What Is Fraud?

The most common legal definition of fraud is when a person intentionally deceives another for personal gain or to damage a person. It is a common subsection of white-collar crime. There are untold fraudulent schemes being perpetrated on a daily basis.

Fraud can be committed through many different means mail, wire, phone, Internet fraud. One of the most wanted men by the FBI, Semion Mogilevich, committed hundreds of millions of dollars worth of fraud. The FBI believes that he is currently in Russia.

He is wanted for defrauding thousands of investors in the stock of a public company in Canada--it was traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The scheme defrauded thousands of investors in excess of 150 million U.S. dollars. Securities fraud is a common form of fraud in America. We have seen this with Bernie Madoff, most recently. Madoff ran a $64 billion Ponzi scheme and wast sentenced to 150 years in prison in June 2009.

If you have been charged with fraud, contact a Plano criminal defense lawyer today.