That escape was more of a faux‑break than a real jailbreak. Eliyahu Weinstein, a 51‑year‑old former real‑estate developer from Lakewood, New Jersey, was set to return to prison after scamming another $35 million from 150 people in a fraud scheme tied to medical and security supplies for Ukraine.
Weinstein was given a pardon by President Trump in 2021, a move that had been facilitated by lobbyists such as Nick Muzin and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and by legal advice from high‑profile attorney Alan Dershowitz. At the time, he was serving more than half of his 24‑year sentence for earlier fraud.
The new scheme began just months after his release. Prosecutors described it as a “Ponzi-like fraud scheme” in which new investor money was redirected to pay earlier investors. Weinstein and a group of co‑defendants—one of whom was named in criminal filings—touted Optimus Investments Inc. as the vehicle, with Weinstein acting as a “silent partner.”
They convinced investors to purchase COVID‑19 related supplies—ranging from N95 masks to “scarce baby formula”—supposedly to aid people in war‑torn Ukraine. The money raised was in part funneled into the Turkish stock market under the guise of a mask scam, and the “baby formula” was fabricated to appear as if it had been shipped from Turkey to Newark.
According to the federal court, the victims were largely affluent members of the local Orthodox Jewish community. In earlier conduct, Weinstein allegedly leveraged his background as a former yeshiva student to defraud investors of an estimated $230 million in two other real‑estate Ponzi schemes.
In a tape recorded by co‑conspirators shortly after his release, Weinstein admitted, “I finagled, and Ponzied, and lied to people to cover us for our deals,” highlighting how he diverted investor funds in the mask scheme.
Following his March conviction, a judge, Michael Shipp, imposed a 37‑year prison term and ordered Weinstein to pay roughly $44 million in restitution. The sentence reflects the continuation of a pattern that began with his prior fraud, “picked up right where he left off,” according to former U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, Philip Sellinger.
Weinstein had served seven years and eight months of his original sentence before the clemency, and is now headed back to the slammer after a series of new deceptive ventures.
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