If you want a pardon, try not to be associated with Hunter Biden

In May last year David Gentile and Jeffry Schneider received long prison sentences.

They were convicted of running a very large private equity fraud/ponzi known as GBP Capital. The Justice Department release can be found here:

https://www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/former-private-equity-executives-sentenced-prison

I had not previously been aware of David Gentile (except in as much as he worked with Schneider) but Schneider was someone I had followed for many years.

He came up in a blog I wrote in April 2009.

The Financial Times - doing some reporting of their own - followed this up here.

What alerted me was Schneider’s involvement in a fraudulent fund called Ponta Negra. The perpetrator - Francesco Rusciano - went to prison for a year and a day.

Ponta Negra - which I regarded as an obvious fraud - was marketed by Jeffry Schneider. He marketed other obvious frauds as well. These frauds were so obvious that either Jeffry Schneider was unbelievably stupid or complicit.

The headline - that warranted scrutiny - was that Schneider was closely associated with a fund of hedge funds called Paradigm Global and owned by Hunter Biden.

To quote the Financial Times:

Until 2007 Jeffry Schneider was the head of marketing for the Bidens’ Paradigm funds. He and a small team under him were responsible for soliciting new investments and managing relationships with existing clients.Schneider had been with Paradigm since 2004, having previously worked at CIBC Oppenheimer and Axiom Capital Management. While still working for Paradigm as head of marketing, in 2006 he set up his own separate firm, Onyx Capital, which he also ran from the 17th floor of 650 5th.Onyx describes itself as an investment adviser, though it is not registered as one with the SEC. From what we can determine from its website (now removed from the web) it acted as a placement agent, collecting fees for matching investors to funds.

and later:

Via Jeffry Schneider, the Bidens, and Paradigm have two things to regret: links to Ponta Negra is one. Links to Stanford Capital Management [another major fraud] is the other.In 2007, Schneider left Paradigm. In a “mutually agreed” arrangement, according to Paradigm spokesperson Marc LoPresti, Schneider – and Onyx Capital – were retained, however, as the marketing agents for the Paradigm funds. Other employees of Paradigm joined Schneider’s new venture. The relationship, though not exactly cosy, wasn’t exactly what you might call sequestered.Schneider and Onyx continued to operate from the Paradigm offices. They continued to be described by outsiders as Paradigm’s marketers. And they led Paradigm into relationships – albeit indirect ones – with Stanford Capital Management and Ponta Negra.

I only raise all this again because Donald Trump pardoned David Gentile but did not pardon Jeffry Schneider.

This was odd because David Gentile was the perpetrator here (the Francesco Rusciano) and Schneider was simply the sales guy. It was odd that the perpetrator but not the sales guy got the pardon.

Many Senators wrote a letter to Trump expressing concern at this pardon.

This letter asks what I think was a silly question:

On what basis does David Gentile receive clemency while his co-conspirator, Jeffry Schneider, convicted of identical offenses from the same scheme, continues serving his sentence?

I don’t think this question is complicated but Ruben Gallego, Chris Van Hollen and seven other US Senators did not posit the obvious answer.

Jeffry Schneider did not get pardoned because he is associated with Hunter Biden.

Is any other explanation necessary?




John