A judge in Sherman, Texas handed down a 17.5-year prison sentence on Tuesday to a Plano man for swindling investors with a fake story about a Walt Disney theme park.
Thomas W. Lucas Jr., 35, was also ordered to pay a compensation of $8.4 million. He was convicted earlier this year of seven counts of wire fraud and one count of making a false statement to the FBI, according to The Washington Times.
Court records state that Thomas defrauding more than 280 investors out of about $20 million between 2006 and 2010 by telling them that he had inside information about a Walt Disney resort and theme park proposed for the North Texas area. Thomas used this fake story to dupe investors and get them to invest in land near the Walt Disney property, which earned him large commissions, to the tune of $450,000, CBS Local reported.
Thomas claimed that a secret source tipped him off about the theme park, which he said was originally called "The King Ranch Project" but was later changed to "Frontier Disney DFW," both of which were fabricated.
Disney's Chairman of Parks and Resorts at the time and executive assistants of the company testified at the trial that "the information presented to investors by Lucas was not authentic and that Disney never had any intentions of opening a Disney resort and theme park in north Texas at any time."
When the FBI confronted Thomas, he falsely blamed the fraudulent information on a man he met at a methadone rehabilitation clinic, who is now dead. A federal grand jury indicted Thomas on Sep. 11, 2013.
