David Gentile, a convicted fraudster pardoned by President Donald Trump, will no longer have to pay the $15.5 million in restitution he owed.
The former CEO of GPB Capital and his business partner, Jeffry Schneider, were convicted in August 2024 of conspiring to defraud thousands of investors in a scheme totaling $1.6 billion, Politico reported Wednesday.
The pair reportedly used the money from investors to “pay distributions and create a false appearance of success."
Gentile was sentenced in May and was just 12 days into his seven-year sentence when Trump commuted it on Monday.
The investigation into Gentile began in 2018, during Trump's first term, and one of Trump's DOJ attorneys pushed the courts to give Gentile a 15-year sentence earlier this year.
The White House has argued that Gentile's company had told investors about their strategy.
“At trial, the government was unable to tie any supposedly fraudulent representations to Mr. Gentile,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Monday during a press briefing. “This is another example that has been brought to the president’s attention of the weaponization of justice from the previous administration and therefore he signed this commutation.”