President Donald Trump has commuted the prison sentence of David Gentile, a private equity executive who was convicted of defrauding thousands of investors in a $1.6 billion scheme.
The former CEO and co-founder of GPB Capital Holdings served less than two weeks of his seven-year sentence when he was released from prison Wednesday, according to The New York Times.
Gentile, 59, and a co-defendant, Jeffry Schneider, were convicted of securities and wire fraud charges in August 2024 and sentenced in May. Schneider, who was sentenced to six years, does not appear to have received clemency from Trump.
In a social media post on Thanksgiving, Trump’s “pardon czar” Alice Marie Johnson said she was “deeply grateful” to see Gentile going home to his young children.
In court filings, prosecutors said that Gentile and Schneider used investor funds to take stakes in companies in the automotive and retail industries. It paid out regular annual distributions to investors from returns on these holdings.
Former President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice found last year that GPB’s use of investor funds to pay investors, instead of tapping into funds from its current operations, constituted a Ponzi scheme.
However, a White House official argued that prosecutors wrongly characterized the business as a Ponzi scheme, telling Reuters the claim was “profoundly undercut by the fact that GPB had explicitly told investors what would happen.”
“At trial, the government was unable to tie any supposedly fraudulent representations to Mr. Gentile," the anonymous White House official told Reuters.
“Mr. Gentile also raised serious concerns that the government had elicited false testimony and failed to correct such testimony,” the source added.
As of Saturday, the text of Gentile’s commutation had not yet been posted on the Justice Department’s website. It was unclear if the commutation would affect any financial penalties.
In June, prosecutors asked the judge in the case to order Gentile to forfeit more than $15.5 million, whereas Schneider was asked to forfeit over $12 million.
In September, prosecutors indicated in a letter to the judge that a court-appointed receiver had access to more than $700 million, which would likely be distributed to investors, according to the Times.
With reporting by the Associated Press
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