Ephren Taylor II is sentenced to nearly 20 years in Ponzi scheme
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Tuesday, Jul 08, 2014
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Alleged Ponzi Schemer Connected to Bishop Eddie Long Arrested in Missouri
By Michael Gryboski
(Photo: CNBC)
Ephren Taylor, former CEO of holding company City Capital, in guest appearance on CNBC's Big Idea circa 2007.
June 18, 2014|12:28 pm
An alleged Ponzi schemer who was once endorsed by Bishop Eddie Long has been arrested by federal authorities in Missouri.
Ephren Taylor, formerly a financial advisor to megachurch congregations like Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Georgia, surrendered to authorities in Kansas City on Tuesday.
In a press release, the Department of Justice announced that the 31-year-old Taylor and a business partner are charged with "defrauding investors across the country of more than $5 million."
For years, Taylor went around the country speaking to churches as part of his "building wealth tour," which brought in large amounts of money for himself.
"Taylor crisscrossed the country touting wealth management seminars and followed-up with private meetings with interested investors," reported ABC News.
"Some congregants from some of the most prominent megachurches, including Bishop Eddie Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church and Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church in Texas, turned over their life savings to Taylor."
In October 2009, Bishop Long introduced his congregation to Taylor, whom he described as "my friend, my brother, the great Ephren Taylor."
Taylor pitched his "social capitalist" message to the large congregation and received many wiling investors into his endeavor.
Last year, Channel 2 Action News of Atlanta uncovered documentary evidence that Long had foreknowledge of Taylor's fraudulent activity.
"Court records show Long was warned about self-described 'social capitalist' Ephren Taylor more than a week before Long's parishioners were scammed out of more than a million dollars," reported Channel 2.
"In 2011, Long recorded a YouTube video, referring to Taylor as a "great man," and urging him to repay the congregants' money."
About a dozen New Birth Missionary members filed a lawsuit against Long, which set out to recover their financial losses.
In February, Long made with the suing members a confidential financial settlement wherein the plaintiffs received approximately $1 million.
"Bishop Long really did not guard his flock the way he should have," said Quinton Seay, an attorney who represented one of the fraud victims.
"Bishop Long was given a very explicit warning. Basically, he was told exactly what was going to happen, and it materialized."
After taking the money of the congregants, Taylor and his wife went on the run, at one point being spotted by a news team last August in Lenexa, Kansas.
Regarding the recent apprehension of Taylor, New Birth Missionary released a statement expressing hope that a resolution to the episode can soon be found.
"It has always been our prayer for a resolution to this matter in which many lost their investments. Our hearts go out to anyone who suffered losses, and we pray for healing," stated New Birth.
Source URL : Alleged Ponzi Schemer Connected to Bishop Eddie Long Arrested in Missouri
He ended up getting 20 years.
Ephren Taylor II is sentenced to nearly 20 years in Ponzi scheme
The son of a Johnson County preacher, Ephren Taylor II targeted African-American churchgoers, bilking more than 400 victims. Many lost their entire life savings. A judge also ordered him to pay $15.6 million in restitution to scam victims.
An Overland Park man was sentenced Tuesday to nearly 20 years in federal prison for defrauding hundreds of investors out of almost $16 million.
Ephren Taylor II, 32, pleaded guilty last fall to one count of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.
In addition to the sentence of 19 years and seven months, a judge in Atlanta sentenced Taylor to three years of supervised release following prison and ordered him to pay $15.6 million in restitution to scam victims.
The son of a Johnson County preacher, Taylor targeted African-American churchgoers, bilking more than 400 victims. Many lost their entire life savings, according to federal authorities who prosecuted the case.
“At churches across the country, he touted himself as a socially conscious investor,” John Horn, the acting U.S. attorney in Atlanta, said in a statement Tuesday, “but his investment opportunities were nothing but a Ponzi scheme designed to build his own personal wealth. This sentencing brings a measure of justice to those who remain devastated by his actions.”
An accomplice, Wendy Connor, was sentenced to five years in prison followed by three years of supervised release and was ordered to pay $5.8 million in restitution. She earlier pleaded guilty to one count of transportation of money taken by fraud.
None of the money was recovered, much of it being spent supporting Taylor’s lavish lifestyle, authorities said.
Taylor was the chief executive officer and Connor the chief operating officer of City Capital Corp., whose sole purpose, the government alleged, was to defraud investors.
Taylor, who also went by the name Ephren Taylor Jr., claimed that 20 percent of his investments’ profits went to charity. But that was a lie, authorities said.
Taylor’s sales pitch emphasized his own early success. He said he became rich enough to retire while a teenager.
The basis for that lie was publicity that he and a classmate received after starting a website while students at Blue Valley North High School.
GoFerretGo.com paired job-seeking teens with employers. While neither he nor his partner got rich from that website, Taylor claimed otherwise.
He wrote books about his phony success story and touted himself as the youngest African-American CEO in the country. Some media outlets bought the story. He appeared on national TV and spoke at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
A 2012 profile of Taylor in The Kansas City Star reported that some of his earliest business ventures were in the Kansas City area. He once owned a large piece of land south of Kansas City’s jazz district and said he planned to build housing there. But it never happened, and the land remains undeveloped.
Another federal court issued a nearly $12 million judgment against him in 2013 after the Securities and Exchange Commission accused Taylor of running “a Ponzi scheme to swindle more than $11 million, primarily from African-American churchgoers.”
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:scumbag: 
