Bala Cynwyd Company Founder Gets 22 Years For Ponzi Scheme

BALA CYNWYD, PA — The founder of a Bala Cynwyd company will spend nearly two dozen years in prison and pay back tens of millions of dollars for running a Ponzi scheme, according to federal authorities.

United States Attorney William M. McSwain said Troy Wragg, 37, of Philadelphia, was sentenced today to 22 years in prison and $54 million restitution for perpetrating two fraud schemes.

Wragg was the founder of Mantria Corporation, based in Bala Cynwyd.

From 2005 until 2009, Wragg received approximately $54 million in funds from investors across the United States with the false promise that they would earn 50 percent or higher returns on their investments.

Wragg told the victim investors that Mantria was a very successful company with investments in real estate and green energy. In reality, however, Mantria was a Ponzi scheme which used new investor funds to pay "earnings" to earlier investors.

Wragg obtained these large investments through co-defendant Wayde McKelvy, who ran unlicensed investment clubs in Colorado.

In addition to advising the victims to invest their retirement savings in Mantria, Wragg and McKelvy coached the victims to obtain home equity loans, credit card loans, and other loans to raise even more funds to invest in Mantria. Thus, when the Mantria Ponzi scheme collapsed, many of the victims were left financially devastated.

While on bail pending sentencing for the Mantria fraud, Wragg brazenly committed a second fraud scheme.

Wragg solicited an investment in an online video dating service, known as LUVR, with the false representation that the company was about to be purchased by a well-known internet entrepreneur. In reality, no such deal ever existed and the victim lost her entire investment.

Wragg pleaded guilty to both fraud schemes. Co-defendant Amanda Knorr also pleaded guilty to her role in the Mantria fraud and was sentenced in April 2019 to 30 months’ in prison.

Co-defendant Wayde McKelvy was convicted on all counts at trial in October 2018. The Court has not yet set a sentencing date for McKelvy.