The B.C. Securities Commission has permanently banned four B.C. residents and ordered them to pay $26 million in penalties and to return $16 million for operating a Ponzi scheme.
The BCSC found that Hal (Mike) Allan McLeod, David John Vaughan, Kenneth Robert McMordie (also known as Byrun Fox) and Dianne Sharon Rosiek violated securities laws when they fraudulently distributed securities and made misrepresentations through Manna Trading Corp Ltd., Manna Humanitarian Foundation, Legacy Capital Inc. and Legacy Trust Inc.
The panel found that McLeod created the Manna scheme and he expanded it with Vaughan's help and more aggressively expanded it with the assistance of McMordie and Rosiek.
The BCSC panel found that they all used investors' funds to enrich themselves before the scheme collapsed in 2007.
The group defrauded 800 investors who lost up to US$13 million.
The BCSC fined McLoed $8 million, and ordered Vaughan, Rosiek and McMordie to pay penalties of $6 million each. It also ordered the group to disgorge the $16 million the scheme obtained from investors.
All of them have been permanently banned from trading securities or exchange contracts and from being a manager or consultant in connection to the securities market. They are also prohibited from being a director or officer of any issuing company and from engaging in any investor relations activities.