U.S. SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Litigation Release No. 17949 / January 24, 2003

SEC v. Raymond M. Marker, et al., Case No. 1:02-CV1109 (M.D.N.C. ).

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION SEEKS CONTEMPT ORDER AGAINST GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA BUSINESSMAN AND HIS INVESTMENT FUND

On January 14, 2003, the Securities and Exchange Commission filed an application in the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina seeking an order to show cause why United States Private Investment Fund ("USPIF"), a purported international fund doing business in North Carolina, and its principal, Raymond M. Marker should not be held in contempt. The application states that Marker and USPIF violated the Court's December 20, 2002 Order and January 3, 2003 Order Freezing Assets of Defendants Marker and USPIF and Directing an Accounting. Those orders (1) prohibited defendants from destroying or transferring documents from their office at 701 Green Valley Road, Suite 306, Greensboro, North Carolina 27429 until the Court's January 8, 2003 hearing on the Commission's motion for a temporary restraining order and other equitable relief and (2) required the defendants to submit to the Court and the Commission an accounting on or before January 8, 2003. Although defendants were served with the Orders, they have not complied with these requirements. Instead, Marker removed substantially all contents within his offices and left the state of North Carolina. Morover, the Commission properly served Marker with a subpoena requiring him to appear at the Court's January 8, 2003 hearing, but Marker failed to appear.

The SEC's application requests that the Court: (i) issue an order to show cause; (ii) find that Marker and USPIF have acted in contempt of the Court's December 20, 2002 and January 3, 2003 Orders and the Commission's subpoena; and (iii) direct that fines and/or incarceration will be imposed for every day in which Marker and USPIF are found to be in contempt in the future.

http://www.sec.gov/litigation/litreleases/lr17949.htm