A former Royal Alliance Associates broker and the firm have been ordered to pay a total of more than $4 million by a Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration panel for stealing money from an elderly women client who suffers from a brain injury, according to Jonathan Kurta, a New York City lawyer representing the client.
The Finra arbitrators ordered former broker Gary Basralian of Springfield, N.J., and Royal Alliance to pay $2.1 million each, plus $500,000 each in attorney’ fees, for stealing money invested with him by Cathy Carter, a resident of Manchester, N.H. Part of the invested money was from a settlement she received for injuries from the car accident that caused the injuries, the settlement said.
Two other hearings before Finra, involving other victims, are scheduled for later this year. Most of the victims, all women, are widows and suffer from some debilitating disease or injury, Kurta said. The cases involve several million dollars in lost funds and stretch back as far as 2003, he said.
Basralian resigned from Royal Alliance in 2017 and was barred from the industry by Finra last March. He pled guilty in federal district court in Newark, N.J. to wire fraud and investment advisor fraud in August and awaits sentencing.
Basralian used money that he was supposed to be investing for his clients for himself. When asked by one victim why her account had diminished in value, Basralian sent the victim a phony spreadsheet showing that the money was being invested as loans to various companies and would be paid back with interest, according to the U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey.
Kurta said in an email, “Ms. Carter is extremely pleased with the arbitration panel’s decision. She was victimized by a Royal Alliance supervisor and branch manager who will likely spend the rest of his life behind bars for the crimes he committed.”
Advisor Group, the parent company for Royal Alliance, had not returned an email requesting comment as of the time of publication and a Royal Alliance attorney had not returned a phone call.