La Jolla Lawyer Receives 21 Months in Prison

A local lawyer was sentenced July 1 to 21 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release for wire fraud. Paul Conrad Ward of La Jolla was also ordered to pay $530,000 in restitution, according to the FBI.

Ward was indicted in August 2010 and charged with devising a scheme to defraud an investor in New Mexico. The FBI said Ward induced the victim to give $500,000 to a business entity controlled by Ward, purportedly an overseas trading program; however, Ward used the money for personal use.

Ward entered a guilty plea on March 31 and admitted to soliciting and accepting $500,000 from a victim under false pretenses. And according to the FBI, he admitted that he did not invest the money as promised, but instead spent almost all of the money for his personal use and the use of others in less than three weeks.

At his sentencing, Ward issued a $200,000 check that will be applied to his restitution bill, according to the FBI’s Albuquerque division. The balance is due within one year of his release from prison.

Ward was ordered to self-surrender to a federal correctional facility within 60 days of his sentencing.