NEW YORK (AP) – A wealthy former CEO who dodged securities fraud charges by spending a decade in Africa with a $50 million nest egg was sentenced Thursday to 30 months in prison by a judge in New York City who blasted him as “foolish” for hatching his scheme and fleeing justice for so long.
The sentence for Jacob “Kobi” Alexander, an Israeli citizen and permanent U.S. resident, was the longest for any U.S. defendant convicted of manipulating stock options, though far less than the maximum 10-year term. Of his two co-defendants, one received time served, and the other one year.
Alexander, 64, is a former Israeli military officer who made his fortune at the helm of Comverse, a once-thriving voicemail software firm with offices in Woodbury, New York.
“I really don’t understand how someone as brilliant and accomplished and focused and respected as you, could be so incredibly, abjectly foolish to make some of the decisions you made,” U.S. District Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis said in federal court in Brooklyn.
The sentence was meant to send a message to other wealthy defendants that they “cannot buy a new life to escape justice,” the judge added.