{"id":84847,"date":"2023-05-24T02:04:02","date_gmt":"2023-05-24T06:04:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hedgeco.net\/news\/?p=84847"},"modified":"2023-05-24T01:55:26","modified_gmt":"2023-05-24T05:55:26","slug":"sec-shuts-down-weedgenics-60-million-cannabis-offering-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/05\/2023\/sec-shuts-down-weedgenics-60-million-cannabis-offering-fraud.html","title":{"rendered":"SEC Shuts Down WeedGenics $60 Million Cannabis Offering Fraud"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>(HedgeCo.Net) The Securities and Exchange Commission obtained an emergency order to halt an alleged ongoing offering fraud and Ponzi-like scheme by Integrated National Resources Inc. (INR), which does business as <strong>WeedGenics,<\/strong> and its owners, Rolf Max Hirschmann and Patrick Earl Williams, who have raised more than <strong>$60 million<\/strong> from investors to expand their cannabis operations, but have instead used the majority of funds to make <strong>$16.2 million<\/strong> in Ponzi-like payments and to enrich themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to the complaint, since at least June 2019, Hirschmann and Williams have promised investors they would use raised funds to expand WeedGenics facilities, which they guaranteed would produce up to 36 percent returns, but in reality Hirschmann and Williams never owned or operated any facilities\u2014it was all a sham. The complaint alleges that when Hirschmann and Williams received investors&#8217; funds, they transferred the money through multiple accounts to enrich others and for personal use such as entertainment, jewelry, luxury cars, and residential real estate. The complaint further alleges that in an attempt to avoid detection, Hirschmann, acting as the face of the company, used the fake name Max Bergmann the entire time he communicated with investors, while Williams, as Vice President of the company, worked behind the scenes while spending investor funds on his more public career as a rap musician known as \u201cBigRigBaby.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cRolf Hirschmann and Patrick Williams allegedly had no real company, no product, and no business, yet despite this, they promised investors everything and then delivered nothing,\u201d said Michele Wein Layne, Director of the SEC\u2019s Los Angeles Regional Office. \u201cThis action demonstrates that, despite the defendants\u2019 extensive efforts to avoid detection, the SEC has the ability to uncover fraud to protect investors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The court granted the SEC emergency relief against INR, Hirschmann, Williams, and several relief defendants, including a temporary restraining order, an order freezing their assets, and appointment of a temporary receiver over INR and the entity relief defendants. A hearing is scheduled for June 2, 2023 to consider whether to issue a preliminary injunction and appoint a permanent receiver.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The SEC\u2019s complaint charges the defendants with violating the antifraud provisions of the securities laws and seeks permanent injunctions, conduct-based injunctions, disgorgement with prejudgment interest, civil penalties, and officer and director bars. The SEC also seeks disgorgement with prejudgment interest from the named relief defendants.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(HedgeCo.Net) The Securities and Exchange Commission obtained an emergency order to halt an alleged ongoing offering fraud and Ponzi-like scheme by Integrated National Resources Inc. (INR), which does business as WeedGenics, and its owners, Rolf Max Hirschmann and Patrick Earl [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,3,16048,16047],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hedgeco-networks-press-releases","category-hedgeco-news","category-hedgecovest-news","category-insider-trading-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84847"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84848,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847\/revisions\/84848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hedgeco.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}