Ex-NFL player sentenced in $5 million fraud

Personal Injury News

Article Date: 11/19/2009 | Resource: MLG

Ex-NFL player sentenced in $5 million fraud

An ex-Mater Dei assistant football coach and former Tennessee Titans player was sentenced today to 57 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to charges related to a bogus loan program that defrauded nine people out of more than $5 million, federal prosecutors said.

Reed Kyle Diehl, 31, a Coto de Caza resident who was arrested in March 2008, pleaded guilty in July to three counts of wire fraud and one count of money laundering.
U.S. District Judge David O. Carter noted the “extraordinary” harm caused by Diehl’s scheme as he passed sentence today, prosecutors said.

In pleading guilty, Diehl admitted that he bilked investors with promises of high rates of return on investments in loan programs, including multimillion-dollar condominium projects in Mexico, prosecutors said.

The plea agreement states that Diehl told investors he would pool their money with that of other investors and make secured, “hard-money loans” to businesses and individuals. The investors would then profit from a supposed rate of return.

But the loans were not secured and no rate of return was earned, according to the agreement.

“Instead, much of the investors’ funds were used by defendant to make payments of interest and/or principal to earlier investors, or were withdrawn by defendant’s lifestyle and activities,” the filing said.

Six investors were duped out of a total of $810,000 in Diehl’s promissory note program, while four borrowers lost $4.2 million in Diehl’s line of credit program, according to the agreement.

Diehl spent one year on the Mater Dei coaching staff and briefly played for the Titans after being an All-Pac-10 player at U.C. Berkeley. He also played football at Mater Dei.

For more information regarding this article please contact:

Jeffrey Marquart
(949)589-0150
jmarquart@marquartlawgroup.com