A federal grand jury has indicted a former Casper resident - who admitted to violating Wyoming securities laws in 2000 - for allegedly running a $100 million Ponzi scheme in Utah.

Claud "Rick" Koerber, 36, left Wyoming earlier in the decade for Utah, began a radio show called Free Capitalist, started a number of real estate investment businesses including FranklinSquires Companies LLC and Founder's Capital LLC, and has been sued by unhappy investors.

In the latest development in Koerber's business career, Tuesday's indictment charges him with mail fraud, wire fraud and tax evasion in schemes he conducted from 2004 through 2008. If convicted on all counts, he faces up to 45 years imprisonment and $750,000 in fines, according to a news release from the U.S. Department of Justice office in Salt Lake City.

Koerber - who bills himself as a "Capitalist, Mormon, Dad" - through radio programs and seminars promised people in the "Equity Mill" program they would earn large returns on loans to Founder's Capital using the equity in their homes, according to the indictment.

A former FranklinSquires employee further explained the process in an unrelated federal civil lawsuit in Mississippi that Koerber and his associates would take the equity of the property they had bought for less than full-market value, but obtain a loan on the property for full or near full market-value through a complicated series of steps.

Koerber ran the scheme on several levels, according to the indictment on Tuesday.

He paid his "first line" investors who were to "act and think like a bank" about 5 percent a month; they were encouraged to recruit and pay 3 percent to "second line" investors who put money in Founders Capital; and the second line investors recruited and paid 1 percent to "third line" investors who made loans to Founders Capital, according to the indictment.

But Koerber and his companies usually did not buy real estate, according to the indictment.

He instead used about half the money he received - about $50 million - to make payments to the earlier investors as part of the Ponzi scheme, according to the indictment.

"In this way, defendant Koerber created the false impression that the businesses were profitable, that the investments were safe, secure, and that interest was being paid," according to the indictment.

He also used a lot of the money for personal interests including $850,000 for restaurants; $800,000 loaned to an associate for a restaurant; more than $1 million for expensive automobiles; and $5 million to make movies, according to the indictment.

The indictment does not give more details about the money trail, nor does it say whether any investors are from Wyoming.

The U.S. attorney in Utah is not releasing names of victims because they may be witnesses at trial, U.S. Department of Justice public information officer Melodie Rydalch said Thursday.

The majority of known victims are Utahns, but it's possible some are from Wyoming, Rydalch said.

The FBI is still in the process of identifying investors because of the complexity of the multiple tiers in the scheme, she said.

Rydalch did not know if Koerber had an attorney, but said he probably will have one by the time of his initial appearance in federal court on June 16.

Koerber did not have a listed phone number, according to directory assistance. The phone for FranklinSquires has been disconnected.

However, he wrote on his Web site www.rickkoerber.com in April that he didn't know if he would be indicted but was preparing for that possibility. "Regardless of what happens, I'm sure it's only more likely that I'll eventually be indicted as I continue to criticize the government, government employees, the lazy government PR media, and now complicit lawyers.

"The point, however, is that it's not really me who will be put on trial in such a case. It's America, and its citizenry who are already on trial, today."

Koerber combined business and political themes in Casper, too.

In the 1990s, he operated National Business Solutions under the umbrella of a firm called the Global Information Council. The GIC included its social activism arm called the SoFaith - Society of Families Anchored in Truth and Honor - Project, which denounced Casper College's "Safe Zone" program to promote understanding of homosexuality.

In 2000, the Wyoming secretary of state issued a cease and desist order against Koerber and NBS for violating the state's securities laws.

In 2001, Koerber filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. In the bankruptcy filing, he declared he owed $109,260 to scores of NBS investors as part of his $608,000 in assets and $116,000 in liabilities.

Contact Tom Morton at 307-266-0592 or tom.morton@trib.com. Read his blog at tribtown.trib.com/TomMorton/blog.

WHERE TO CALL

Anyone with information about Rick Koerber, Founder's Capital LLC or related companies is encouraged to call the Salt Lake City office of the FBI at 801-579-1400.