On November 4, 2025, Jay Clayton, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, unsealed the indictment of Bradley Heppner, founder of Beneficient Company Group LP, a financial services startup, who has been charged with multiple crimes related to an alleged yearslong fraudulent scheme executed to divert funds for his personal gain. According to the indictment, Heppner’s fraud left investors and lenders to absorb more than $1 billion of losses. The indictment was unsealed shortly after he was arrested by federal authorities. The investigation is an important reminder for companies and individuals how much federal authorities are maintaining an aggressive enforcement approach related to investor fraud.
According to the indictment, Heppner allegedly orchestrated a scheme to misappropriate more than $150 million from GWG Holdings Inc., a publicly traded company, through a shell entity he controlled called Highland Consolidated Limited Partnership (HCLP). The charges include securities fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud and wire fraud, making false statements to GWG’s independent auditors, and the falsification of records.
Prosecutors allege that after GWG took an equity stake in Beneficient, Heppner directed Beneficient to acquire the ownership interests of GWG’s founding members, giving Heppner control over the company. Heppner then installed himself as GWG’s chairman and appointed friends and associates to the board of directors, several of whom also served as Beneficient directors. After GWG’s board formed an independent special committee to oversee transactions between GWG and Beneficient, Heppner repeatedly misrepresented the circumstances of Beneficient’s debt to the special committee in order to obtain approval of funds transfers from GWG to Beneficient that he used to pay off significant outstanding loans, including debts that Beneficient allegedly owed to Heppner’s shell company HCLP. Heppner represented to the special committee that HCLP was a third-party lender, concealing his ownership interest, and funneling the funds received from GWG to HCLP for his own use.
To maintain the fraudulent scheme, Heppner falsified documents regarding the control and management of HCLP and lied to Beneficient’s auditors regarding Beneficient’s financial position, according to the indictment. Beneficient’s fraudulent audit was incorporated into GWG’s annual 10-K filing, making GWG’s filing materially misleading to investors. Heppner later falsified additional documents that were produced to the SEC in response to an enforcement subpoena issued to GWG as part of an ongoing investigation into GWG and Beneficient. According to the indictment, as a result of Heppner’s conduct, GWG ultimately filed for bankruptcy, leaving over $1 billion of unpaid obligations to bondholders.
The coordinated efforts of the SEC and FBI led to Heppner’s indictment. Heppner faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for the fraud charges and up to five years for the conspiracy charges.
For more information, please contact us or your regular Parker Poe contact. Click here to subscribe to our latest alerts and insights.