He was busted hiding in a South Florida home. Now, convicted Ponzi schemer faces prison

Miami Herald (FL)

Volodimyr Pigida was a shifty guy.

In late 2022, a federal jury found him guilty of ripping off about $11 million from thousands of people who fell prey to his email-marketing investment scam that he operated out of Washington and Florida.

But when he was supposed to show up for his sentencing in Seattle federal court last August, Pigida was a no-show.

In October, South Florida FBI agents caught up with him in Parkland, where he was hiding during a three-hour standoff behind a false wall in a relative’s home.

“Agents had to literally drag him out,” a federal prosecutor wrote in a sentencing memo.

Pigida, 49, was sentenced Friday to 14 years in prison on 26 felony counts, after U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez said he had abused the court’s “trust” by fleeing from justice. Martinez also described Pigida’s fraud as an “extensive, elaborate, complex scheme” that caused “immense harm” for his victims.

‘Work-at-home’ email scheme

According to an indictment and other court records, Pigida and his wife, Marina Bondarenko, operated a ‘work-at-home’ email scheme named Trend Sound Promoter, which advertised music and other goods on the internet. The couple sold advertising packages to about 6,750 people who were to be paid for sending marketing emails on behalf of Trend Sound.

In reality, prosecutors say, the only real revenue came from the fraudulent sale of the packages, generating about $22 million for Pigida and his wife between 2012 and 2017. The couple used half of that money to pay off earlier purchasers in a typical Ponzi scheme, until it ultimately crashed, according to Assistant United States Attorney Philip Kopczynski.

The prosecutor said the couple kept about $11 million by raiding the company’s accounts to purchase homes, expensive cars and a yacht. About 3,300 people got stiffed in the end.

Pigida, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Ukraine, and his wife were charged with conspiracy as well as mail, wire and bankruptcy fraud in 2018. The following year, Bondarenko pleaded guilty to bankruptcy fraud and was sentenced to just over three years in prison.