Alleged Funds Thief Arrested by FBI
BOSTON – Gregory Loles, an investment adviser from Easton, was arrested by the FBI Tuesday and charged with swindling clients, including the church he attends, the St. Barbara Greek Orthodox Church of Orange, Connecticut, and his fellow parishioners. The Hartford Courant reports that “Loles, 50, was charged with using the U.S. mail and federally regulated communication lines to orchestrate phony investment deals and that U.S. Magistrate Judge Holly B. Fitzsimmons ordered the accused held for a bail hearing in Bridgeport on Friday.”
According to The New Haven Register, which cited the church’s attorney and federal court documents, “Loles allegedly made off with more than $2 million from three parishioners, and likely millions more from the Orange church.” The Courant revealed that “Federal prosecutors said Loles used investor funds for his personal use and diverted a portion to Farnbacher-Loles Motor Sports, a Danbury-based automobile racing team in which he has an interest.”
In an exclusive interview with The National Herald, Rev. Peter Orfanakos, the parish’s priest of 13 years, said that the St. Barbara parish “is still in shock,” after the revelation that one of its members allegedly embezzled huge amounts of money from the endowment and building funds of the church, as The
National Herald reported in last week’s edition.
Although the exact amount has not been determined as yet, it is believed, according to Fr. Orfanakos, that “it might be the total amount of the endowment fund, $1.8 million.”
The New Haven Register reported that Mr. Loles attempted to commit suicide last week and that he was hospitalized. Since then he was discharged from the hospital but nobody seems to know his whereabouts.
In an interview with The National Herald, Fr. Peter Orfanakos refused to say if Mr. Loles attempted suicide, but he said that “he was hospitalized.”
Asked by The Herald about the events in his parish, Fr. Orfanakos said, “I know you have some information that was given to you by Greg Stamos. The church is diligently looking through its records to see the extent of the damage and what
was done. The church right now finds itself an apparent victim, amongst many victims.”
Addressing the question of how much money is involved, Fr. Orfanakos said, “It is so early to tell. Again, we are trying to uncover the extent of the damage. There was an endowment fund that had in it $1.8 million and there was a building fund that had in it about $250 thousand.”
Fr. Orfanakos admitted that: “Mr. Loles had access to the endowment fund account. He was a member of the fund. We have turned everything over to the civil authorities. We are cooperating with them and the FBI, so I am limited [in my ability] to answer some of the questions.”
When asked if Mr. Loles was the financial planner for the endowment fund, Fr. Orfanakos said, “I do not really know the answer to that.” To the follow-up question concerning how the embezzlement was executed, he said “I do not know the answer to that. I am trying to minister to these potential, apparent victims [who were his clients] and to the members of the church [who feel victimized].”
Asked about the seven member committee that oversaw the endowment fund and what type of supervision they did, Fr. Orfanakos said, “That is what everyone is looking into right now; that is something out of our hands at the present time. We thought that we had plenty of security checks and balances in place, but we found ourselves in this situation now, so we are trying to see how security was breached.”
To the question of whether the alleged perpetrator, Mr. Loles, acted alone or if there were any other collaborators, he said: “To the best of our knowledge, he acted alone, but again, the entire parish and all the other victims are collaborating with the FBI and the other civic authorities who lead the investigation.”
Speaking about who the whistleblower was that informed the parish priest and attorney Gregory Stamos, Fr. Orfanakos said, “He was not a parishioner but someone who made a phone call that caused us a little a bit of alarm”. He added, “As a parish, we moved as quickly as possible as soon as the phone call came in, trying to get answers; within three days, the FBI was alerted.”
Asked again about the amount of money that is missing, he said, “In all honesty I do not know, but in the worst case scenario, it is the money that was there ($1.8 million), but
they are still searching and the FBI has ways of looking for these things but we are not privileged to any of that.”
With regards to who was making the decisions about the money of the endowment fund, Fr. Orfanakos said, “The committee itself was coming up with different decisions.” As
to who was executing those decisions, he said: “I believe that it was Greg Loles, but now that is what we are investigating”. When asked who appointed him to do that, Fr. Orfanakos
said, “We are looking into the minutes of past [meetings] to see.”
Regarding how many years this situation was going on, Fr. Orfanakos said,”I do not know if we know the answer to that question”. He said of Mr. Loles, “My understanding is that he grew up in St. Spyridon parish in Washington Heights, in New York.” Fr. Orfanakos added: “I knew him as a parishioner, but again now – as we see through things