Northstar Commercial Partners And CEO Brian Watson Found Liable For Securities Fraud
After a five-day trial, a Denver-based development company and its founder were found liable for two counts of intentional securities fraud.
A jury in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado found Northstar Commercial Partners and founder and CEO Brian Watson responsible for defrauding investors in 11 real estate projects over a roughly three-year period. The Securities and Exchange Commission stated that Watson made false statements about investing his own money in Northstar’s projects over enough time to account as a scheme.
“We are pleased with the jury’s verdict holding Mr. Watson and Northstar liable for fraud for making material misrepresentations to investors in multiple real estate projects,” SEC Enforcement Director Margaret A. Ryan said in a statement. “This case demonstrates the SEC’s continued commitment to protecting investors and holding accountable those who seek to mislead and defraud them.”
During the trial, the SEC stated that Watson raised around $50M between 2017 and 2019 but didn’t invest the 5% of his own money as investor documents suggested he would, The Denver Post reported.
Northstar did not immediately return Bisnow’s request for comment on the ruling.
Watson’s team sought to put those 11 deals in the context of all other projects Northstar had undertaken since its founding, noting that the CEO had nearly always invested at least 5% of his own money.
The punishment for Northstar and Watson has not yet been decided, though their sentence is expected to be financial, as the charges against them were civil.
During his testimony last week, Watson accused online retail giant Amazon of weaponizing the SEC against him.
Amazon sued Watson in federal court in Virginia for racketeering and fraud in 2020. The online retailer alleged Northstar paid kickbacks to two Amazon employees to help the firm land deals to develop multiple data centers in Virginia.
Watson denied the allegations.
That prompted the FBI to conduct an investigation and execute a search warrant at Watson’s home in April 2020.
“We know that Amazon hired attorneys who then lobbied their cronies at the Department of Justice to investigate me,” Watson said during his testimony on Jan. 29. “For four and a half years they investigated me.”
The federal criminal investigation into Watson did not result in charges.
Watson and his lawyers said the SEC specifically selected the 11 projects at the root of the case from the 166 deals Northstar executed since its founding in 2000. They argued that the investor materials were not binding contracts because only the deals’ operating agreements were.
“Without telling the truth, defendants robbed investors of an informed choice,” SEC attorney Terry Miller said during the case’s closing arguments. “It was fraud and it happened over and over.”
