(Council Bluffs, IA) -- A judge has ordered a western Iowa man to serve prison time and pay $1.3 million dollars in restitution to his former clients. Court documents state 53-year-old Jeffrey Carley, formerly of Treynor, in Pottawattamie County, encouraged clients to move money from traditional I-R-A accounts to investments that Carley owned. He then used the funds for his personal expenses. Carley's been sentenced to five years in prison. He's also been ordered to serve three years of supervised release after his prison term.
Carley pleaded guilty to Wire Fraud on October 22, 2021.
Court documents state Carley was a financial investment counselor and he owned or had an ownership interest in Carley Financial Group, Prosperity Partners, and Main Street Solutions. Investigators say between 2013 and December of 2020, Carley encouraged his clients to move money from their traditional IRA accounts to a “self-directed” IRA.
Carley then advised his clients to move their money from the “self-directed” IRA to investment opportunities Carley owned or had ownership interest in and advised clients they would receive a financial return. Carley never told his clients that he owned or had an interest in the investments he represented to them as solid investments. Carley also failed to invest the clients’ money and instead used the funds for his personal expenses.
“The defendant…has destroyed the savings of people that trusted him and there is no way to quantify the damage the defendant did to the emotional security of those he stole from. Making this crime even more egregious, it appears, although one cannot be sure, that the defendant flitted away all the money he stole for personal purposes, leaving nothing available to repay the victims,” wrote Assistant United States Attorney Richard E. Rothrock in the government’s sentencing brief.
The sentencing judge noted the length of time the scheme lasted and the harm and age of the victims as some of the aggravating factors in this case she considered in determining the five-year sentence.