A former investment broker who made false statements to banks, defrauded investors, and evaded taxes pled guilty today to eight felony offenses in federal court in Cedar Rapids.
Randy Beltramea, age 49, from Marion, Iowa, was convicted of two counts of wire fraud, two counts of making false statements to financial institutions, two counts of money laundering, one count of aggravated identity theft, and one count of tax evasion.
In a plea agreement, Beltramea admitted that in 2009 and 2010, he devised a scheme to defraud former investors by soliciting money from them under false pretenses. In particular, Beltramea admitted telling former investors that their money was to be invested in Subway sandwich shop restaurants, when he actually intended to, and did, use their money in his own real estate investment and for his own personal expenses. In connection with soliciting money from one of the investors, Belramea provided the investor with a promissory note on which he forged the signature of another person who was involved in buying a Subway restaurant. In fact, that other person did not give Beltramea permission to use or sign his name to the promissory note. Beltramea also admitted that he moved some of the proceeds from the fraud into a bank account under his mother’s name for the purpose of trying to hide the source of the money and in an effort to evade taxes. The IRS had previously imposed a tax lien in excess of $320,000 against Beltramea because he had not filed tax returns or paid taxes since 2001. Finally, Belramea admitted that he obtained loans and loan extensions from two banks by providing them with false financial statements and with tax returns he falsely represented had been filed with the IRS.
Sentencing before United States District Court Chief Judge Linda R. Reade will be set after a presentence report is prepared. Beltramea remains free on bond previously set pending sentencing.
Beltramea faces a mandatory minimum sentence of two years’ imprisonment and a possible maximum sentence of 137 years’ imprisonment, a $3,750,000 fine, $800 in special assessments, and 28 years of supervised release following any imprisonment.
The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney C.J. Williams and was investigated by the Internal Revenue Service.
Court file information is available at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl. The case file number is 13-20-LRR.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
