A Minnesota investment advisor and broker was this week sentenced to seven years in prison for defrauding clients of $2.3 million.
Isaiah Leslie Goodman of Maple Grove, Minn., pled guilty in U.S. District Court to one count of mail fraud in February. As the owner of Becoming Financial Group and Becoming Financial Advisory Services, he appropriated his clients’ funds for his own benefit after promising the clients they would be placed in secure vehicles and retirement accounts, the U.S. Attorney said.
Among other things, the 34-year-old Goodman used the money for personal and business expenses—including a hot tub, furniture, a cruise, fitness club memberships, a Ford Explorer and a Ford Expedition. He also remodeled his home in Maple Grove and constructed a $1.69 million home in Plymouth, Minn., prosecutors said. Goodman also moved money to a start-up business called MoneyVerbs, a financial app developer.
The DOJ says Goodman defrauded 23 clients out of approximately $2,335,797 from 2017 to November 2020. Clients were told that their money would be placed in secure savings and retirement funds, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota.
According to civil charges brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Becoming Financial’s investing materials told clients they would be invested in things like mutual funds, bonds, annuities, stocks, Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, non-U.S. securities, venture capital funds and private placements. Clients moved their money to bank accounts in Becoming Financial’s name and under Goodman’s control.
“During in-person sales pitches or through email messages and phone calls, Goodman provided clients with materially false and fraudulent information, including investment proposals and bogus online account information,” said the Department of Justice in a release announcing the sentence. “Goodman also misrepresented to clients that their funds would be returned to them upon request, when, in fact, Goodman either kept all of the money or provided investors with refunded payments that were late, incomplete, or both, or that were refunds actually funded by other clients’ money.
“To further his fraud and deceive his clients,” the SEC complaint said, “Goodman created, and provided to clients, fake account statements and computer screenshots purporting to show that their funds were appropriately invested and their accounts had appreciated in value. Goodman also made Ponzi-like payments to certain clients after receiving new investments from other clients.”
Goodman was affiliated with MML Investors Services, the Massachusetts Mutual subsidiary, from 2016 to 2018, according to BrokerCheck. Before that, he was with Northwestern Mutual Investment Services.
Goodman was also sentenced to three years of supervised release following the 84-month prison sentence. In February his attorney said to reporters that Goodman “takes full responsibility for his actions.”