A con man who claimed to be the first black hedge fund manager in America was slammed with a 5-year prison term by a seething Brooklyn federal judge Tuesday who skewered him as a “narcissistic, self-promoting predator.”
Suave conman Fredrick Scott pleaded guilty to sucking more than a million dollars out of investors and then using the money to fund a lavish lifestyle marked by a Manhattan townhouse, pricey restaurants, a chauffeur and frequent shopping jaunts to Louis Vuitton and Chanel boutiques.
Scott — who paid a PR firm to burnish his image as a financial savant and landed a spread in Ebony magazine — told his marks that he managed billions in capital and flashed pictures of himself grinning alongside celebrities like former Knick Patrick Ewing to drive home his status, according to court papers.
The pint-sized but well-groomed bamboozler, 29, delivered a barely coherent rant at his sentencing Tuesday, lobbying Judge Roslynn Masukopf to be easy with the jail time so that he could be free to pay back his victims the $1.3 million he owed them.
But the simmering jurist eventually curbed Scott’s address and delivered one of her own before hitting him at the highest level of federal sentences guidelines for the fraud.
“You are continuing your con in front of me,” she deadpanned. “You were — and you are — an unmitigated conman.”
Mauskopf said she wasn’t moved by Scott’s silver-tongued soliloquy that blamed everything from his impoverished childhood to the inherent greed of all humanity for his actions.
“You used your charisma, lies and fast talk to cheat your victims,” she said,
Mauskopf said that Scott crippled his victims financially and even prevented one woman from being able to pay for her son’s medical school tuition.
Even after Mauskopf delivered her sentence, Scott hectored his lawyer into asking for more time to address the court.
The judge refused.
“Fredrick Douglas Scott claimed to be a part of history,” said US Attorney Loretta Lynch after the sentencing. “In reality he was a con man and a thief who fleeced unsuspecting retail investors, his so-called clients, out of more than a million dollars.”