Sarasota County Man Sentenced in Federal Fraud Case

A Sarasota County title insurance company owner will spend the better part of the next three years in prison while facing a financial judgment of $4.7 million in a fraud case that caught federal investigators’ attention.

Stephen J. Cormier, 42, of Nokomis was sentenced recently by Senior U.S. District Judge Susan C. Bucklew, according to an email from the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office. Cormier plead guilty March 5, 2013, in the case that involves a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. The sentence handed down is for three years and five months. Bucklew also issued a financial judgment against Cormier.

Cormier was the sole owner of A Clear Title and Escrow Exchange in Venice. Part of that company’s business was to write title insurance policies while holding money in escrow for real estate and business transactions. Cormier was accused of receiving money that came from fraudulent activities, the sheriff’s office email stated.

Some of that money included “investments that had been made by numerous investor-victims related to ‘synthetic’ financial transactions,” the email stated. “These transactions generally involved promises of high rates of return within a short time period, and have been publicly labelled as fraudulent by the Securities and Exchange Commission and other financial authorities.”

The money was ultimately disbursed under the direction of other co-conspirators, the sheriff’s office said.

Cormier was also accused of making false representations to victims as to the status of their money.

All told, he handled about $4.7 in investor funds.

The sheriff’s office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation worked together on the case.

Photo Credit: Stephen Cormier/Courtesy of the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office