Jury selection begins Tuesday in the trial of a Marietta financial adviser accused of bilking more than $2 million from a woman by using a number of investment schemes.
Frank Constantino has been accused of stealing $2.7 million from Judy Cox, a Marietta woman who said she invested the money with Constantino between 2002 and 2005.
Constantino’s deals included selling stock in a bank in Belize. He also sold units in a development along that country’s coast and invested in a marina and yacht club there, according to court records previously obtained by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Constantino was indicted by a grand jury last February and has been in the Cobb County Jail. His charges include securities fraud and racketeering.
Constantino denies the charges. His attorney and his wife told the AJC that he is innocent.
Cox, who is not related to the family that owns the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, told the newspaper she trusted Constantino to the point that she gave him what amounted to her life savings.
Officials in Georgia didn’t issue any public warnings or sanctions involving Constantino until they arrested him last February.
However, Missouri securities regulators had ordered Constantino to stop selling questionable investments in their state six years before that.
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