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Like so many others, Sacha Amar Singh was impressed by the young, skinny, self-annointed “crypto king” Aiden Pleterski.
“I thought he was a sharp kid and could be one of those unicorns,” the real estate developer recalled.
He’d first heard of Pleterski through his friend Akil “A.K.” Heywood and met him at a Pickering restaurant in April 2021. “He was being touted as the next big thing,” Singh said.
He admitted knowing it was high risk and invested just $10,000 at first. By the end, he’d handed over $3.6 million to the Oshawa whiz kid he labelled “Aiden Banker” in their text conversations where Pleterski excitedly updated him on weekly high returns.
A year later, Singh had only managed to withdraw $700,000 of his funds – and confronted Pleterski with his suspicion that it was money he’d taken from other investors.
Pleterski, 27, has pleaded not guilty to fraud over $5,000 and money laundering. His jury trial has heard from numerous investors who claim the high-flying guru who curated an online persona of private jet travel and collecting luxury sports cars had cheated them out of millions of dollars in a short-lived Ponzi scheme.
Singh, who testified virtually from a location 12 hours ahead, said he withdrew $1 million in gains — with Pleterski taking the agreed-upon 30% — in November 2021. The next month, Pleterski sent out a mass message to all investors apologizing for “little bit of a backup with funds coming out, especially cash.”
Worried about investment
By the spring, though, Singh was worried about his investment as Pleterski complained his Belize-based trading platform froze their funds.
“Like that 700,000 you gave me, did that come from FXChoice? Or did that come from other investors that gave you money and you just gave it to me?” he demanded in a conversation he secretly recorded with Pleterski in May 2022.
“They were still paying, last year. The delays started early December. The last payment I ever got from them was in February. Ever since February, I have been paying people out of my own pocket. That is exactly how it is.”
Sought proof
Singh wanted proof there was actually money in the brokerage account. Pleterski agreed to send his associate, Mitchell Learning, with a computer to show him a live screenshot of his account balance of over $300 million.
Learning, who also invested with Pleterski, has testified he was also shown a video of Pleterski’s investment account with a balance of $311 million. But when he logged into Pleterski’s computer in June 2022, he saw it had been deleted.
“You did me so f–ing dirty,” Learning said in a phone recording played for the jury last week. “Like, I just tried to help you so much, and you just, you just f—ed me. You lied to me. You got me to show fake f—ing s–t to people, put my neck out for you”
After Singh was shown the balance by Learning, Pleterski told him he’d discovered the trading platform and its accounting was all smoke and mirrors. “There’s nothing official about these guys whatsoever,” he said in the recording.
“I think I saw 300-and-something million, Mitch just showed me,” an incredulous Singh said. “But they are treating it as a ‘demo account,’ and it is not real money? Is that what you are trying to say?”
Pleterski painted himself as victim
No more money was coming out of that platform, Pleterski said, and then painted himself as the victim.
“I’ve been paying people out of pocket for months and months and months,” he told Singh. “And I can’t afford to keep doing that. Because if I do keep doing that, I’m going to end up bankrupt.”
Crown attorney Scott Patterson then asked Singh similar questions he’s posed to other investors who say they lost their investment.
“If you knew your money was being used for other purposes, would you have invested?”
“No,” Singh replied.
“If you knew the source of that $700,000 (he was paid back) was just your previous investments – the money you’d already given to Mr. Pleterski – would you have continued to invest with him?”
“No,” Singh repeated.
Superior Court Justice Shaun Nakatsuru asked the self-represented Pleterski if he wanted to cross-examine his former client.
“I don’t have the legal knowledge to challenge the inconsistencies in his testimony, Your Honour.”
The trial continues Friday.
mmandel@postmedia.com