WEST PALM BEACH, FL (HEDGECO.NET) – Hedge fund manager, Kirk Wright was arrested last week in Florida after eluding authorities for nearly three months. Wright and his company collected as much as$185 million from at least 500 investors since 1997 and misled some of them to believe the value of those investments was increasing using false statements and documents.
But U.S. Magistrate Stephen Brown in Miami denied the government’s request for pretrial detention on a mail fraud charge Tuesday and ordered a $1 million corporate surety bond. But before the bond is granted, Wright must prove the collateral backing the bond comes from legitimate sources.
Wright’s Miami attorney, Marc David Seitles, said he had begun the process of satisfying the magistrate’s conditions to post bond. The U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, which has jurisdiction in the case because Wright and his International Management Associates firm are based in Marietta, appealed the bond order to U.S. District Court Judge Beverly Martin in Atlanta.
“We believe Mr. Wright needs to be detained pending trial, and so we are appealing the Florida magistrate judge’s decision,†U.S. Attorney David Nahmias of Atlanta said in a statement.
The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a federal lawsuit Feb. 27 against Wright and his company. Wright faces five counts of fraud. A civil complaint also was filed in Georgia state court on Feb. 17.
Among the clients Wright allegedly deceived, authorities said, are former Denver Broncos Terrell Davis, Steve Atwater, Rod Smith, Ray Crockett, Blaine Bishop and Al Smith, as well as former longtime Philadelphia Eagles player Clyde Simmons.
When several investors demanded brokerage account statements from hedge funds in October, Wright produced statements he said were from online brokerage Ameritrade, showing over $155 million in securities from four accounts, SEC investigators claim in court documents. Three of the accounts did not exist and the fourth was not held by any of those investors.
Alex Akesson
Contributing Writer
HedgeCo.Net
Email: Editor@hedgeco.net
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