Expatriate Sydney property developer Nati Stoliar jailed
Jonathan ChancellorDecember 7, 2020
The expatriate Sydney property developer Nati Stoliar has been sentenced to two years jail in the United States, after he pleaded guilty to fraud under the US Clean Air Act.
His Nevada home has been sold after he was ordered to pay more than US$1.4 million in restitution and to forfeit $4 million in cash in a biofuels fraud case.
The 64 year old Stoliar, who pleaded guilty in mid-2014 to the fraud, faced a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
The FBI announced earlier this month Stoliar had been sentenced to 24 months in prison along with three years of supervised release. It was for his role in an illegal scheme to generate fraudulent biodiesel credits and to export biodiesel without providing biodiesel credits to the United States.
As a Sydney property developer Nati Stoliar owned two of the trophy homes of Sydney, Boomerang at Elizabeth Bay and then Villa del Mar at Point Piper.
His six bedroom, six bathroom US home in Henderson, Nevada was sold under order of forfeiture at US$1,140,000.
Stoliar's business partner James Jariv was sentenced in federal court in Las Vegas to ten years in prison. Records show other items forfeited included a gold Bulgari chronograph and a diamond tennis bracelet.
Under the 2009 scheme, Stoliar and his co-defendants were alleged to falsely claim to import, purchase, and blend more than 4.2 million gallons of biodiesel.
They then allegedly sold the fraudulent RINs (regulatory information notices) generating more than $7 million.
It was alleged Stoliar and Jariv instructed tanker truck drivers to drive back and forth across the U.S.-Canada border, claiming to be importing biodiesel into the United States and exporting feedstock to City Farm in Canada.
The trips would generate credits paperwork purporting to show biodiesel production and importation.
Accounts were utilized in Nevada, Canada and Australia, and transactions were investigated by the U.S. EPA Criminal Investigation Division and the FBI, with assistance from the U.S. Secret Service and the Department of Homeland Security.
Following his indictment, Stoliar’s arrest was sought by the United States. Located in Poland, Stoliar returned to the United States to surrender for arrest.
James Jariv and Stoliar then both pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy, one count of conspiracy to engage in money laundering, two counts of wire fraud and one count of making false statements under the Clean Air Act.
“This was an egregious scheme to defraud fuel suppliers, the United States, and a program designed to strengthen our nation’s petroleum independence and improve our air quality” said assistant attorney general John C. Cruden for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.
“We will not tolerate such fraud and will vigorously prosecute those who put their own enrichment above our nation’s interests.”
The image above is of Sydney trophy home Villa del Mare, which Stoliar built in the late 1990's.
This article first appeared in The Sunday Telegraph.
Jonathan Chancellor
Jonathan Chancellor is one of Australia's most respected property journalists, having been at the top of the game since the early 1980s. Jonathan co-founded the property industry website Property Observer and has written for national and international publications.