Greg Lindberg slams ‘vindictiveness’ in fight for prison computer access

The cooperation enjoyed in recent years by Greg Lindberg and the investigators unwinding his complex, fraud-enabled empire is very quickly evaporating.

Lindberg, sentenced to 12 years in prison last month and ordered to pay restitution of $1.655 billion, said investigators are suddenly playing hardball with elements of his plea agreement. Lindberg expected to be temporarily housed at Pike County Detention Center, where he would have access to a computer, internet and spreadsheet software.

Instead, Lindberg was transferred from PCDC after one day, he said in a new court filing. Lindberg is asking for an emergency order to delay his reporting date to the Bureau of Prisons, or to ensure his continued access to a computer and the internet, until the restitution issue is settled.

Lindberg is appealing the May 28 order of $1.655 billion by Judge Max O. Cogburn. After he filed the appeal, the government resorted to “prosecutorial vindictiveness,” Lindberg alleges.

In a memorandum accompanying his appeal, Lindberg argues that a proper accounting under federal restitution law shows he owes nothing. In fact, Lindberg claims he overpaid by about $1.27 billion.

In response, Lindberg claims that government attorney Lyndie Freeman asked the defense to withdraw the appeal, “stating that a failure to do so would be treated as a breach of the plea agreement.”

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of North Carolina could not be reached for comment. The plea agreement, presentencing report and other documents were filed under seal.

Lindberg: The government reneged

The government had promised to support Lindberg’s request for an extended delay in reporting to the Bureau of Prisons, Lindberg claims, in exchange for his cooperation with the special master unwinding his financial empire.

Lindberg worked for months with the special master, Joseph W. Grier III of the law firm ⁠Grier Wright Martinez.

In his appeal from the restitution order, however, Lindberg took aim at financial decisions made by Grier, as well as tactics by the prosecutor. For example, Lindberg criticized the reuse at sentencing of victim statements collected about two-and-a-half years earlier.

“The timing—an adverse demand made directly in response to a protected, post-conviction filing implicating the prosecutor personally—establishes actual prosecutorial vindictiveness—and, at the very least, the ‘realistic likelihood of vindictiveness’ the Constitution forbids,” Lindberg’s attorney writes in the request for an emergency order.

Lindberg and his co-conspirators caused companies he controlled in North Carolina, Bermuda, Malta, and elsewhere to invest more than $2 billion in loans and other securities with his own affiliated companies and laundered the proceeds of the scheme, the government has said.

Lindberg directed the scheme and personally benefitted from the fraud in part by “forgiving” more than $125 million in loans to himself from the insurance companies that he controlled. Lindberg used his ill-gotten gains to fund a lavish lifestyle, buying private jets, mansions and a 200-foot luxury yacht, court documents say.

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InsuranceNewsNet Senior Editor John Hilton has covered business and other beats in more than 20 years of daily journalism. John may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @INNJohnH.