SEC Claims Jamaican Ran Ponzi Scam

MANHATTAN (CN) - Gedrey Thompson used his company, GTF Enterprises, to defraud "the Caribbean and African-American community in Brooklyn" of more than $800,000 in a Ponzi scheme, from which he swiped "hundreds of thousands of dollars for his personal use," the SEC claims in Federal Court.

Thompson, 37, who may be in Brooklyn or Virginia or Jamaica, ran and owned GTF, which was never registered to offer or trade any form of securities, the SEC says.

He was assisted by co-defendants Dean Lewis, 37, of Fairlawn, N.J.; and Sezzie Goodluck, 33, or Brooklyn, according to the complaint.

As is usual with Ponzi schemes, the defendants targeted unsophisticated investors "by promising lofty, but false, investment returns with guaranteed safety of principal," the SEC says. "Instead of using investors' money as promised, Thompson misappropriated hundreds of thousands of dollars for his personal use. Many GTF investors lost their life savings in the scheme."

The SEC seeks disgorgement and penalties, though it is unclear, from the complaint, whether the agency even knows where Thompson is.

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