The main link was an American, Bryant D. Cragun, 57, a former stockbroker turned financier.
Securities and Exchange Commission filings, incorporation papers and other documents show that Cragun figured prominently in the creation or evolution of the companies, as an officer, director or financier.
The property settlement from his divorce in Arizona in 2001 also shows that he had an ownership interest in two of the unlicensed, offshore brokerages that promoted the companies' shares.
While most people who bought and held their shares in Chequemate and the other companies lost nearly everything they invested, Cragun became rich.
Another divorce document estimated the value of the assets he and his wife were dividing to be "in the middle eight figures," or roughly $50 million.
Cragun told The Wall Street Journal four years ago that the SEC had investigated the overseas stock sales. But the agency has not taken action.
The Post-Dispatch's investigation turned up additional information about Cragun's business dealings. For example:
The divorce case in 2001 shows that Cragun had an ownership interest in Oxford International Management, based in the Philippines, and PT Dolok Permai, which was incorporated in Indonesia and did business under the name International Asset Management. He previously denied, in court cases, that he had a stake in either operation.
Two partners in a Salt Lake City accounting firm that audited Chequemate's financial statements were barred by the SEC from auditing public companies in 2001 because of their role in a separate stock fraud case. One of them, R. Gordon Jones, is listed as an officer with Cragun in a company that owned part of Oxford.
A stock research firm in California, whose glowing report triggered a sharp rise in Chequemate's share price, was incorporated by disbarred lawyer Regis M. Possino, who has convictions for drug dealing and fraud. He had big stakes in several other companies that Oxford promoted. The SEC has since charged in a lawsuit that the stock-research firm, Access 1 Financial, and its president issued a false and misleading report on another company's stock as part of a "pump-and-dump" scheme.
A firm that Chequemate hired to promote its shares was controlled by Allen Z. Wolfson, a white-collar criminal who has since returned to prison on separate stock fraud and manipulation charges.
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