Broward County Resident Sentenced to 66 Months in Prison and Ordered to Pay Over $200K for Defrauding Investors in Public Impact Projects Throughout Africa

Ariana Fajardo Orshan, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida and the Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the Export Import Bank of the United States (EXIM Bank) announced that Bernd Zalke Rind, 63, of Broward County, Florida was sentenced to prison and ordered to pay restitution for orchestrating a fraud scheme that preyed on individuals looking to make public impact investments in Africa.

Rind had previously pled guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft (Case No. 18-cr-60323).  He was sentenced to 66 months in prison by U.S. District Senior Judge William J. Zloch on June 25, 2019. Last week, on September 13, 2019, Rind was ordered to pay $217,315 in restitution by U.S. District Judge Robert N. Scola, Jr. 

According to the court docket, including the criminal Indictment and a Stipulated Factual Basis that was filed in support of Rind’s guilty plea, between October 2017 and through May 2018, Rind utilized fraudulent EXIM Bank documents as part of an “advance fee” scheme.  As part of this scheme, Rind would obtain legitimate EXIM Bank documents through his company, B&T Trust, LLC.  Rind would then alter these documents to make it appear that he had obtained EXIM Bank financing for various public interest construction projects in Africa.  This included fake loans totaling hundreds of millions of dollars that, according to Rind, provided financing for a school in Botswana, a low-income housing project in Zimbabwe, a Solar Power plant, and a medical clinic in Zambia.  Using the lure of lucrative and socially impactful investments, along with the assurance of guaranteed EXIM Bank financing, Rind tricked investors into paying him hundreds of thousands of dollars in up front “retainer fees” in order to avoid losing the fake EXIM loans that he had supposedly obtained.  Rind received at least $217,315 in illegal proceeds as a result of his fraudulent scheme.  The victim investors are located throughout Africa and the United States.  This was Rind’s second Federal felony conviction related to fraudulent business practices.             

U.S. Attorney Fajardo Orshan commended the investigatory efforts of EXIM Bank’s Office of Inspector General – Office of Investigations in this matter. This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Frederic Shadley.

Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or at http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.