Another great story for gold cheats …

Gold firm owner sentenced in $29.5 million Ponzi scheme

By Jon Burstein, Sun-Sentinel

9:02 p.m. EST, November 18, 2011

The founder of a Lake Worth-based precious metals firm that was a front for a $29.5 million fraud was sentenced Friday to more than 12 years in prison.

Jamie Campany, the owner of the grandiose-sounding Global Bullion Exchange, took money from more than 1,400 customers nationwide who thought precious metals would be good to have in uncertain economic times. The firm told customers that the metals would be stored at secured locations until they wanted to sell.

But those metals were never bought, Campany admitted. Global Bullion Exchange was a Ponzi scheme, with old clients getting paid with new clients’ money.

Global Bullion Exchange often would run the addresses of potential customers through Google Earth to check the size of their homes, Campany told ABC’s “Nightline” last month. The bigger the home, the more money that could be squeezed out using high-pressure sales tactics, Campany said.
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Global Bullion Exchange was part of an explosion of precious metals firms that set up shop in Broward and Palm Beach counties, operating in what has been a largely unregulated niche of the precious metals industry. More than 45 firms opened locally between 2007 and last year, most offering gold, silver and palladium via heavily financed transactions.

A Sun-Sentinel investigation in March found that convicted felons and people with checkered regulatory histories were able to operate such businesses with little'if any'scrutiny. Nine precious metals firms in South Florida have left customers suffering total losses of more than $91 million, according to court records.

Campany, 48, apologized Friday in Fort Lauderdale federal court, calling what he did “wrong, selfish and irresponsible.” Since Global Bullion Exchange closed in December 2009, Campany has been cooperating with federal authorities, as well as attorneys trying to recover money for investors.

Campany, of Delray Beach, pleaded guilty in August to one count of mail fraud and one count of wire fraud. Under his plea deal, he faced at least 10 years in prison and up to 12 1/2 years.

U.S. District Judge James I. Cohn said the toughest possible sentence was warranted for the fraud that cost some investors their life’s savings.

“I think we must be the Ponzi scheme capital of the world here in South Florida,” Cohn said.

It’s unclear if Global Bullion Exchange clients will get any money back, said Daniel Stermer, the attorney tasked with trying to recover the funds. He has been filing lawsuits against people and businesses that had been affiliated with Global Bullion Exchange.

Stermer sued Campany in Miami-Dade Circuit Court, alleging Global Bullion Exchange sought out elderly customers. The majority of the firm’s 20 largest clients were senior citizens. One 87-year-old man lost $686,000 to the company before he died.

Christopher Bruno, Campany’s attorney, denied that Global Bullion Exchange targeted the elderly. The firm had its most success getting money from men who own small businesses, Bruno said.

Much of the money raised by Global Bullion Exchange went to the brokers working the phones. The company’s tax returns for 2007 show that 77 percent of the firm’s gross receipts went to brokers.

Even with Campany’s sentencing, some questions still remain involving Global Bullion Exchange, particularly what happened to $500,000 in silver bars. Campany has told deputies from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office that the day after Global Bullion Exchange shut down, the bars were stolen from an U-Haul he had parked along an unlit gravel road in Delray Beach.

Prior to forming Global Bullion Exchange, Campany ran two other precious metals firms'Barclay Trading Group and The Bullion Group Inc. Both were operated out of West Palm Beach.

Bruno argued Friday that his client resorted to running Global Bullion Exchange as a Ponzi scheme after he was ripped off by a Miami-based firm involved in financing the purchase of precious metals. By December 2009, Campany realized that he had evolved into a financial predator and voluntarily shut down the firm, Bruno said.

Campany then went to federal authorities on his own, admitting what he had done, Bruno said. Campany was arrested in June.

“There is simply no excuse for my actions,” Campany told Cohn.

The judge agreed.

“I have no sympathy for you, no sympathy at all,” Cohn told Campany. “My sympathy is with the victims.”

jburstein@tribune.com or 954-356-4491.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/breakingnews/fl-global-bullion-exchange-20111118%2c0%2c3291746.story