April 22. Two Cornelius residents are facing federal charges in connection with a multi-million dollar investment scheme.
A federal grand jury returned a criminal indictment this week against Marlin Hershey and Dana Bradley, both 52, charging them with mail and wire fraud conspiracy, mail fraud, securities fraud, and money laundering conspiracy.
Hershey out on bond
The indictment was unsealed this morning following Hershey’s appearance in court, according to Dena J. King, US Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina.
According to allegations contained in the indictment, from approximately 2009 to 2021, Hershey and Bradley induced dozens of victims to invest millions of dollars in unregistered securities offerings, promoted by the defendants through Performance Holdings and other entities controlled by the defendants and other individuals, including Performance Retire on Rentals, Distressed Lending Fund, Moteng Funding and Southeast Lot Acquisitions.
The indictment alleges that the investment materials Hershey and Bradley provided to victim investors in connection with these securities offerings contained false and/or misleading statements and failed to disclose material information
For example, the indictment alleges that the offering materials failed to disclose that the defendants received commissions based on the amount of investments they sold, and often provided investors with offering materials that represented the opposite – that nobody would be…
