Court sentences hedge fund manager to more than seven year in prison in fraud case

A Connecticut man has been sentenced to seven years and four months in federal prison. He was involved in operating a multi-million dollar fraud scheme. He swindled his family members and friends by using that scheme. Several victims of the fraud scheme were from Chicago.

Alvin Wilkinson, the founder of Chicago Index Partners LP and Wilkinson Financial Opportunity Fund LP, convinced his friends, family members, and colleagues to invest in his funds. His fraud scheme swindled at least 30 individuals. According to the court documents, Wilkinson acquired $13.5 million through his fraud scheme. He convinced the victims to invest in his funds as he had a firm strategy to trade financial instruments.

Wilkinson also served as a director at the Chicago Board Options Exchange in the past. He convinced the victims that his trading strategy raised huge money regardless of the market conditions. Wilkinson did not use the acquired money in the trade of options and futures. According to the court documents, he spent the money on covering his personal expenses and paying earlier investors through the Ponzi-type payment.

The court documents revealed that he initiated the fraud scheme no later than 1999 and continued until 2016. Wilkinson pleaded guilty in the court via a written plea agreement. He admitted that he was involved in one count of wire fraud. Wilkinson was sentenced by Sharon Johnson Coleman, a US District Judge, on Thursday. Judge Coleman sentenced him to seven years and four months in federal prison. Judge Coleman also ordered him to pay $8.032 in restitution to the victims.

The sentence was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., the US attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and Emmerson Buie, Jr., the special agent-in-charge of the FBI’s Chicago office. Nicholas J. Eichenseer, an assistant US attorney, argued in the court, “Defendant was a fiduciary who was supposed to act in investors’ best interest at all times.”