Failed Day Trader Owes $7M to Defrauded Wife

(CN) - A Texas doctor owes his wife $7 million for losing her money on the stock market without her knowledge, a state appeals court ruled.

Though the ruling entitles Cathy Diane Lewis to restitution, it does not Marcus Kyle Free to deposit anything he earns above $4,000 per month.

The couple were married for 16 years when Free decided to take a break from practicing medicine and become a day trader of financial securities instead.

After Free told Lewis that he had successfully day-traded stocks in the past, Lewis, a nurse, contributed $200,000 from offshore bank accounts she owned before the marriage.

Free's previous successful trades turned out to be fraudulent inducement, and he lost the money, but he invested another $5.5 million from his wife's accounts by forging her signature and sending to a private post-office box.

In an attempt to reconcile with his family, Free agreed to a restitution agreement that would require him to deposit anything he makes above $4,000 per month.

But Lewis filed in suit in 2009 after Free apparently defaulted on the agreement.

A Nueces County judge ruled that Lewis was entitled to $7 million and specific performance of the restitution agreement.

The Corpus Christi-based 13th District Court of Appeals upheld the financial award, but not the method of collection on Aug. 9.

"Enforcement of this decree would unquestionably require constant supervision by the trial court over an indeterminate number of years or decades," Justice Dori Contreras Garza wrote for a three-member panel. "Present performance is not possible, and Lewis has identified no significant public interest compelling an order of specific performance; therefore, specific performance via injunction was improper."

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