Fake Hedge Fund Scammers Get 7 Years

(CN) - Two men who ran a fake hedge fund that scammed dozens of investors out of $7 million were sentenced to 7 years in prison by a Manhattan federal judge.

Igor Levin aka Tiger aka Trigger, and Yevgeny Shvartsshteyn pleaded guilty last year to fraud in operating A.R. Capital, a general partner of A.R. Capital Global Fund.

Levin and Shvartsshteyn and unnamed co-conspirators contacted investors through the mail and through cold calls in 2005 and 2006.

According to the bill of information, the men hyped A.R. Capital as a hedge fund that invested primarily in international real estate companies, oil, gas, and other commodities.

Those investments did not exist. Prosecutors said Levin and Shvartsshteyn wired $7 million of their victims' money to Ukrainian bank accounts. The SEC shut down the operation in September 2006.

U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein handed down an 87-month sentence to both men on Friday, and ordered them to forfeit $7 million in ill-gotten gains.

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