San Angelo Man Senteced to 78 Months After Defrauding Investors

SAN ANGELO, TX – After being convicted of running two fraudulent schemes, a San Angelo man, Stanley Jonathan Fortenberry, 51, has been sentenced to 78 months in prison. Fortenberry obstructed a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) investigation and defrauded investors of nearly $900,000 over a span of four years.

Fortenberry confessed to running an investment company called Premier Investment Fund (Premier), which allegedly raised funds from investors for social media projects. Another company that worked in the country music industry supposedly ran these projects. After lying to investors about where the funds were going and how much profit the company actually made, Fortenberry confessed to pocketing about half of the funds raised for personal use and to the expense of his operation.

In 2013, Fortenberry began raising funds for Wattenberg Energy Partners, which was supposed to setup gas drilling projects in Colorado. The company was set up in his son’s name because he was under investigation by the SEC for misusing the funds from his previous Premier fraud scheme. In order to make the operation work, Fortenberry had sales people call potential investors and ask them to invest in the project. Once again, he admitted to spending the vast majority of the money on himself and on financing the scheme. However, he denied having control or working for that company at an administrative hearing in October of 2014.

According to a press release, Fortenberry pleaded guilty to the fraud and to obstruction of justice. He will go on to serve 78 months in prison and will have to pay $890,310 in restitution. He admitted that the total loss in both schemes to his victims was $887,311.