Diario Horizonte - VENEZUELAN ACCOUNTANT SENTENCED TO 14 MONTHS IN FEDERAL PRISON FOR OBSTRUCTING SEC INVESTIGATION

David B. Fein, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that JUAN CARLOS GUILLEN ZERPA, 44, a citizen of Venezuela, was sentenced today by United States District Judge Stefan R. Underhill in Bridgeport to 14 months of imprisonment, followed by two years of supervised release, for conspiring to obstruct a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigation of a Connecticut hedge fund advisor. GUILLEN also was ordered to pay a fine in the amount of $10,000.
�The U.S. Attorney�s Office, FBI and our Connecticut Securities, Commodities and Investor Fraud Task Force are committed to the aggressive investigation and prosecution of individuals who attempt to obstruct the SEC and its critically important mission of protecting investors and the integrity of American capital markets,� stated U.S. Attorney Fein.
According to court documents and statements made in court, Francisco Illarramendi of New Canaan, Conn. acted as an investment adviser to certain hedge funds. In approximately 2006, one hedge fund he advised lost millions of dollars of the money he was charged with investing. Rather than disclose to his investors the truth about the losses incurred, Illarramendi intentionally chose to conceal this information by engaging in a long-running scheme to defraud and mislead his investors, creditors and the SEC to prevent the truth about the losses from being discovered. As part of the scheme, Illarramendi and others created fraudulent documents, including a fictitious asset verification letter falsely representing that one of the hedge funds, the Short Term Liquidity Fund (�STLF�), had at least $275 million in credits as a result of outstanding loans, when Illarramendi and others knew it did not have any such credits.
GUILLEN is a resident and citizen of Venezuela who was the managing partner of a Venezuelan accounting firm associated with a major international accounting firm. In late 2010, GUILLEN agreed to prepare the asset verification letter that would falsely indicate that the STLF had made outstanding loans to Venezuelan companies. A co-conspirator, Juan Carlos Horna Napolitano, then worked with other persons to create a fraudulent list of loans and to incorporate this list in the asset verification letter to be signed by GUILLEN.
In approximately January 2011, GUILLEN executed the false asset verification letter and sent it by email ...

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