[h=3]By DANIEL GILBERT[/h]HOUSTON—R. Allen Stanford, the once-highflying financier convicted of masterminding a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, was sentenced Thursday to 110 years in federal prison.
The punishment amounts to an effective life sentence for Mr. Stanford, who is 62 years old and used to live extravagantly aboard yachts, jets and homes around the world.
ReutersConvicted financier Allen Stanford arrives at federal court in Houston for sentencing Thursday.
"I didn't run a Ponzi scheme, I didn't defraud anybody, and there was never any intent to defraud anybody," Mr. Stanford, wearing a green prison jumpsuit, told U.S. District Court Judge David Hittner before he was sentenced.
In a rambling statement, marked with long pauses as he choked up and wiped away tears, Mr. Stanford accused the government of using "Gestapo tactics" and blamed it for the billions of dollars in losses to his investors.
Mr. Stanford's sentence was 40 years less than the prison term given to Bernard Madoff, but 100 years more than his lawyers had asked for.
The sentence ends the three-year criminal prosecution of Mr. Stanford, who in March was convicted by a federal jury on 13 of 14 counts including fraud, obstructing investigators and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Though investors continue to seek hundreds of millions of dollars from Mr. Stanford in a civil proceeding, the end of the criminal case closes a chapter on one of the most flamboyant figures in the annals of white-collar crime.
Mr. Stanford, a native of Mexia, Texas, rose from owning a gym to controlling an empire that included banks, airlines and the largest newspaper on the Caribbean island of Antigua. It was there that Mr. Stanford based his Stanford International Bank, and where he became one of the largest employers and was knighted in 2006.
For two decades, Mr. Stanford enjoyed the rarefied life of a billionaire, ferrying tailors, bottles of artesian water and exotic fish on his private jets to homes in Miami and St. Croix, according to the U.S. government. He became internationally known as a benefactor of the sport of cricket, and in 2008, Forbes magazine ranked him as the 205th richest American, with a net worth of $2.2 billion.
But that wealth was illegally taken from his clients, according to prosecutors, who accused him of running a "massive, international criminal organization masquerading as a bank."
In 2009, U.S. attorneys charged Mr. Stanford with swindling investors by selling them certificates of deposit through the bank he controlled in Antigua and telling them the money would be invested in stocks and bonds. Instead, prosecutors alleged, he funneled $2 billion of their principal into risky real-estate ventures and his own businesses.
To cover up the scheme, prosecutors said, he bribed an Antiguan regulator and an outside auditor.
[h=3]Related Reading[/h]Prison Beating Clouds Stanford Trial (Jan. 21, 2012)
[h=3]R. Allen Stanford's Emails From Prison[/h]In emails, Mr. Stanford told family members and his former fiancée how his perspective on life changed, as well as the effects of a beating and subsequent medication he got for his injuries.
[h=3]Court Battle[/h]Review court documents relating to whether R. Allen Stanford was fit to stand trial after a beating in prison.
Mr. Stanford didn't testify at his monthlong criminal trial earlier this year. His lawyers portrayed him as an absentee chief executive who entrusted the business to his chief financial officer, James Davis. Mr. Davis pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiring to obstruct a federal proceeding, and testified against his former boss.
On Thursday, Mr. Stanford's lawyers repeatedly maintained that he didn't engage in a Ponzi scheme but made actual investments in businesses and was ruined when the government froze his assets. Prosecutors countered that it was a "blatant Ponzi scheme," predicated on his ability to obtain more deposits and that his business collapsed when he couldn't.
After his arrest, Mr. Stanford claimed that head trauma from a prison beating he suffered in September 2009 impaired his memory. Judge Hittner initially found him incompetent to stand trial because of his addiction to his prescribed painkillers, but in December 2011 endorsed a forensic and psychiatric report finding that Mr. Stanford had exaggerated his impairment and found him competent.
Write to Daniel Gilbert at [email protected]
The punishment amounts to an effective life sentence for Mr. Stanford, who is 62 years old and used to live extravagantly aboard yachts, jets and homes around the world.
ReutersConvicted financier Allen Stanford arrives at federal court in Houston for sentencing Thursday.
"I didn't run a Ponzi scheme, I didn't defraud anybody, and there was never any intent to defraud anybody," Mr. Stanford, wearing a green prison jumpsuit, told U.S. District Court Judge David Hittner before he was sentenced.
In a rambling statement, marked with long pauses as he choked up and wiped away tears, Mr. Stanford accused the government of using "Gestapo tactics" and blamed it for the billions of dollars in losses to his investors.
Mr. Stanford's sentence was 40 years less than the prison term given to Bernard Madoff, but 100 years more than his lawyers had asked for.
The sentence ends the three-year criminal prosecution of Mr. Stanford, who in March was convicted by a federal jury on 13 of 14 counts including fraud, obstructing investigators and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Though investors continue to seek hundreds of millions of dollars from Mr. Stanford in a civil proceeding, the end of the criminal case closes a chapter on one of the most flamboyant figures in the annals of white-collar crime.
Mr. Stanford, a native of Mexia, Texas, rose from owning a gym to controlling an empire that included banks, airlines and the largest newspaper on the Caribbean island of Antigua. It was there that Mr. Stanford based his Stanford International Bank, and where he became one of the largest employers and was knighted in 2006.
For two decades, Mr. Stanford enjoyed the rarefied life of a billionaire, ferrying tailors, bottles of artesian water and exotic fish on his private jets to homes in Miami and St. Croix, according to the U.S. government. He became internationally known as a benefactor of the sport of cricket, and in 2008, Forbes magazine ranked him as the 205th richest American, with a net worth of $2.2 billion.
But that wealth was illegally taken from his clients, according to prosecutors, who accused him of running a "massive, international criminal organization masquerading as a bank."
In 2009, U.S. attorneys charged Mr. Stanford with swindling investors by selling them certificates of deposit through the bank he controlled in Antigua and telling them the money would be invested in stocks and bonds. Instead, prosecutors alleged, he funneled $2 billion of their principal into risky real-estate ventures and his own businesses.
To cover up the scheme, prosecutors said, he bribed an Antiguan regulator and an outside auditor.
[h=3]Related Reading[/h]Prison Beating Clouds Stanford Trial (Jan. 21, 2012)
[h=3]R. Allen Stanford's Emails From Prison[/h]In emails, Mr. Stanford told family members and his former fiancée how his perspective on life changed, as well as the effects of a beating and subsequent medication he got for his injuries.
[h=3]Court Battle[/h]Review court documents relating to whether R. Allen Stanford was fit to stand trial after a beating in prison.
Mr. Stanford didn't testify at his monthlong criminal trial earlier this year. His lawyers portrayed him as an absentee chief executive who entrusted the business to his chief financial officer, James Davis. Mr. Davis pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiring to obstruct a federal proceeding, and testified against his former boss.
On Thursday, Mr. Stanford's lawyers repeatedly maintained that he didn't engage in a Ponzi scheme but made actual investments in businesses and was ruined when the government froze his assets. Prosecutors countered that it was a "blatant Ponzi scheme," predicated on his ability to obtain more deposits and that his business collapsed when he couldn't.
After his arrest, Mr. Stanford claimed that head trauma from a prison beating he suffered in September 2009 impaired his memory. Judge Hittner initially found him incompetent to stand trial because of his addiction to his prescribed painkillers, but in December 2011 endorsed a forensic and psychiatric report finding that Mr. Stanford had exaggerated his impairment and found him competent.
Write to Daniel Gilbert at [email protected]