Johanna Michely García, 41 years old and former executive director of MJ Capital Funding, LLC, pleaded guilty to defrauding nearly 200 million dollars from investors to allegedly finance merchants through a pyramid scheme, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida reported on Monday.
The accusation against Johanna was made public in July of last year, and it charged her with conspiracy to commit fraud, both electronic and postal, and multiple counts of money laundering.
According to court documents, MJ Capital Funding, LLC was a company based in Pompano Beach that offered cash advances to merchants, or MCA, a type of short-term financing typically used by small and medium-sized enterprises, the Efe agency reports.
The accusation alleges that from approximately October 2020 until August 12, 2021, García, Pavel Ramón Ruiz Hernández (detained in 2022), and others fraudulently solicited money from investors supposedly to finance the MCAs of MJ Capital Funding, LLC.
It is also argued that García, Ruiz Hernández, and their accomplices recruited others to seek additional investors, usually paying those recruited around 10% of the money they raised.
García faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for charges of conspiracy and money laundering.
Ruiz Hernández was accused in August 2022, pleaded guilty in April 2023, and was sentenced to nine years and two months in prison.
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