In Newark federal court this week, Jerrid Douglas was sentenced for his role in defrauding multiple victims through a $1 million “upfront-fee” scheme.

Last October, Douglas, 49, of Freehold, was convicted of wire fraud conspiracy and four counts of wire fraud following a five-week jury trial. U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Philip Sellinger announced July 26 that Douglas was sentenced by U.S. District Judge John Michael Vazquez to 45 months in prison.

Last month, two co-defendants, Roy Johannes Gillar, 51, of Las Vegas, and Harold Mignott, 60, of Voorhees, were sentenced (six years in prison for the former and three years for the latter) for their respective roles in the scheme. Prosecutors say that from March 2016 through June 2016, the three men, along with a fourth conspirator, defrauded the owners of a victim company of approximately $1 million.

“The defendants fraudulently induced the two victim company owners to enter a joint venture agreement with the defendants’ New Jersey-based shell company. The defendants falsely represented that their company could acquire and provide a ‘standby letter of credit’ (SBLC) backed by either 1 billion euros in cash or highly lucrative gold bonds,” according to case documents and trial evidence. “An SBLC is a guarantee of payment issued by a bank on behalf of a client that is used should the client fail to fulfill a contractual commitment with a third-party.”

Prosecutors add that the victim company wanted access to the SBLC so it could purchase raw gold overseas and sell it to gold refineries, and agreed to pay the defendants $1 million for the bank fee associated with the SBLC.

“In order to cover up the scheme and convince the victims to approve the transfer of the funds, the defendants made numerous verbal and written misrepresentations, including providing the victims with a phony letter from a major international bank saying that it was ready, willing, and able to provide a one-billion-euro SBLC to the defendants’ shell company,” according to prosecutors. “However, after the victim company owners transmitted $800,000 of the $1 million to the defendants, the defendants failed to provide the SBLC or anything of value. Instead, the defendants misappropriated the money for their personal use.”

Douglas was also sentenced to three years of supervised release, restitution of $1.1 million, and forfeiture of $44,750.

See also:

• Fraudster freed by Trump charged in new $35M scheme
• Celsius founder and former CEO arrested, charged with fraud
• South Jersey firefighters sentenced for role in health care fraud scheme
• Monmouth man charged with defrauding Gold Star families