A former Bay Area solar company executive has been sentenced to 6 1/2 years in federal prison for his role in a $1 billion scheme to defraud investors, the sixth person to be sentenced since the collapse of DC Solar Solutions four years ago.
Ryan Guidry, 45, of Pleasant Hill, pleaded guilty in 2020 to conspiracy and money-laundering. He was sentenced Monday by U.S. District Judge Dale Drozd of Sacramento, who also ordered him to pay $619 million to victims of the fraud, similar to restitution orders against others in the firm.
Guidry worked for DC Solar from 2011 to 2019 and became its vice president of operations in 2015. The company, based in Benicia, made solar generators mounted on trailers that provided event lighting and emergency power for communications companies.
But federal prosecutors said DC Solar turned into a “Ponzi scheme” that used its investors’ funds to pay earlier investors. Prosecutors said the company sold the generators through special funds for investors to get federal tax credits, and then claimed to lease those generators to third parties to generate revenue, little of which it actually made. Of the 17,000 generators the company claimed to have manufactured, prosecutors said, 9,000 were nonexistent.
After DC Solar filed for bankruptcy, a dozen investors reported losses of tax credits totaling $1 billion, including Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, which said it lost $340 million.
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