Sentencing slated for seller of unregistered securities

“We will argue for jail time,” said John Kelleher, assistant chief deputy attorney general.

Clark County District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez could sentence Nash to a maximum of 40 years in prison, or the judge could put Nash on probation.

Seventy-year-old Deanna Lucas, one of the investors, said she will go to court to argue for prison time.

“I don’t believe the court should show any mercy,” Lucas said. “She showed none to me.”

Nash persuaded Lucas and her husband, David, to borrow against their paid-off home so that they could earn 10 percent interest lending Nash money for business and real estate ventures. The couple invested $313,000 with Nash.

The Lucases wanted to use the interest payments to travel, Deanna Lucas said, but they now must sell their house. Deanna Lucas fears they may not make any profit from the sale because of the depressed real estate market. Lucas said she and her husband are too old to go back to work to replace the money they lost to Nash.

“She doesn’t seem to have any regrets or remorse about what she did to us,” Lucas said. “The attorney thinks she probably hid the money someplace. I know she had a very extravagant lifestyle.”

The Lucases were among 34 elderly couples and individuals who invested with Nash, court papers show. A lot of these investors lost their life savings, Kelleher said.

“She made no effort to pay anybody back,” Kelleher said.

Her only asset appears to be a house that is encumbered with loans, he said. Nash qualified for a public defender because she convinced authorities that she was poor.

Attempts to reach Nash and her attorney failed.

Another woman with a similar name lives in Sandy Valley. The second Nash said she had to hire attorneys to remove a $3 million judgment entered against her by mistake. Nash, the criminal defendant, lives in southeast Las Vegas.

The Securities Division of the Secretary of State’s office completed its investigation of criminal defendant Nash, and she was charged initially with 23 felony violations. The attorney general’s office later increased the number of criminal counts in the complaint to 28. She pleaded guilty Oct. 15.

Nash did business as Palace Worldwide Enterprises and Nash Financial Management with offices at 3216 W. Charleston Blvd. She ran newspaper ads and held investment seminars at area casinos.

The defendant offered investors opportunities to invest in private mortgage investments and encouraged some to tap their home equity to make investments that were said to yield as much as 16.8 percent.

Some loans were supposed to be have strip shopping centers as collateral. But court papers say she provided investors with no prospectus and failed to explain how she would repay the mortgage loans. The defendant did not disclose that she transferred ownership of Roosevelt, Utah, property to a limited liability company in Utah called La Rue Park, according to papers.

“This is just another example of seniors being targeted in investment schemes,” Secretary of State Ross Miller said following the filing of the criminal complaint against Nash. “Seniors need to be aware of the scams out there.”

Contact reporter John G. Edwards at jedwards@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0420.