By Clint Olivier
FRESNO - Karyn Sabin and her brother Lance Sabin are getting together for the first time since they heard their investment in Fresno-based HL Leasing has gone bad.
The two have potentially lost tens of thousands of dollars.
"Lord knows it better not be a fraud," Lance Sabin said.
But the FBI field office in Sacramento says it probably is.
"It does appear that we do have some victims in this case, that could potentially be out a significant amount of money so we are going to look into it to try and determine exactly what happened here," FBI Agent Steve Dupre said.
The FBI says about eleven hundred people were probably victimized by this man, HL Leasing owner John Otto.
He committed suicide last weekend.
The offices of HL Leasing are located at 3439 W. Shaw.
It was represented as a company that bought discounted medical leases through American Express.
The money made would be paid back to investors at a staggering rate of 9 percent interest.
Investigators now want to know whether or not Otto worked alone.
They're also tracking any money lost, right now it's an estimated 200 million dollars.
"We do attempt to recover as much of the assets that we can in hopes of trying to return some of that money to the investors," Dupre said.
But lawyers for HL Leasing say they will find the cash first, and pay it back.
In a statement given to KMPH news, Daniel Callahan of the Orange County law firm of Callahan and Blaine, said:
"There aren't any warning signs that would indicate this is a Ponzi scheme. I don't see any evidence to support that."
He adds:
"I believe the money will be located in the accounts where it belongs," Callahan said.
It should be mentioned Callahan says he was hired by John Otto last Friday. Only a couple of days before Otto took his own life.
Callahan says he still needs to find all the paperwork pertaining to HL Leasing, and he is pleading for investors to remain calm.
But Lance Sabin and his sister Karyn say that's not good enough.
"I'm hoping that everybody's wrong, and that the investments are solid, and if they're not, there's a way of collecting back the money," Karyn Sabin said.
Besides the anger at losing so much money, victims say they're also dealing with guilt.
Many encouraged friends and loved ones to also invest with Otto.
Now they may be victims too.
