A Florida man and company founder was sentenced to 12 years in prison earlier this week for allegedly committing $2 billion worth of fraud.
Greg Lindberg, 56, of Tampa, Florida, and the founder and chairman of Eli Global LLC and owner of Global Bankers Insurance Group (GBIG), was sentenced to a combined 12 years in prison for his role in a bribery conspiracy and multibillion-dollar fraud conspiracy that bankrupted multiple insurance companies with thousands of unpaid policyholder victims.
Court documents say that from at least 2016 through at least 2019, Lindberg conspired with others to defraud various insurance companies, other third parties and hundreds of thousands of insurance policyholders.
Lindberg and others conspired to deceive the North Carolina Department of Insurance (NCDOI) and other regulators, evaded regulatory requirements meant to protect policyholders, concealed the true financial condition of his companies and improperly used insurance company funds for his personal benefit.
Lindberg and his co-conspirators caused companies he controlled in North Carolina, Bermuda, Malta, and elsewhere to invest more than $2 billion in loans and other securities with his own affiliated companies and laundered the proceeds of the scheme. Lindberg directed the scheme and personally benefitted from the fraud in part by “forgiving” more than $125 million in loans to himself from the insurance companies that he controlled.
Lindberg used his ill-gotten gains to fund a lavish lifestyle, buying private jets, mansions and a 200-foot luxury yacht.
Lindberg and others engaged in circular transactions among Lindberg’s web of entities using insurance company funds and misled or omitted material information from regulators, various ratings agencies, insurance companies and ultimately policyholders, regarding these transactions.
As Lindberg’s fraud and money laundering conspiracies were beginning to unravel, from April 2017 to August 2018, Lindberg and others engaged in a bribery scheme for the purpose of causing the Commissioner of Insurance of the NCDOI to take official action favorable to Lindberg’s company, GBIG.
Lindberg and others gave the Commissioner millions of dollars in campaign contributions and other things of value in exchange for the removal of NCDOI’s Senior Deputy Commissioner, who was responsible for overseeing the regulation and the periodic examination of GBIG.
As a result of Lindberg’s conduct, his insurance companies, third-party entities and policyholders suffered substantial financial hardship, and multiple of his insurance companies have been placed in rehabilitation and liquidation. To date, thousands of individual policyholders and other victims are collectively still owed more than $1 billion. A special master was appointed by the court in the fraud case to assist with the restitution process and distribution of funds to victims. A separate restitution hearing will be set at a later date.
In November 2024, Lindberg pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit offenses against the United States and conspiracy to commit money laundering. In May 2024, Lindberg was convicted by a federal jury of conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud and bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds.
The FBI Charlotte Field Office investigated both cases.
Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Russ Ferguson for the Western District of North Carolina; and Special Agent in Charge Reid Davis of the FBI Charlotte Field Office made the announcement.
Trial Attorney Lyndie Freeman of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Dan Ryan for the Western District of North Carolina prosecuted the fraud case. Trial Attorney William Gullotta of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Dana Washington for the Western District of North Carolina prosecuted the bribery case.
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