The Securities and Exchange Commission today filed a complaint against Brady Speers, Chatree “Ben” Thiranon, and GHAP, LLC d/b/a Blue Star Texas (“Blue Star”) for running a fraudulent house-flipping scheme that raised almost $8 million from 40 investors through the unregistered sale of promissory notes. Speers, Thiranon, and Blue Star represented that they would use investor funds to buy, renovate, and sell residential properties. The SEC’s complaint alleges, however, that the defendants misused more than $2.9 million of investor funds to pay personal expenses and to make Ponzi-like payments.
According to the SEC’s complaint, Speers, Thiranon, and Blue Star, a company they owned and controlled, raised funds by misrepresenting and omitting material information. The SEC’s complaint alleges that Blue Star told investors that their funds were secured by property interests in the real estate assets underlying the investments, when in reality Blue Star only secured investor interests in isolated instances and sometimes never even held title to the properties at issue. The SEC also alleges that Blue Star rolled over investor funds to other projects without required authorization. Additionally, the complaint alleges that Blue Star touted Speers’s business experience and background without also disclosing that the SEC charged him with violations of the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws in 2015 and that he filed for personal bankruptcy on two separate occasions.
Source: SEC Charges Recidivist and Others in Real Estate Offering Fraud
