The author of the book is Ellen Joan Pollock. She was working as a senior special writer
for The Wall Street Journal while writing this book. She is currently working at Bloomberg
Businessweek (Bloomgarden-Smoke, 2017). Her history of business journalism indicates why
she decided to publish a book about fraud. In the Epilogue of the book, she mentions that she met
Martin Frankel in a German courtroom, where she asked him to write her from his prison cell.
Frankel never wrote her and would not participate in interviews.
After losing his job as a stockbroker at Dominick & Dominick working for John and
Sonia Schulte, Marty began working from his bedroom. Marty used astrology to predict what
would happen in financial markets. Although his predictions were almost always true, he could
not bring himself to make the trades as a stockbroker due to overwhelming anxiety. Because
Marty was too afraid to make the trades, he began a Ponzi scheme and had to pay his old
investors using new investors money. After getting caught, Marty remained in business by using
aliases and shell companies. Most of his money came from Franklin American Insurance
Company.
Marty began doing business with Sonia Schulte, who decided to divorce her husband.
Sonia became Marty’s first love, and they moved into a mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut.
Marty bought the mansion with the money he laundered from Franklin American Insurance
Company and wired into his many bank accounts. Not long into their relationship, Marty began
to obsess over sadomasochism, which Sonia was not a fan of. He then started to post online
advertisements looking for submissive women. He provided the women he met online with new
cars and housing that he bought with his stolen money. Marty bought many of his business
partners and staff new cars or homes with his stolen money. Sonia left soon after his obsession
began, but she still helped him make fake statements that showed returns on the investments
made by Franklin American.
Because Marty was afraid to use his real name in business, he used aliases. He was
mainly referred to as “David Rosse,” which was the name of a security guard that Marty hired
when he started seeing Sonia. There were not many people who knew Marty’s identity, but there
were a few people that figured out Marty never went out of business. John Schulte was arrested
for committing fraud at Dominick & Dominick, and was out to seek revenge against Marty and
Sonia for turning him in. Marty knew Schulte would be on his tail as soon as he got out of jail,
which is why he hired the real David Rosse to keep him away. Even with the extra security,
Schulte still knew Marty was back in business and tried to turn him in. There were others who
also figured out Marty’s identity and scheme who tried to contact authorities, but nothing ever
came out of it. The SEC claimed that Marty’s fraud was too small, and they had bigger things to
worry about.
Lee Harrell called a meeting with “David Rosse” (Marty) and his consultants to answer
questions. Marty did not show up and decided to escape to Europe because Harrell unraveled his
plan. He ordered those still occupying his mansion to shred all his documents, but they got bored
and decided to burn them instead, which caused a fire. When authorities showed up, they found
all of Marty’s documents. Cynthia Allison accompanied Marty in Europe, gave the police their
whereabouts. Marty was arrested in Germany for using a fake passport and was turned into the
United States for his other crimes.
Marty Frankel’s fraud began when he created the Frankel Fund. His plan was to trade
stocks for his investors, but he was not making any money because he was too afraid to trade.
Marty made fake statements for his clients showing that they were making money when they
weren’t. When his clients got suspicious and wanted to leave, he took money from other
investor’s accounts to give them their money back. When he didn’t have any money left, those
who lost their investments and did not receive a refund filed a lawsuit, which led to the loss of
his brokers’ license.
With the SEC watching him, Marty began using aliases to make shell companies and
open a variety of bank accounts, both in the United States and overseas. Marty made John
