Audrey Strauss (U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York) announced today that Brent Borland, principal and owner of a New York-based fund called the Belize Infrastructure Fund I LLC (“Belize Fund”) has been terminated. Manhattan federal court sentenced BORLAND to 84 months imprisonment for arranging a $26,000,000 investment fraud scheme against investors. BORLAND pleaded guilty to conspiracy and committing securities fraud before District Judge Katherine Polk Failla. She was sentenced today.
U.S. attorney Strauss Manhattan stated that Brent Borland ran a multi-year scheme to bilk victims of more than $26,000,000 for a total of one year. Borland used lies and deceit to entrust his hard-earned money to more than 40 investors. Borland made false promises to investors and spent most of the money on himself. Borland will spend seven years in prison due to the financial and emotional damage he caused.
According to the Complaint and indictment, sentence statements were made:
BORLAND received $26.1 million from 40 investors between 2014 and March 2018. This was based on the representation that it would use investors’ money to build an airport at Belize. BORLAND promised investors a high rate of return for their investments. He called it “bridge financing”. BORLAND informed investors that investments in Belize would be fully protected by Belize property, which had no obligation or numbering.
However, BORLAND took millions of dollars from investor funds and used them for its own gain. BORLAND used large amounts of the victim’s funds to pay for personal expenses such as his mortgage payments, credit card bills, and beach club membership fees. He also paid for private school tuition for his children. . All of the investors who were identified in the scheme lost money, contrary to BORLAND’s claims that they would be able to earn high returns within a certain time period. BORLAND claimed that investments would be secured with property. However, the collateral Borland claimed was the property was unduly pledged by multiple investors. In some cases, Borland reported that the property was not in fact present in the manner Borland identified in documents that he provided to investors.
BORLAND, 51 of West Palm Beach (Florida), was sentenced to three years supervised release. He was also ordered to forfeit $26,584,970 and to reinstate $26,184,970.
Ms. Strauss praised U.S. Job Inspection Service’s investigative work. Ms. Strauss thanked the Securities and Exchange Commission for bringing a separate civil action.
The Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force of the Office is handling this case. The prosecution is being led by Edward Imperatore and Negar Tekeei, Assistant U.S. Solicitors.
