FBI Arrests Family Suspected of Bilking 2,000 in Metals Scam
The FBI said today that it has arrested a family wanted in California for allegedly running a precious-metals scam that bilked 2,000 investors of $8.5 million.
Agents said they found a semiautomatic weapon in the Miami Beach apartment used by the three, identified as Joel Herbert Fisch, 56, his wife, Joan, 55, and their son, Todd Evans Fisch, 25.
On Oct. 2, a federal grand jury in Los Angeles indicted the three on 32 mail-fraud counts, 14 wire-fraud counts and two counts of interstate transportation of proceeds of a fraud.
According to the indictment, Joel Fisch was chairman of First Trading Group Ltd., which in 1983 and 1984 had offices in the California cities of El Toro, Los Angeles, San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco. His wife and son were also officers in the company.
They sold precious-metals futures contracts to about 2,000 investors in the United States and Canada, costing investors $8.5 million, said William Wells, special agent in charge of the Miami FBI office.
They asked for a deposit from investors, then sent fraudulent documentation saying the money had been invested in the precious- metals market, Wells said.
In January, 1984, they learned they were under investigation and fled to Vancouver, Canada, taking large amounts of cash, precious metals and company records, the FBI said.
They then ran a similar operation under the name FTG British Columbia, ending it by mailing out false statements to victims telling them they had lost all the money in their accounts, according to investigators.
