A once-trusted Chicago suburban insurance agent will now be counting bars instead of cash. Daniel M. Rosenbaum, the former owner of Alexander & Rosenbaum Financial Group LLC in Kenilworth, Illinois, found himself sentenced to seven years in the slammer Tuesday for bilking friends, family, and clients out of over $1 million in annuity premiums, federal prosecutors announced.
Beginning in 2016, Rosenbaum, who was trusted by at least 18 victims, pocketed annuity payments that funded a lifestyle far above his means, using the cash for personal expenses like spousal and child support, credit card bills, and jewelry store splurges. According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, Rosenbaum crafted a series of fake documents complete with cut-and-paste logos from actual insurers to dupe clients into believing they were legitimately covered.
In a story of deceit growing ever more knotty, Rosenbaum didn't stop at selling phony annuities. Adding to his fraudulent repertoire, he exploited the federal Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) intended for businesses suffering during the COVID-19 pandemic. The crafty agent submitted three bogus PPP loan applications and made off with $53,537, prosecutors revealed.
The financial shenanigans continued as Rosenbaum, a resident of Brown Deer, Wisconsin, even defrauded his own state. By filing false applications, unaware of one of them being a close family member, he bagged an additional $65,826 from Illinois' unemployment insurance benefits. "Not only was Rosenbaum stealing his clients' money, but he was also leaving them without the annuity coverage they expected to have," Assistant U.S. Attorney Prashant Kolluri notably weighed in on the defendant's actions, as clients suffered "substantial financial hardship."
Ultimately, Rosenbaum's day of reckoning came before U.S. District Judge Manish S. Shah in Chicago, where the 56-year-old pled guilty to a federal wire fraud charge. His seven-year sentence was a joint venture between the Northern District of Illinois' U.S. Attorney's Office and the FBI's Chicago Field Office, with indispensable aid from the South Chicago Heights Police Department.
