Captive Insurance Expert Pleads Guilty to Aiding Solar Ponzi Scheme Leaders - Insurance Journal
Remember the Carpoffs, the California couple sent to prison in 2021 and 2022 for running a $1 billion Ponzi scheme tied to mobile solar generators? The scheme that reportedly ensnared Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway and the Progressive insurance corporation? A South Carolina attorney, known as a leader in setting up captive insurance programs and head of Hamilton Captive Management, has now pleaded guilty to helping Jeff and Paulette Carpoff hide millions of dollars from their fraudulent gains. Peter J. Strauss, 45, of Beaufort, South Carolina, knowingly transferred as much as $11 million to a trust account in 2018 and 2019, shortly after federal agents searched the Carpoffs' DC Solar and other businesses, the U.S. Attorney for South Carolina said in a statement. Strauss then improperly distributed much of the money to criminal defense attorneys, bankruptcy lawyers and to the Carpoff's own captive insurance firm, the prosecutor said. Strauss ple...