Mr. Curshen, for his part, sought a much lower sentence. He said that the scheme was not a pump-and-dump of any sort. He had told the undercover agent that brokerage customers could sell the stock at any time. As far as he knew, he had no obligation to disclose the kickbacks, or commissions as he called them. By his calculations, his sentence should have been as low as six months.
Mr. Curshen also asked that the judge consider that he had already "suffered tremendously" for his actions. Among other things, since his arrest he had to live apart from his Costa Rican wife (who the FBI threatened to arrest if she came to the U.S.). He also became impoverished, as he lost his Costa Rican business, a stock promotion firm called Red Sea Management. In addition, he had to leave the securities industry and ended up working for a bakery. He asked that the judge consider placing him under house arrest instead of sending him to prison.
Judge Sand, in the end, determined that jail was appropriate for Mr. Curshen to deter both him and others from similar crimes. As the judge saw it, the 16-month sentence was a lenient one. "You have repeatedly, repeatedly, engaged in ... illegal activity. You have testified falsely or furnished documents under oath which are contrary to fact," the judge said at the sentencing hearing.
The judge was initially going to order Mr. Curshen immediately taken into custody to begin his sentence, but instead allowed him 10 days to say goodbye to his children and to wrap up his affairs. In doing so, he recognized that Mr. Curshen has a GPS tracking device attached to him as part of his bond conditions in another criminal case he faces in Miami. The judge also fined Mr. Curshen $10,000. (All figures are in U.S. dollars.) |
