TOLEDO, Ohio — Five local money managers accused of running a $72 million Ponzi scheme have been re-indicted by the state of Ohio.
In May, the Attorney General’s Office dismissed more than 200 felony counts against eight Northwest Capital employees after it became apparent that there was no simple way to share five million pages of documents related to the case with defense teams.
On Friday afternoon, 154 felony counts were announced against five employees:
- James DelVerne, 78 felony counts
- Doug Miller, 26 felony counts
- Gary Rathbun, 24 felony counts
- Nancy Rathbun, six felony counts
- John Walters, 20 felony counts
“It was anticipated. We’ll deal with it and work through it," DelVerne's attorney, Richard Kerger, said.
Previously, three other employees – Colleen Hall, Adam Salon, and Brad Konerman – also faced charges, but, so far, they have not been re-indicted.
Steve Irwin, a spokesman for the AG’s office had no comment on if they would face charges.
“These are all the cases we have today. It’s an ongoing case,” Irwin said.
Many of the clients previously asked Lucas County Common Pleas Court Judge Gary Cook to dismiss the case with prejudice, meaning the state would not be able to re-indict. Last month, Judge Cook rejected that attempt, saying they did not act in bad faith by not turning over the millions of document pages.
However, Judge Cook said the defense teams needed to be reimbursed for the time spent on the case since the eight were originally indicted last April. There was also a hearing in which the team hired experts to testify about the ineffectiveness of the system. Cook also ruled last month that those fees should be reimbursed.
The state appealed that decision on Friday.
Cook awarded the following sanctions:
- DelVerne, $20,000
- Miller, $22,000
- Rathbun, $13,637.50
- Hall, $19,950
- Nancy Rathbun, $7,900
- Salon, $23,600
- Walters, $12,937.50
- Konerman, $36,200
That amount adds up to $156,225.