An 81-year-old man was sentenced to 28 years in prison Friday in an investment scam that prosecutors say seeped across half the country and bilked 1,800 people, many of them elderly, of about $190 million. John Heath, who was convicted last month alongside his son Daniel Heath and another man, also was ordered to pay $117 million in restitution to the clients who invested directly through him. Prosecutors said the company ran a scam dating back to the early 1990s that promised clients their money would go into fixed investments with little or no risk. Another business associate, Larre Schlarmann, is serving a 15-year prison term after pleading guilty in 2005 to money laundering and fraud for his involvement in the scheme. read more

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