Utah Woman Sentenced In $1.7M Fraud Case

SALT LAKE CITY - A Logan woman was sentenced Tuesday to between two and 30 years in prison for defrauding investors out of about $1.7 million.

Lori Ann Anderson, 54, pleaded guilty in 1st District Court in January to a pattern of unlawful activity and two counts of securities fraud, all second-degree felonies. The sentence is the result of two consecutive one to 15 year prison terms handed down by Judge Thomas Willmore.

Between 2013 and 2015, Anderson misled friends who had invested with her, believing she was making gains while day trading in Apple stock, Utah Attorney General's Office spokesman Daniel Burton said Tuesday. Instead, Anderson's trading during that span resulted in substantial losses, which she lied about, Burton said.

Anderson accomplished the fraud in part by producing false account statements and sending them to investors who had put money into a trading club she founded called SMTS.

"Anderson represented to her investors that she made returns of around 10 percent a year and never had a losing day trading. ... She also admitted to showing investors false earnings on a program she had purchased for her computer," Burton said in a statement.

In July, Anderson informed investigators that only about $40,000 of the $1.7 million invested with her still remained in her possession. In all, 46 people lost money after investing with Anderson because of her deceptive promises, Burton said.

Anderson was sentenced to up to 18 months in prison in 1992 after pleading guilty to 27 felonies for bilking more than two dozen policyholders out of $140,000 as a Farm Bureau Insurance agent.

"Lori Anderson's case is a grim repeat performance - deluding unsuspecting victims into handing over their trust and money in a church environment," Keith Woodwell, director of the Utah Division of Securities, said in a statement Tuesday. "Affinity fraud continues to be the most damaging white-collar crime where fraudsters not only steal the nest eggs of Utah victims but destroy their trusting nature as well."

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