Adam JacksonMark Roy Anderson, a notorious California con artist with a lengthy history of swindling investors, has reportedly cut a deal with federal authorities for collecting cash for a nonexistent hemp enterprise.
On Friday, the 69-year-old pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud and admitted to duping investors out of more than $18 million by fabricating a bogus cannabis empire while completing a sentence for a prior criminal conviction, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Anderson’s scheme involved deceiving investors about his companies, which supposedly invested in hemp farms, cannabis-infused products, and a bottling business, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s office. This comes nearly a year after Anderson was indicted by a federal grand jury last May.
The disbarred lawyer, who has a track record of fraudulent activities spanning at least three decades, launched his purported hemp venture immediately after his release from a federal prison in Texas, where he had served more than 11 years for an oil investment scam, in May 2019.
In the first scheme, which occurred from June 2020 to April 2021, Anderson convinced investors to fund his company, Harvest Farm Group, by falsely claiming he owned a profitable hemp farm in Kern County, California, and was using his own equipment to convert the hemp into CBD isolate and Delta-8 products.
“Anderson attempted to maintain a veneer of trustworthiness by taking steps to assure investors Harvest Farm Group was legitimate and he was not the ‘Mark Roy Anderson’ with multiple prior fraud convictions,” the attorney general’s office wrote.
“Anderson concealed that he had been convicted of multiple federal and state felony crimes, including mail fraud, wire fraud, grand theft, forgery, preparing false evidence, and money laundering. He also concealed that he was still serving a criminal sentence and was on supervised release at the time he was soliciting investments.”
The office added, “To stall victim investors from making collection efforts and reporting him to law enforcement, Anderson falsely told them that sales of products derived from hemp grown at the farm had been delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, misleadingly promised that he would pay the victims money from purported sales he had made to Canadian companies, and falsely promised that he would otherwise return their money.”
The second scheme, from April 2021 to May 2023, involved Anderson soliciting money for his sham companies, Bio Pharma and Verta Bottling, by claiming they successfully manufactured and sold CBD-infused products and beverages.
“Anderson’s other lies to investors included false claims that his bottling companies had at least $10 million in purchase-order contracts from suppliers,” the office said.
“He drafted fake legal and business documents, which included fabricated purchase order contracts purporting to show agreements with third party companies to purchase tens of millions of dollars’ worth of products manufactured by the Anderson bottling companies. Anderson also provided victims samples of products purportedly manufactured by his purported bottling companies.”
Instead of investing the funds as promised, Anderson used the money for personal expenses. He has agreed to forfeit his ill-gotten gains, including 15 cars, one of which is a Ferrari, and real estate in Ojai. In total, Anderson solicited more than $18.8 million from 45 victims, causing losses of approximately $18.4 million.
Anderson faces a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison for each count of wire fraud.
