Hollywood Actor Zachary Horwitz Sentenced To 20 Years For Swindling $650 Mn In Ponzi Scam
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Los Angeles, Feb 15 : Aspiring Hollywood actor Zachary Horwitz (35) has been charged with fabricating a $650 million deal with HBO and Netflix in a Ponzi scheme, which according to the prosecution has been the biggest in the history of Hollywood. Horwitz has been sentenced to 20 years in prison and also been ordered to pay up $230 million in damages to more than 250 victims. Prosecutors alleged that in the period between 2014 to 2019, Horwitz secured hundreds of millions of dollars in loans for his film company, 1inMM Capital LLC, by telling his investors that he was buying foreign distribution rights for US movies, and then selling them to streaming platforms like HBO and Netflix.
Horwitz used some of the money to repay earlier investors in a classic Ponzi scheme and to support an extravagant lifestyle for himself that included buying a $6 million home, prosecutors said. U.S. District Judge Mark C. Scarsi ran down part of the list: $706,000 on interior decorating, $605,000 on Mercedes Benz and Audi cars, $345,000 on private jet and yacht trips, $174,000 on Los Angeles party consultant services, $136,000 on Las Vegas casinos and nightclubs and $6.9 million in credit-card payments to American Express. “These are all expenditures of other people’s hard earned money,” Scarsi said.
Horwitz told Scarsi he made “misguided, awful decisions” as he tried to break into the movie business and was sorry for the “immense pain and hardship” he caused. His attorneys told the judge that Horwitz was “not mentally well” and should not have to miss his two toddler sons growing up. But Scarsi said it was striking that neither Horwitz nor his attorneys offered any explanation for the extravagant spending that was uncovered by federal investigators. “Horwitz portrayed himself as a Hollywood success story,” prosecutors said, according to the Department of Justice. “He branded himself as an industry player, who… leveraged his relationships with online streaming platforms like HBO and Netflix to sell them foreign film distribution rights at a steady premium.
“But, as his victims came to learn, (Horwitz) was not a successful businessman or Hollywood insider. He just played one.” Family members in the courtroom gallery sobbed as the judge announced he was following prosecutors’ recommendation and sentencing Horwitz to the maximum penalty allowed by law. Horwitz — better known by his stage name “Zach Avery” — spent the past decade acting in around a dozen mostly low-budget films, including “Trespassers” and “The White Crow,” according to his IMDb profile.
With UNI Inputs
