months later he was joined by his wife, the affidavit said. The couple kept in touch with investors and reassured them there was a way to recover their money, the document said.
One of the plans was to acquire "Morgenthau Bonds," which the Cerizos claimed were stored in a "secret location" in the Philippines since the end of World War II, McDonald said. "Morgenthau Bonds," according to the affidavit, is a "well-known fraud scheme claiming that millions of dollars in unredeemed bonds are hidden in the Philippines.
In a series of e-mails obtained by the FBI, John Cerizo chronicled dramatic attempts to recover the bonds. In one e-mail, the affidavit said, Cerizo wrote: "The commodities have arrived at its destination but for a price: two of our crew of seven died in the process."
In another e-mail, Cerizo said an "authenticator" hired by him said he was having trouble depositing the money because of security breaches.
"The people who are pursuing us are armed and dangerous, which is understandable since we are carrying 30 million in old currencies on us," Cerizo quoted the authenticator as saying.
When Cerizo became aware that he was under investigation by the FBI, he wrote to an investor that he "not give any information that would hurt me at this time," the affidavit said. "I am going to give all the money back, however if they intervene at this point, your payback will be delayed considerably by the bureaucracy involved."
The FBI declined further comment yesterday on the status of the case.
Reach Curtis Lum at 525-8025 or culum@honoluluadvertiser.com.
