In this week’s episode of The Dark Side of Finance, Darryl Lyons unpacks the shocking case of Dawn Bennett, once a top financial advisor with a dazzling reputation, now serving a 20-year prison sentence for orchestrating one of the most bizarre financial frauds in recent history. From her rise to fame as one of the country’s leading female advisors to her fall involving a Ponzi scheme and occult rituals, this story is one you won’t believe.
Key show highlights include:
- The unique story of Dawn Bennett, one of the most renowned female financial advisors.
- An explanation of how she ran a Ponzi scheme, stealing millions from clients.
- A deep dive into the investigation that led to her arrest and the shocking discoveries made by the FBI.
- The aftermath for her victims, many of whom lost their life savings and may never recover financially.
Join us as we explore this story of deception, greed, and the insane lengths some will go to maintain image and power. If you find this episode insightful, be sure to share it with those you care about. Keep your head on a swivel, and let’s navigate this dark side together.
Transcript:
Hey, this is Darryl Lyons. I’m the co-founder of PAX Financial Group, and you’re listening to The Dark Side of Finance. This information is general in nature only. It’s not intended to provide specific investment, tax or legal advice. Visit PAXFinancialGroup.com for more information.
Dawn Bennett was a veteran financial advisor. In fact, Bill Murphy, who is the chairman of the Gold Antitrust Action Committee, said that “Dawn is one sharp cookie and as up in her gold game as anyone I have spoken in the media.” Or, Ben Elliott, the Director of White House Speechwriting from ‘81 to ‘86, he said, “You have to admire her courage for making these points so boldly.” Now, Ed Moy, a Director of the U.S. Mint, he was the director from 2006 to 2011, he said that “She’s savvy, right to the point.”
I think people generally believe that she was one of the sharpest, most articulate financial advisors in the entire country. She actually had this show called “Financial Myth Busting” that was in D.C, and she had some incredible guests on there, including Steve Forbes. It was on Saturdays, it was at 10 a.m., and it was exploding. She had big name guests, like I said, Steve Forbes, Senator Rand Paul, Ted Nugent, Trey Gowdy, I mean, Ben Carson. She just brought them all.
She was sharp. She had been in the business since the 80s. And she, according to Barron’s Magazine, which Barron’s is an important publication for financial advisors across the country because it ranks financial advisors. And me personally, as a financial advisor, even though we would be ranked pretty well, we manage a lot of money, we’ve never submitted for Barron’s. It just hasn’t been a priority for us. But many advisors around the country love to get their name on that list. And she was one of them.
She touted that she was getting returns that were in the top 1% of all returns worldwide. But in the Barron’s Magazine, she had said that she was managing 2 billion and what that did for her is she was one of the top women financial advisors in the entire country. In fact, she was number five, according to Barron’s magazine. Now, this 57-year-old at the time that this was happening, generally speaking, is now serving 20 years of prison time. I’m going to share with you how this unfolded and the Voodoo that was involved.
Now, again, Bennett was a product of the 80s. She started her career in ‘87, which was an interesting year because for those that don’t remember or weren’t old enough, that was market crash year. Michael Milken. Junk bonds. It’s a tough year to start in this career, but I do see a lot of the, a lot of some of the best advisors in the country start their career in these bad years somehow. And she did that. She started in a bad year, and she built relationships with some clients, and they stuck with her for all those years.
For example, she helped this one guy named Michael Fox, not Michael J. Fox. This guy was a Museum Director from Arizona. He was in his 70s and unfortunately, he was caring for his ill spouse, and he trusted Dawn. He trusted her. And his entire life savings was stolen by Dawn Bennett.
I mean, there were clues. And we’ll talk about some of those clues, but this was a tough case. She was good. She’s bold. Brash. Some people even called her a bully. She would bully her way to get what she wanted. But some people were attracted to that, “I want a fighter on my team when it comes to my money.”
Michael Fox mentioned to her again, this funeral director, he said, told her in an email, “Dawn, what you were managing is our sole security blanket. It would be a killer, if for any reason, an investment in your fine company would lead to any more losses than what our portfolio had experienced in the recent past”. And she assured him again, confidently, boldly, brashly. So he wired $851,985 to Dawn, including a loan against his life insurance policy.
You must have thought, “Man, she’s in the Barron’s Magazine. She’s brash, she’s bold. She’s been doing this since ‘87.” In fact, she was so successful, she had a luxury suite at the Cowboy Stadium. She played the part. In August of 2017, she started a luxury sports clothing line called, DJBennett.com. And this is where she began to redirect her client’s money into this new venture.
