Linda Kennedy gets 5 years for real estate scam
Superior Court Judge Barry T. LaBarbera sentanced Linda Kennedy to five years in jail on Tuesday for running a real estate ponzi scheme, KCOY reports. She plead no contest to four felony counts related to fraudulent lending practices.
Kennedy was the former president of 21st Century Financial on Vine Street in Paso Robles. She took money from clients to invest in real estate developments in return for promises of interest payments. It’s a service called “hard money lending,” but she stopped paying interest on the investments and lied to clients about how the money was spent.
Ten of Kennedy’s victims testified to the court how she had ruined their lives. The judge ordered Kennedy to pay full restitution to all victims in the case.
Cal Coast News reported that Kennedy, 49, allegedly swindled more than 1,000 investors out of millions in a lending scheme involving hard money. In August 2007, when she closed the firm, the company held a $100 million real estate portfolio. Even so, the San Luis Obispo County District Attorney’s Office charged her with having caused a loss of $1.3 million to numerous investors.
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