A former Raleigh, N.C., investment advisor who was sentenced in 2019 to 40 years in prison for running a Ponzi scheme that swindled $10 million from investors has lost his appeal to reverse the ruling, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of North Carolina.

Stephen Condon Peters, 47, who operated VisionQuest Wealth Management and two other VisionQuest entities (VisionQuest Capital, LLC and VQ Wealth, LLC), also is liable for paying more than $15 million in restitution and forfeiting assets.

“For years now, the many victims of former investment advisor Stephen Peters have been holding their breath, waiting for any kind of news about the outcome of his appeal, so that they can move on with their lives. Today I am pleased to report that the appeal is over. There were no dissenting votes,” Acting U.S. Attorney G. Norman Acker, III, who made the announcement following the issuance of the judgment and opinion by the appellate court, said in a statement.

“Stephen Peters will serve the 40 years imposed upon him. With this result, this office can now resume its efforts to liquidate assets and return them to victims as quickly as possible,” he added.

Peters, according to the court, “used misrepresentations and omissions of material fact” to carry out a Ponzi scheme by selling about $10.1 million in promissory notes issued by his VQ Capital entity to at least 60 investors. The fraud took place between at least Apri1 2012 and June 2017, the court said. Investors were told that the notes had five-year terms and provided for payment of annual interest of 8% if paid quarterly, or 9% if the noteholder elected to receive a lump-sum payment of principal and interest at the end of the term. Peters also lied that the notes had little or no risk of loss and that they were “guaranteed.”

Most of the money Peters raised was used for his own benefit or to pay interest to, or redeem, earlier investors, the court said. He used $4.4 million to remodel his residence, buy a farm property called the Whispering Hope Farm near Gastonia, N.C., purchase fine art for his personal residence and build a vacation home in Costa Rica. He used at least another $4.9 million or so to make interest and principal payments to earlier investors.

Peters was convicted in federal prison in a week-long trial in 2019 on charges of investment advisor fraud, fraud in the sale of unregistered securities, wire fraud, conducting monetary transactions in criminally derived property, and aggravated identity theft.

“The evidence showed that Peters, in his role as a registered investment advisor, defrauded his numerous clients by steering them into investments in which Peters had a direct financial interest. He then compounded his crimes by attempting to defraud the SEC with false documents and statements,” the release said, adding that the sentencing judge referred to the crimes Peters committed as “breathtaking,” that were proven with a “tsunami of evidence.”

"In issuing its 40-year sentence, the court also pointed out that Peters 'quadrupled down' on the crime by, among other things, perjuring himself at trial,” the release said.