You Think You Know Someone … Until They Commit a Crime

Let’s say a crooked financial advisor approaches his/her mark and promises unrealistic returns on a investment. Thinking it’s too good to be true, the mark overrides critical thinking and dives right into the deal because the adviser appears to be on the up and up, and the mark trusts that the cash will come rolling into his/her bank account. While knowingly committing fraud, the financial advisor accepts the money and rather than investing a dime of it, places it in a bogus account and never invests the funds. When the mark begins to have questions down the road like, “Hey, what happened to my money?” or reads about the financial adviser’s arrest in the newspaper, he/she realizes they have been scammed. But how could he/she not know that the advisor had no intention of investing the money, and every intention of pocketing it for himself? Because he/she was made to feel that their was trust in the relationship. The advisor had a good reputation, was likeable, a family guy, active in his community, seemingly successful, and would give anyone the shirt off his back. Everybody was shocked when this great guy was arrested and sent to prison. Jeez, you think you know someone. (Too many of these types of incidents to list here)

Let’s say a small municipality learned after an audit that their bookkeeper, who had been employed as the town comptroller for twenty years, was found to have embezzled $53 million dollars over that time period, but flew under the radar because there had never been any reason to question her loyalty to the town or her accounting practices because the books always looked tip top and she was friendly and great at her job.

Before the comptroller was caught with her hand in the cookie jar, money had become extraordinarily scarce and the budget required laying off city workers, including slashing police budgets which left the town at risk. But nobody ever bothered to look at why money was drying up and they would only learn of the embezzlement after the comptroller was sent on a reluctant and long overdue vacation. She was of course arrested and later indicted. Everyone was shocked to learn about her double life; one as a mousey bookkeeper, and one as a flashy bedazzled and well known quarter horse breeder who had spent millions on her own folly. How could the city have missed $53 million dollars and the fact that the mousey bookkeeper was a well known horse breeder??? Jeez, you think you know someone. (Rita Cromwell’s story can be seen in the documentary “All the Queens Horses.)

Let’s say your family doctor, a stellar NYC practitioner with a highly respected reputation in the medical community, and whom who have relied upon for years to keep you and your neighbors alive, has just been indicted for receiving kickbacks from a pharma manufacturing company for pushing pills that are full of fentanyl. With each script, the good doctor pocketed cash and patients were shocked. Not only was the doctor indicted, but the entire pharma company was shut down and the CEO went to prison along with the doctor. By the way, the good doctor not only pushed street level pills, but one of his patients mistakenly overdosed and died. Jeez, you think you know somebody. (Gordan Freedman)

I could list a thousand other cases like these that produced as many victims. My point here is that it’s rare to spot a fraudster who by all appearances flies under the radar, no matter how much you have trusted that person in the past, even if it was FOR YEARS. After all, aren’t relationships made up of both personal verification and implicit trust? The truth is, fraudsters aren’t easy to spot because their cover is impeccable. Victims are duped for so long because they think they know who they are dealing with and because the person they trusted gave no evidence of being anything other than trustworthy.

Everyone feels terrible for victims of financial fraud. So why then, does the public see the spouse of a financial perp as an accomplice rather than a victim? Just as a fraudster gives no evidence of being a crook to their boss, coworkers or clients, they also give no indication of their nefarious dealings to their spouse. In the majority of cases, the innocent spouse doesn’t learn a crime has been committed unless and until a formal investigation is evident. In fact, innocent spouses are more shocked than anyone when they learn of his/her spouse’s financial fraud. This is the person they slept with, had children with, and trusted with their lives.

Innocent spouses and children are at the top of the list of stakeholders who are grossly affected by the dire fallout of occupational crimes. They are not only victims of a grave breach of familial and financial trust, they are also victims of a corrupt legal system’s lack of due process, and or, standing, when it comes to the inevitable civil asset seizure and forfeiture of an innocent spouse’s legal untainted portion of the marital estate. Even perps receive due process. “But she enjoyed the fruits of her perp husband’s crime, so she’s just as guilty!” This point of view may seem worthy from the outside, but as I have repeated time and again, perps don’t park their windfalls in the family bank account. And if they do, they always give a legitimate reason. After all, they’re good guys. Right?