NEW YORK, Dec. 18 -- Two money managers with strong ties to a top modeling agency have been indicted on grand larceny and fraud charges for allegedly pocketing more than $1 million of their clients' money. New York State Attorney General Dennis Vacco said Monday that instead of protecting and investing the models' earnings, David Weil and Peter Bucchieri were illegally diverting cash from the accounts.
In addition, Weil was charged with statutory rape for having sex with a 15-year-old model in 1992. He was arrested Monday. Bucchieri is in Las Vegas and is expected to surrender next week, a spokesman for Vacco said. The attorney general launched an investigation into the pair's business dealings after New York Magazine reported several models' complaints about their firm, Star Capital Management Inc., in July. Vacco did not release the names of more than a dozen models allegedly fleeced by Star Capital. But the magazine reported that Guess? model Ingrid Seynhaeve was the first to raise questions about the duo. Star Capital rented office space from the agency that handles the careers of Seynhaeve and many of the other alleged victims, Elite Model Management. About 30 Elite models signed up with the firm, depositing an estimated $7 to $10 million a year into its accounts. The defendants reportedly persuaded many of their clients to sign agreements giving them power of attorney by promising they would ensure the models always had cash in their accounts they would withdraw while on location. 'What this pair of con men did was abuse their position of fiduciary trust and cheat unsuspecting young models out of their hard-earned money,' Vacco said in a statement Monday. 'They convinced the models they were working in their interests when all long they were nothing more than conniving vipers.'
