Ponzi, Ponzi, Who’s Got the Ponzi?

PORTLAND, Ore. (CN) - The SEC filed three federal lawsuits accusing two men of long-running Ponzi schemes, and two attorneys of helping one of them do it.

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Yusaf Jawed ran a 10-year, $37 million Ponzi scheme through his Grifphon Asset Management and Grifphon Holdings, and in late 2009 attorney Robert Custis began helping him do, the SEC claims.

In a separate complaint, the SEC claims that attorney Jacques Nichols, "aided and abetted a long-running, multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme masterminded by Yusaf Jawed."

And in a third complaint, the SEC claims that Lyman Bruhn, 50, of Vancouver, Wash., ran Sasquatch Capital Management and Pearl Asset Management, supposed hedge funds, as a Ponzi scheme for years.

Both masterminds began their Ponzi when they suffered losses, and began using new money to pay off old investors, and themselves, the SEC says.

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