The Bellagio resort and casino in Las Vegas, Nev. (Courtesy of MGM Resorts)
A gambler raised $1.3 million from investors who believed in his plans for a hand sanitizer and CBD-infused coffee bottling plant in Colorado, then spent most of that money at Las Vegas casinos, on designer watches and to pay his own rent, federal regulators allege.
Robert Cournoyer, 56, was sued in Denver on May 10 by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which is accusing him of securities fraud. The SEC’s allegations are civil, not criminal, and therefore are punishable by fines rather than prison time.
Cournoyer, who has a history of running afoul of the SEC, founded a firm called Green Equity in late 2017, initially to buy and retrofit a CBD bottling plant in southern Colorado, according to the SEC. But that idea was scuttled in 2019 and Cournoyer’s alleged fraud began.
“Despite the bottling plant project being abandoned in 2019 and never becoming operational and Green Equity not conducting any business activities since 2019, Cournoyer, through Green Equity, continued to lull investors,” according to last week’s federal lawsuit.
In April 2020, investors were told that their money would “get our (bottling) facility up and running,” and that it would initially “produce high-grade hand sanitizer,” which was in demand as the pandemic began. By January 2021, Cournoyer was falsely claiming that “sanitizer production is underway” at the plant, according to the SEC’s complaint.
Lured by Cournoyer’s assurances that he “was working to partner with casinos to sell hand sanitizer and provide CBD coffee,” 38 investors gave $1.3 million to Green Equity and a second firm, RS Group, that Cournoyer allegedly created to take their money. (Information about the investors, including how many are Coloradans, was not included in the lawsuit.)
At least $755,000 of that $1.3 million was spent on Cournoyer’s personal expenses, according to the SEC, “including gambling, rent for his personal residence, and luxury purchases such as designer watches and clothing, and also making substantial cash withdrawals.”
Cournoyer, who reportedly did not have a personal bank account at the time, would spend investor cash soon after it was received, the SEC said. For example, take June 2019.
Green Equity’s bank account had $500 in it on June 1. Investors then deposited $90,000, which was spent at the Mirage and the Bellagio in Las Vegas, at a Panerai luxury watch shop there, at a Hugo Boss clothing store, to pay rent on a home in Texas, and to pay off Cournoyer’s personal credit cards, the SEC tallies. On June 30, the account had a balance of $9,000.
“Cournoyer was gambling full-time starting in 2019 or 2020,” according to the SEC.
Of the $1.3 million that investors gave, only $5,000 was returned to one of them, according to last week’s lawsuit. That lawsuit asks Judge Maritza Dominguez Braswell to bar Cournoyer from ever running a public company and order him to “disgorge any and all ill-gotten gains.”
Cournoyer was an investment broker until 2004, when a federal judge barred him from selling securities and ordered him to pay $1.2 million. Cournoyer was found to have defrauded investors in a Wikipedia-like startup called GetAnswers by lying about the company and then using the capital to pay himself $500,000, buy luxury vehicles and go to Vegas.
Reached by email this week, Cournoyer said that he needed 24 hours to review the SEC’s lawsuit before responding. He did not answer follow-up requests 24 hours later.
The Bellagio resort and casino in Las Vegas, Nev. (Courtesy of MGM Resorts)
A gambler raised $1.3 million from investors who believed in his plans for a hand sanitizer and CBD-infused coffee bottling plant in Colorado, then spent most of that money at Las Vegas casinos, on designer watches and to pay his own rent, federal regulators allege.
Robert Cournoyer, 56, was sued in Denver on May 10 by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which is accusing him of securities fraud. The SEC’s allegations are civil, not criminal, and therefore are punishable by fines rather than prison time.
Cournoyer, who has a history of running afoul of the SEC, founded a firm called Green Equity in late 2017, initially to buy and retrofit a CBD bottling plant in southern Colorado, according to the SEC. But that idea was scuttled in 2019 and Cournoyer’s alleged fraud began.
“Despite the bottling plant project being abandoned in 2019 and never becoming operational and Green Equity not conducting any business activities since 2019, Cournoyer, through Green Equity, continued to lull investors,” according to last week’s federal lawsuit.
In April 2020, investors were told that their money would “get our (bottling) facility up and running,” and that it would initially “produce high-grade hand sanitizer,” which was in demand as the pandemic began. By January 2021, Cournoyer was falsely claiming that “sanitizer production is underway” at the plant, according to the SEC’s complaint.
Lured by Cournoyer’s assurances that he “was working to partner with casinos to sell hand sanitizer and provide CBD coffee,” 38 investors gave $1.3 million to Green Equity and a second firm, RS Group, that Cournoyer allegedly created to take their money. (Information about the investors, including how many are Coloradans, was not included in the lawsuit.)
At least $755,000 of that $1.3 million was spent on Cournoyer’s personal expenses, according to the SEC, “including gambling, rent for his personal residence, and luxury purchases such as designer watches and clothing, and also making substantial cash withdrawals.”
Cournoyer, who reportedly did not have a personal bank account at the time, would spend investor cash soon after it was received, the SEC said. For example, take June 2019.
Green Equity’s bank account had $500 in it on June 1. Investors then deposited $90,000, which was spent at the Mirage and the Bellagio in Las Vegas, at a Panerai luxury watch shop there, at a Hugo Boss clothing store, to pay rent on a home in Texas, and to pay off Cournoyer’s personal credit cards, the SEC tallies. On June 30, the account had a balance of $9,000.
“Cournoyer was gambling full-time starting in 2019 or 2020,” according to the SEC.
Of the $1.3 million that investors gave, only $5,000 was returned to one of them, according to last week’s lawsuit. That lawsuit asks Judge Maritza Dominguez Braswell to bar Cournoyer from ever running a public company and order him to “disgorge any and all ill-gotten gains.”
Cournoyer was an investment broker until 2004, when a federal judge barred him from selling securities and ordered him to pay $1.2 million. Cournoyer was found to have defrauded investors in a Wikipedia-like startup called GetAnswers by lying about the company and then using the capital to pay himself $500,000, buy luxury vehicles and go to Vegas.
Reached by email this week, Cournoyer said that he needed 24 hours to review the SEC’s lawsuit before responding. He did not answer follow-up requests 24 hours later.
