The Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday charged more than a dozen penny-stock promoters in a series of alleged kickback schemes to manipulate the volume and price of microcap stocks and illegally generate stock sales.
One of the schemes was allegedly perpetrated by Larry Wilcox, perhaps best known as Officer Jonathan "Jon" Baker on the 30-year-old television show "CHiPs."
According to the SEC's complaints filed in federal court in Florida, the schemes generally involved the payment of kickbacks to purportedly corrupt pension fund managers or stockbrokers, who would use their clients' accounts to purchase the publicly traded stock of microcap issuers controlled or promoted by the individuals or companies charged.
What the promoters and insiders didn't know, according to the SEC, was that the people with whom they arranged the illegal transactions were actually undercover Federal Bureau of Investigation agents or confidential sources participating in undercover operations.
"These penny stock promoters paid illicit kickbacks to people who they thought would help them profit at the expense of unsuspecting investors by manipulating the price of their stock or fraudulently selling their shares," said Eric I. Bustillo, director of the SEC's Miami office.
The SEC alleges Wilcox, who lives in West Hills, Calif., perpetrated interrelated kickback schemes with two other penny stock company executives. Dow Jones Newswires
