A Salt Lake City attorney faces federal prices for defrauding purchasers of millions of bucks for much more than 10 yrs, using cash from the shoppers to fund what prosecutors referred to as a “lavish life style.”
Prosecutors allege that Calvin Curtis, an estate attorney, lied to clients and misrepresented or omitted information to divert cash from clients’ trusts for his particular takes advantage of — including to renovate his mansion in the 1100 East block of South Temple in Salt Lake City.
Curtis fraudulently diverted cash from at least 22 trusts, federal prosecutors reported in a U.S. District Court docket submitting, embezzling much more than $9.5 million considering the fact that 2008.
Curtis did not straight away return phone calls still left at his office, trying to get comment.
Mentioned as an example in the court submitting, in 2016, Curtis sold real estate belonging to a client — referred to as G.M. — for $9.2 million. He allegedly designed only $7.5 million accessible for the client’s treatment, and saved about $1.7 million for his own takes advantage of.
Curtis also is accused of lying to that client’s court-appointed conservator, Stagg Fiduciary Providers, at the very least three times, by supplying untrue accounting for the have faith in when he was individually applying money from the account.
He transferred cash from that client’s expense accounts to her trust accounts and then into his legislation agency account or his particular examining accounts at Wells Fargo financial institution, prosecutors stated.
Curtis “used proceeds to assistance a lavish life style with recurrent vacation, to buy tickets to basketball and football games, to give lavish gifts to others and to help operations of his law company,” court files condition.
Curtis is billed with 1 count of wire fraud and a single depend of revenue laundering for his alleged actions.
If convicted, Curtis will have to hand around his home and regulation office environment on South Temple — which has nine bedrooms and 8 comprehensive baths and is mentioned for sale for $2.5 million — as properly as any home that can be traced to the crimes, money for residence that simply cannot be transferred and substitute property allowed by legislation.
Stagg Fiduciary, on behalf of a 79-yr-old girl in excess of whom it is conservator, and the woman’s guardian, Guardian Advocate Companies, gained a lawsuit previous thirty day period from Curtis for these allegations. In that situation, Choose William Kendall purchased Curtis to pay out more than $12 million in damages. It is not obvious regardless of whether the G.M. mentioned in the criminal filing is the exact individual stated in the civil go well with.