Woman Sentenced In Investment Ploy

A 66-year-old Union County woman was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison this week after earlier pleading guilty to possession of counterfeit securities and money laundering.

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U.S. District Judge Thomas W. Phillips also ordered Joan Black of Maynardville to pay $580,139.08 in restitution.

Black pleaded guilty to the charges Sept. 7.

According to the plea agreement, Black admitted that as early as October 2007 she began soliciting investors to purchase annuities through her company, Benefit Capital Inc.

She told investors that the annuities were issued by a Texas insurance company and were guaranteed to pay an annual interest rate of 10 percent, records show. The annuities, in fact, were bogus, with Black using a printing company in Knoxville to create fictitious annuity portfolios bearing the name and corporate logo of the insurance company. Black also admitted that from October 2007 through at least December 2008 she was paid approximately $673,500 by five different investors, according to the plea agreement. Instead of investing those funds, she deposited them into a bank account she controlled and converted the funds for her own personal use.