Main Line Businessman Arrested In $5 Million Ponzi Scheme
BALA CYNWYD, Pa. (CBS) -- Only CBS 3 cameras were there as a Main Line businessman was taken away to prison in handcuffs charged with defrauding investors out of more than $5 million dollars.
Ira Pressman who lives in Bala Cynwyd, Lower Merion Township, is accused of swindling eight friends and associates in what prosecutors call a "classic Ponzi scheme." It's alleged the suspect, whose business was headquartered in Bryn Mawr, took money from one investor giving it to another; duping them into thinking they were making a profit from the scheme.
According to an arrest warrant, several investors, including one 70-year-old man, put hundreds of thousands into the investment scheme, and one victim invested more than $1 million.
Pressman's attorney says his client came forward and alerted police to the scheme. The attorney says Pressman, who went to prison in 1993 for fraudulently obtaining more than $200,000 in loans from several banks, regrets his actions and has already made nearly $2 million in restitution.
Following his surrender, Pressman was held in $1 million bail and is now being housed in Montgomery County Prison.
Reported by Walt Hunter, CBS 3
