CMG Holdings Group Inc (CMGO)

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THANKS: After reading these Glenn Laken related articles and documents all the Hudson Gray Inc. and LLC confusion makes perfect sense:

Chicago Trader Indicted In Fraud Sweep
June 15, 2000|By Kathy Bergen and Matt O'Connor, Tribune Staff Writers.

A Chicago futures trader and hedge fund manager with a history of disciplinary problems was among the 120 people caught up Wednesday in the largest federal sweep against securities fraud.

Glenn Bradley Laken, 46, a member of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and principal manager of the TradeVentureFund, faces racketeering, conspiracy, stock fraud and other charges after authorities accused him Wednesday of participating in two illegal investment schemes.

The sweep, resulting from a yearlong undercover investigation, resulted in numerous indictments and criminal complaints, alleging various violent crimes, stock manipulation and other activities that cost investors more than $50 million over five years.

In one of Laken's cases, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York alleged that a fraudulent investment deal was designed to defraud union pension funds involved in the TradeVentureFund hedge fund.

Laken is charged with making illegal kickbacks to union officials, including one with ties to an organized crime family, in exchange for them influencing their unions to invest in the fund, prosecutors said.

The kickbacks allegedly were to have been funded with excessive trading commissions, generated by churning commodities transactions, and through Laken's plan to invest the union pension funds in high-risk investments, prosecutors said.

In this scheme, he was charged with racketeering, conspiracy, wire fraud and illegal kickbacks, charges that can carry prison terms ranging from 3 to 20 years.

Laken voluntarily surrendered to authorities in Chicago after he was indicted Wednesday. He was later released on $50,000 cash bond following a brief appearance in U.S. District Court in Chicago.

His lawyer, Sheldon Zenner, emphasized that Laken, of Highland Park, is accused of being what he called "very much a bit player" in the charges.

"The allegations against him are wholly unrelated to any violent conduct or any connection to organized crime," Zenner said.

Laken was charged in a second incident in which he is alleged to have enlisted Web site operators, among others, to help fraudulently pump up the stock price of FinancialWeb.com, a stock in which he held a large position.

The stock of FinancialWeb.com, a Florida-based company purportedly in the business of creating and operating investment-related Internet services, trades on the OTC Bulletin Board, prosecutors said.

From February through June, prosecutors allege, Laken employed the services of individuals who controlled Web sites, as well as the publisher of a fraudulent newsletter, to promote the stock.

Prosecutors say he concealed that these individuals were paid to promote the stock and his involvement in the arrangement.

He was charged with conspiracy, stock fraud and wire fraud, which can carry terms ranging from 5 to 10 years.

Laken, a principal in three other Chicago companies, has faced disciplinary action before by the Merc.

In 1996, the Merc fined Laken $10,000 and suspended his floor trading privileges for five days after finding he had punched and severely injured another member in a trading pit. The other member was fined $5,000 for berating Laken and instigating the altercation.

And in 1990, the Merc fined him $30,000 and suspended him for 20 business days after the exchange's business-conduct committee found that he and a clearing firm employee had executed a prearranged sale of 10 Standard & Poor's 500 stock-index futures contracts.

Laken is manager of Lake Trading LLC, a commodity-trading adviser and fund operator, according to the National Futures Association. As well, he is president of Lake Futures Ltd., a commodity-trading adviser, and a floor broker and principal with D&G Futures Inc., a firm that solicits and accepts futures orders.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2000-06-15/business/0006150225_1_stock-fraud-wire-fraud-kickbacks

Two Convicted in Scheme to Bribe Union Bosses to Access Pension Funds
Submitted by Michael Nelson on Mon, 02/18/2002 - 01:00

A N.Y. stockbroker and a Chicago futures trader were convicted Feb. 13 of scheming to bribe union bosses to invest millions of dollars of pension fund money with a corrupt money manager. Stockbroker John M. Black, who authorities say was a Luchese organized crime family associate, and futures trader Glenn B. Laken were convicted today of racketeering, bribery and fraud. Among those whom they planned to bribe were bosses with the Annuity Fund of the N.Y.C. Police Detectives Endowment Ass'n, the independent Production Workers Local 400 in N.Y.C., and Int'l Union of Operating Engineers Local 137 in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y. The verdict was reached at the conclusion of a three-month trial before U.S. Dist. Judge William H. Pauley, III (S.D.N.Y., Clinton).

Federal prosecutors said Black, a principal in Grady & Hatch Co., and Laken, a principal in TradeVentureFund, worked with a mob-controlled investment bank in lower Manhattan, DMN Capital Inc., in planning illegal payoffs to union bosses. The goal was to induce pension fund managers to shift some $300 million in union pension funds to the control of a crooked investment adviser. Laken agreed to pay secret kickbacks to the principals of DMN Capital to raise money for TradeVentureFund on the understanding that the kickbacks would pay off union bosses for switching pension fund money to the corrupt hedge fund.

The two were indicted in June 2000 along with 118 others as part of the FBI's "Operation Uptick," which targeted mob influence on Wall Street. So far, 92 defendants have been convicted of various fraud schemes and another 17 cases are pending. The federal jury in Manhattan also acquitted three other men who were on trial with Black and Laken: Dallas-based real estate developers Gene Phillips and A. Cal Rossi as well as San Francisco-based investment strategist William M. Stephens. Of the 120 defendants charged, 11 have had the charges against them dismissed or were acquitted at trial. Black and Laken face up to 20 years in prison at their sentencing scheduled for May 31.

No bribes were ever paid, and the union money was never diverted to the other investments. Arrests were made before any union pension funds were squandered. Most of the evidence at trial against Stephens arose from 30 to 35 hours of taped conversations between the various defendants and Jeffrey Pokross, a government informant who ran a corrupt investment bank that had been infiltrated by the Gambino and Bonanno crime families, DMN Capital On the tapes played in court, Pokross made reference to bribing pension fund managers in conversations with Stephens. But Stephens, the only defendant to take the witness stand in his own defense, testified that he did not believe Pokross was serious and was merely going along with him to meet potential new clients. [Bloomberg News 2/13/02; Chi. Trib., Daily News (N.Y.C.), S.F. Chron. 2/14/02]

http://nlpc.org/stories/2002/02/18/two-convicted-scheme-bribe-union-bosses-access-pension-funds


United States of America, Appellee, v. Lionel Reifler, Glenn B. Laken, John M. Black, Jr., Defendants-appellants, 446 F.3d 65 (2d Cir. 2006)Annotate this Case
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit - 446 F.3d 65 (2d Cir. 2006)
Argued: April 22, 2005
Final briefs submitted: May 3, 2005
Decided: April 18, 2006


LAKEN: [ ] How many pieces of lead poisoned him?

http://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/446/65/554743/