The Fraud Discovery Institute was an investigative unit that sought to assist in the prosecution of perpetrators of corporate fraud. After the Institute had researched an alleged white-collar crime, it would give a report to the FBI, which could then find and arrest the criminals.[1]

The Fraud Discovery Institute was founded by Barry Minkow in 2001[2] Minkow had been released from prison in 1995, where he was serving a sentence for a Ponzi scheme involving a carpet-cleaning company called ZZZZ Best.[1][3] Other former convicts were also involved in the Fraud Discovery Institute; the rest of the team was composed of auditors.[4] In September 2011, Barry Minkow was returned to prison after making false statements in the Fraud Discovery Institute's reports.[5] Nonetheless, he managed to defraud the church at which he had been serving as pastor.[3] In January 2014 he pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $3 million from the Church and its congregants, with incidents stretching back to 2001.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b Benson, Michael (2008). White-Collar Crime. Infobase Publishing. pp. 24–25.
  2. ^ Bauder, Don (25 February 2015). "Missing from the Barry Minkow movie: He was never redeemed". San Diego Reader. Retrieved 31 January 2022.
  3. ^ a b c Anand, Priya (3 October 2014). "10 things scam artists won't tell you". MarketWatch. Retrieved 26 June 2018.
  4. ^ Zimmerman, Eilene (June 2005). "Barry Minkow". San Diego Magazine: 42–43.
  5. ^ "Barry Minkow heads back to prison". The Los Angeles Times. 2011-09-20. Retrieved 2011-11-02.
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