South Florida Arbitration & Litigation Lawyer Blog
Final Judgments Entered against Richard Verdiramo and Vincent L. Verdiramo, Esq.
The Securities and Exchange Commission recently announced that on April 29, 2013, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York entered final judgments against Richard Verdiramo and Vincent L. Verdiramo, Esq., that require the defendants to pay full disgorgement and civil money penalties, and bar them from penny stock offerings and from serving as officers or directors of public companies. This relief supplements the injunctions and disgorgement that the SEC had previously obtained and concludes the SEC’s case against the defendants.
In March 2010, the SEC charged Richard Verdiramo, RECOV Energy Corp.’s former Chairman, CEO, President, and CFO, with, among other things, committing fraud and violating the securities registration requirements based on his issuances of RECOV stock for his and his father’s personal benefit. The SEC charged his father, Vincent Verdiramo, an attorney who facilitated the misconduct and who was a recipient of some of the RECOV stock, with aiding and abetting his son’s fraud and with violating the securities registration requirements.
The Court previously ordered all of the injunctive relief sought by the Commission in its Complaint against both Richard and Vincent Verdiramo for all of their misconduct. The Court had also previously ordered the defendants to pay full disgorgement for their violations of the securities registration requirements, including holding Richard Verdiramo jointly and severally liable with other defendants. In November 2011, the SEC issued an order suspending Vincent Verdiramo from appearing or practicing before the SEC as an attorney.
The recent judgment requires Richard Verdiramo to disgorge an additional $145,000 in ill-gotten gains plus $61,968 in prejudgment interest, and requires him to pay a civil penalty of $100,000. In addition, the Court barred Richard Verdiramo from participating in any penny stock offering and from serving as an officer or director of any reporting company for five years. The Judgment against Vincent Verdiramo orders him to disgorge an additional $462,000 in ill-gotten gains, plus $197,444 in prejudgment interest, and requires him to pay a civil penalty of $100,000. The Court also permanently barred Vincent Verdiramo from participating in any penny stock offering and from serving as an officer or director of any reporting company. Both Richard and Vincent Verdiramo consented to the entry of the final judgments against them without admitting or denying any of the allegations of the SEC’s Complaint. [SEC v. Richard Verdiramo, Vincent L. Verdiramo, Edward Meyer, Jr., and Victoria Chen, Civil Action No. 10-CIV-1888 (S.D.N.Y.)]
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