On July 21, 2021, George Heckler, whom the SEC charged in March 2021 with operating a decade-long investment adviser fraud, was sentenced in a parallel criminal case to 63 months in prison.

The criminal charges against Heckler, in part, stem from the same misconduct alleged in the SEC's complaint, filed in federal district court in Newark, NJ. The complaint alleges that Heckler formed two private hedge funds, Cassatt Short Term Trading Fund LP (Cassatt) and CV Special Opportunity Fund LP (CV Special), to conceal massive losses incurred by another fund controlled by Heckler. According to the complaint, from 2009 through 2019, Heckler raised millions of dollars in new investor capital through Cassatt, CV Special, and three other entities he controlled, and falsely told investors that their funds were used in very short-term equity trading that consistently generated positive returns. However, the complaint alleges that a substantial amount of investors' funds had not been invested at all or had been used to make Ponzi-like payments to prior investors. Heckler also allegedly concealed his fraud by providing investors with false account statements showing fictitious gains.

The SEC's litigation against Heckler is ongoing. On April 21, 2021, the district court entered a partial judgment against Heckler enjoining him from violating the antifraud provisions of Section 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 thereunder, and Sections 206(1), 206(2), 206(4) and Rule 206(4)-8 of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940.

The SEC's investigation was conducted by Julia C. Green, Burk Burnett and Dustin E. Ruta, and supervised by Scott A. Thompson. The litigation is being handled by John V. Donnelly III. This matter arose out of a referral from the Philadelphia Regional Office's Examination Program.