New Jersey man goes to prison for running sham businesses and defrauding people of $550,000

A man who opened several shell companies and defrauded customers and employees of nearly $550,000 has been sentenced to prison in a federal prison.

Michael Salerno, 55, of Mount Laurel, was sentenced to 37 months in prison on Monday, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania said in a news release. He previously pleaded guilty to three counts of wire fraud.

Salerno operated several companies between 2016 and 2018 that purported to trade foreign currencies. Employees at those companies were charged fees of over $1,000 upon hiring and were falsely promised that they would have access to millions of dollars that they could use to trade for large profits, federal authorities said.

Salerno received more than $300,000 in fees from the new hires and spent the money on himself, federal prosecutors said.

He deceived employees by falsely posing as a successful foreign exchange trader and businessman with a multimillion-dollar real estate empire. In reality, he had filed for bankruptcy twice, been evicted multiple times and was already serving time in prison for a tax-related conviction in federal court, officials said.

After finding out his trading was under investigation, Salerno hatched another plan: He created a company that purported to help people get out of unwanted car leases. Customers paid him hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees before realizing it was a scam.

Those who thought they could get out of their leases had to either continue making payments or have their credit scores affected, while customers who took over the lease faced foreclosure, prosecutors said.

“Michael Salerno is a modern-day quack,” said U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Jacqueline C. Romero. “When he learned that his fraud scheme had caught the attention of the FBI, he didn't just close up shop and clean up his act – he simply turned to another scheme.”

As part of his sentence, Salerno was also ordered to pay $549,835 in restitution.