William Lee Jeffers and Roger Anthony Rawlings

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

LITIGATION RELEASE NO. 16473 \ March 16, 2000

People of the State of Colorado v. William Lee Jeffers and Roger Anthony Rawlings, Civil Action No. 00CR976-5 (Jeffers) and 00CR 990-5 (Rawlings); (El Paso County, CO) March 10, 2000

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that on March 10, 2000 the Attorney General of the State of Colorado obtained criminal indictments against William Lee Jeffers, a stock broker in the Colorado Springs, CO office of D.E. Frey and Company, and his branch manager, Roger A. Rawlings, for securities fraud.

The indictment alleges that Jeffers committed three separate felonies, contending that he excessively or inappropriately traded the accounts of three elderly D.E Frey clients of limited means, failing to disclose to them that he was utilizing margin trading to finance the trading and to generate trading commission for himself. D.E. Frey and Company is a Denver-based broker-dealer with branch offices located throughout the country. The indictment alleges that in the case of one eighty-seven year old female, over a period of twenty-three months Jeffers generated in excess of $25,000 in trading commissions while the account actually suffered a decline in value of approximately $29,000. Bond for Jeffers was set in the amount of $25,000.

The Colorado Grand Jury also indicted Roger A. Rawlings, Jeffers' supervisor and then branch manager of D.E. Frey's Colorado Springs branch office. The indictment against Rawlings alleges a felony based upon his failure to supervise Jeffers, notwithstanding his knowledge that Jeffers' registration to sell securities in Colorado was subject to a special supervision requirement which required that Rawlings monitor Jeffers' trading activity on a daily basis. Bond for Rawlings was set in the amount of $10,000.

Trial on the indictments will be held in El Paso County, Colorado. The staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission rendered assistance to the State of Colorado in this matter.