An Essex woman Edith Pardo (age 68) and her Canadian crime partner Boaz Manor (Age 46) were arrested by the FBI, under the accusation of her alleged involvement in a scam of $30 million orchestrated by Manor.

Both were charged under Wire and Securities fraud and conspiracy charges by US Attorney Craig Carpenito. Additionally, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Friday filed a civil complaint against both the crime partners.

How the Fraud was Orchestrated?

The main accused Boaz Manor who was convicted criminal in Canada, founded a firm in 2017 called CG Blockchain Inc. Manor raised most of the seed money from his close family member. He further partnered with Pardo to hide the source of the seed money. Edith Pardo, his crime aide disguised herself as an affluent investor, who financed seed money to CG blockchain Inc.

Manor then developed a product called Compliance Guard under the CG Blockchain which was a blockchain-based auditing tool to protect the pensioner’s funds and their investments.

CJ Blockchain offered initial coin offering (ICOs) and begin promoting a new product called Blockchain Terminal that permitted financial Institutions and hedge funds to trade cryptocurrencies.

The ICO token was aggressively marketed to potential investors under false information. Pardo and Manor duped the investors by misleading them that the 20 hedge funds were using Compliance Guard and each one was paying CG Blockchain a $1million annual fees. Within a year, the company accumulated $30 million from the ICOs.

While raising capital for CG Blockchain, Manor concealed his true identity and criminal past record from investors and other business associates and used false identity as Shaun McDonald and disguised himself. He also had changed his look to deceive the investors.

A group of his company employees from Hong Kong got suspicious of his past when their regular salaries were discontinued. They managed to trace his past record from some photo images on Facebook.

When confronted by an investor, Manor admitted that he had concealed his identity and criminal activities to maintain the reputation of his new ICO venture. 

Boaz Manors past criminal record

In 2005 Boaz Manor was involved in $730 million hedge fund fraud in Canada. He was then accused of having offshore accounts, smuggling of diamonds and investments. Before returning to the US, he was a fugitive for almost 2 years in Canada. He was imprisoned for four years and was banned in the capital markets of the province.

Future Action by the Court

FBI has arrested Pardo on Friday 17, 2020, and she will be produced before the US Magistrate Jude Steven in Newark Federal Court on next Friday 24.

Both the criminals might be imprisoned for 20 years long with a maximum penalty of $250,000, or twice the gross profit or loss from the offense.

#ComplianceGuard #CJBlockchainInc #Blockchain #ICO #SEC #FBI #NewarkFederalCourt 

Jayashree Ingle

CBW - External Analyst

INDIA