New York, NYU.S. District Judge Richard Sullivan has sentenced noted philanthropist and technology investor Alberto Vilar to nine years in prison for stock fraud, ignoring the 69-year-old's pleas for a community service sentence.
Vilar, the co-founder of the investment advisory firm Amerindo, was convicted of 12 criminal counts of fraud ranging from wire fraud to money laundering in a 2008 trial. His partner and co-founder, Gary Tanaka, was handed a five-year sentence earlier in the year.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) had filed securities fraud charges against the company in 2005 for defrauding a customer out of as much as $5 million, according to AltAssets.com.
The SEC claims that the customer believed that she was investing in the Amerindo Venture Fund, when in actuality the money was being transferred to a brokerage fund, where Tanaka disbursed it between the two men. Vilar allegedly accepted more than $1 million of the money, donating more than $700,000 of it to schools and charities.
Amerindo collapsed shortly after the two men were arrested in 2005.
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