The money was supposed to pay for two chemical and oil shipping tankers bought from a Hong Kong shipping firm. Instead Capser bought the tankers at $20 million apiece with the intention of leasing them back to the shipping company for $8,500 each per day. Other fake items were presented as collateral, including a phony $400 million proceeds from the sale of a fake cattle ranch. Capser used fake investment portfolios, fake emails and fake family emergencies — even going so far as to say his daughter had terminal cancer — to advance the schemes. "The defendant was so dedicated to his fraud that he was willing to use his young daughter as an instrument to accomplish it," prosecutors told the judge.

Source: Forbes December 09, 2021 17:10 UTC