According to the plea agreement, Wasendorf started stealing from Peregrine in the early 1990s, covering his theft by altering statements received from the firm's bank, then passing them to the company's chief financial officer and accountants.
"Defendant used the stolen money to unlawfully bolster the apparent financial position of PGF, fund defendant's outside business interests and for defendant's own personal use and purposes," according to the plea document.
Italian Restaurant
Among those businesses were an Italian restaurant, a publishing company and a construction firm.
Peregrine filed for liquidation in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Chicago on July 10, hours after the firm and Wasendorf were accused of stealing from customers in a lawsuit filed by the CFTC.
Liquidating trustee Ira Bodenstein has asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Carol Doyle to approve a plan to make an interim payment of $123 million to holders of the firm's 17,000 futures accounts.
"There will not be a 100 percent return of anybody's investment in Peregrine," Bodenstein said at a Sept. 10 meeting of creditors. "That is a certainty."
A receiver for Wasendorf's assets has been appointed in the CFTC-filed suit.
Suicide Attempt
Preparing for his suicide attempt, which was interrupted when passersby spotted him in his car, Wasendorf typed separate notes to his son, Peregrine president Russell Wasendorf Jr., and his wife of nine days then, Nancy Paladino.
"To my wonderful son, Russ," he wrote, "by the time you read this I will have taken my own life. I beg for your forgiveness. I have written my final confession that will be discovered with my body."
"I know you'll start second-guessing yourself, thinking back on some of the subtle signals I may be up to something," he told his son. "Your mistake was that you trusted your father, nothing more."