Beverly Hills based company Oxford Gold Group is under federal investigation and the subject of a class lawsuit following numerous complaints about the company and their dealings with people’s investments, according to ABC 7.
Per the Eyewitness News investigation back in July, numerous people transferred five-or-six figure amounts of money to a company that has seemingly disappeared.
“Of all of the gold companies that we could’ve invested in, we invested in the one that was a scam,” Gigi Van Diepen said about Oxford Gold Group, per the report.
“(My husband) wired money to them May 1 of this year,” Diepen said. “They went out of business in April of this year. So, they took our money even though they had closed their doors in Beverly Hills.”
Diepen said that the company was still actively accepting clients even after they closed. Diepen hired an attorney.
“After they were suspended, meaning they weren’t even supposed to be doing business, they went to Gigi’s family and in May,” attorney Michael Aguirre said. “And got them to invest in May of this year.”
Now, a number of people are coming forward to share their stories. Many of them pointed out that when they started to notice something “off” and raised their concerns to the company, the company simply made up excuses.
“She just kept saying, they’re going down a list,” New Jersey resident Sharon Casella, who said she paid over $100,000 to the company, said. “They’re going to straighten it out, you know, it’s all good. Everything’s going to be okay. And then eventually, after all this time, like just up until last week or 2 weeks ago.”
The California Franchise Tax Board suspended the company on April 2nd.
Per the report, customers say that they were directed to set up accounts with a company called Equity Trust, but in February they started letters saying that Equity Trust was no longer working with Oxford Gold.
“What we’re most concerned about today is that the government has not stepped in to take control of the computers, the financial records, the emails, all the rest of it that are essential to identifying where the money went and in so doing, identifying who else may have liability that can pay these folks back,” Aguirre said. “They’re a custodian, okay,” Aguirre said. “So, everybody’s money was transferred to them. And then they gave it to Oxford… the monies were not being deposited or the gold was not being purchased, and we believe that they knew a lot earlier than February of this year.”
Equity Trust would issue the following statement, but did not comment specifically on Oxford Gold: “As a custodian, our function is to take direction from clients who wish to invest using their account at Equity Trust and custody those assets purchased by the clients. Clients choose third parties with which to invest and work directly with that third party to fulfill those purchases and sales.”
The FBI is now involved in the matter, as more and more people have come forward.
