Broker Guilty of Taking $500,000 From Client
A 65-year-old retired stockbroker was convicted Monday on federal charges that he siphoned nearly $500,000 from the stock accounts of Everett Reiten, an eccentric multimillionaire who spent much of his life in Long Beach before he died in Wisconsin last year at age 92.
A U.S. District Court jury found Willard R. Walls Jr. of Huntington Beach guilty of 12 counts of mail and securities fraud and interstate transportation of stolen property. Walls faces 18 months in prison, as well as substantial financial penalties.
Asst. U.S. Atty. Ronni MacLaren portrayed Walls as a man unable to resist the temptation of a $12-million stock account unused by an elderly client he hadn’t heard from in years. Reiten, a penny-pinching recluse who disliked revealing information about himself, left Long Beach in 1981 and fell out of touch with Walls in 1986. Defense attorney Charles Wehner argued that Walls was holding the money for Reiten.
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