That included Michael Fox, included about 46 other people, 45 other people. And you know what? You’re looking at this credibility saying, “Well, how? She’s like, she’s killing it. She’s in Barron’s and she’s got all of this.” Well, even then you probably have some skepticism. And you say, “Dawn, do you have… I’m willing to invest, but can I see the financials? Can I see your profit and loss statement, and your balance sheet?” So, she would provide those. She’d show the financials, but the financials were false. They were falsified by her CFO who was in on this. The company was losing millions. In fact, this CFO, his name is Brad, he’s been sentenced to 30 months. But what did she use this money for if she wasn’t using the money for this start- up business?
She was taking these clients’ IRAs and their retirement money and putting it in DJBennett.com, but what was she using the money for? Luxury handbags, belts, shoes. When the FBI raided her house, they found thousands, tens, maybe even hundreds of thousands of dollars of luxury items that she shopped for. But how did she get caught? If she’s playing this game, how did she get caught? And if a client wanted their money out, she would just go to another investor and just play that game, which as we know we’ve talked about this before, called a Ponzi scheme.
Well, interestingly enough, it was a bank teller that actually started to open up investigations. When a little old lady came in to wire money, the bank teller became suspicious. And eventually other investors became suspicious. This was a quote from one of the investors, he said, “I want to reiterate that I’m requesting to get a full refund of the total of $775,000 that I invested in your company. I do not want any further communication with you, except a notice that the funds have been deposited to my Wells Fargo account.”
Now, that specific investor, he got his money back. But it was from another investor. And eventually these calls started catching up. More and more people became suspicious. So, when somebody called her office, she told her staff that she was out of the country, which she was not out of the country. She just didn’t have the money. She had spent it all.
And in August of 2017, the FBI raided her penthouse in Chevy Chase, Maryland, and they found all of her luxury apparel. And of course, much of the money went to luxury apparel, but also went to luxury travel. What they also found inside of two freezers, dozens of sealed mason jars full of like, murky water and some type of meat inside. And they looked, opened it up, and it was a tongue. And in the tongue, there was a cut, a slice right down the middle of all the tongues, and on top of each of these mason jars were initials.
And obviously the FBI’s like, “What the heck is this?” Well, the initials were all the investigators that worked for this Security Exchange Commission. What she had done is taken $800,000 of her client’s money, that she told them she was investing into DJBennett.com luxury brands, and she went overseas and hired a Hindu priest to teach her a spell called the ‘Beef Tongue Shut Up Hoodoo Spell’. And her attempt was to cast a spell on all of the investigators. She did a spell for each one individually, so they would shut up and they would cease the investigation.
She would chant, “I cross and cover you. Come under my command. I command you to hold your tongue.” Dawn Bennett was absolutely crazy. She stole $20 million from retirees—people just like you and me that trusted in her, that bought into her confidence, bought into her reputation. What could we have known? Is there anything we could have known? I think about that. And I was thinking about as I was researching this, what could we have known?
I did go to the Broker Check site, which is a regulatory site by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, and there was one case on there, which was a settlement. She ended up settling for $750,000, but it was a clue to the degree in which she was manipulating investments. I also, this is not always perfectly correlated, but when there’s this degree of arrogance, I think we as humans need to consider that a red flag. But we often don’t.
I, and I guess it’s our society, maybe television, that considers arrogance to be such a virtue because that person is going to fight for me when I am living my life. And often we look for attorneys that do this, and maybe even doctors, and I think that might have been a clue. And again, going to the FINRA website, that might have been a clue.
But again, these con artists, these fin-crime con artists are hard to spot. She lied to the bank too, I mean she was able to get, and this is a sophisticated institution, she was able to get a $750,000 line of credit. She falsified a statement to the bank saying she had $4 million in another bank account. You know how much she had in that bank account? $35.24.
She lied to Forbes, a credible institution, publication. She said she had $2 billion in assets under management. She had 400 million. She lied to Dallas Cowboys. Saying that she had the financials to support her lease. She lied to the Hindu priest. This is hard, guys. We have to stay vigilant. These thieves are out there. And again, they don’t wear masks anymore.
The arbitration panel for FINRA has asked her to pay 14 million to her victims. That’s not going to happen. But she was charged for 17 federal accounts of conspiracy, securities fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, making false statements. It only took the jury five hours to deliberate. But the victims, some of them may never recover and their lives will never be the same. The irony is, you can still go to this “Financial Myth Busting” site and see all of her interviews. It’s still up. But I went on it in disgust.
My friends, I ask that you keep your head on a swivel. This is a show about financial crimes, also known as fin-crimes, and they’re very real. And they are as prevalent as they have been ever before. Keep your head on a swivel for you, your family, and your community. Make it a great day.
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