The former host of a popular Persian-language financial radio talk show has been indicted on charges that he defrauded investors -- including some of his show?s listeners -- in a long-running Ponzi scheme. John Farahi hosted a Persian-language financial program on KIRN. He's been indicted on charges that he defrauded investors -- including KIRN listeners -- out of $20 million.
Farahi is accused of falsely promising clients of his company, New Point Financial Services, that he would invest their money in corporate bonds insured by TARP, the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program. The feds say Farahi spent the money on personal items, paid returns to early investors, otherwise known as a ponzi scheme and lost millions of dollars on options trades he made.
According to the indictment handed down by a federal grand jury Wednesday, the alleged scheme ran from 2005 until 2010. Farahi hosted a daily financial talk show, ?Economy Today,? for about eight years on KIRN-AM. In 2010 the SECommission filed a lawsuit that accused him of defrauding New Point investors and that was the end of his program. Farahi?s former attorney was also charged, accused of conspiring with Farahi to obstruct an SEC investigation of the fraud scheme.
From 2005 until early 2010, Farahi ran the Beverly Hills-based New Point Financial Services, which he used to sell more than $20 million worth of investment instruments?which he called debentures?to more than 100 investors, most of whom are members of the Southland?s Iranian-Jewish community. Farahi attracted many of the investors through his daily radio show in which he touted a conservative investment philosophy. When Farahi met with investors he falsely told them New Point Financial Services invested in low-risk investments like certificates of deposit, TARP-backed corporate bonds, and deeds of trust backed by substantial amounts of borrower equity.
Read the FBI report HERE
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