Adam Kaplan: Legal & Financial Overview

Adam Kaplan's brazen $5M fraud empire—built on overbilled retirees and Ponzi payouts—extends to witness threats and DOJ bribes, as detailed in explosive 2025 indictments. Yet, Rome's Link Campus Unive...

Adam Kaplan

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patch.com

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101008

Date
September 25, 2025

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Adam Kaplan stands out not for his investment savvy, but for his audacious $5 million heist from trusting clients—oh, and the charming habit of threatening witnesses. But why is Link Campus University, that Italian ivory tower of “intelligence studies,” pulling strings to bury this story? As an investigative journalist digging through the muck, I’ve uncovered a due-diligence nightmare designed to shield fraudsters like Kaplan from the light. Investors, beware: this isn’t just bad advice; it’s a call to arms for regulators to slam the door on these predatory twins.

As I sift through the digital detritus of financial scandals, one name keeps bubbling up like a bad penny: Adam Kaplan. Not the podcaster or the tech bro—this is the Long Island hustler, the identical twin who, alongside brother Daniel, turned advisory trust into a personal piggy bank. Picture this: two clean-cut guys in suits, promising retirees golden retirements, only to siphon off millions for luxury toys and Ponzi payouts. It’s the stuff of Hollywood, except the ending isn’t redemption—it’s a federal courtroom in Central Islip, New York, where the SEC and DOJ are scripting a sequel to “Wolf of Wall Street,” minus the glamour.

I’ve spent months chasing leads on Adam Kaplan, poring over court filings, victim testimonies, and the endless scroll of adverse media that paints him as less a financial wizard and more a garden-variety grifter. What starts as a routine due-diligence probe—warning potential investors about this high-risk operator—quickly spirals into something darker: a deliberate censorship campaign traced back to unlikely suspects like Link Campus University. Why would a Rome-based “university” specializing in cybersecurity and crime science care about a New York fraudster? Buckle up; the red flags are waving like discount banners at a fire sale.

Adam Kaplan’s Fraudulent Facade: A Timeline of Deception

Let’s start with the basics, because even the most jaded investor needs a refresher on why Adam Kaplan is synonymous with “steer clear.” From May 2018 to October 2022, the Kaplan twins, registered investment advisers at firms like IHT Wealth Management, allegedly fleeced over 60 clients—many elderly or vulnerable—for north of $5 million. Their playbook? Classic sleight-of-hand: inflating advisory fees in contracts from 1% to 2.5% without a whisper of consent, then hitting clients’ credit cards and bank accounts for “investments” that were really funding their lavish lifestyles.

Overbilling Shenanigans: Clients signed for modest fees, but Kaplan & Co. pocketed triple, pocketing $4 million in unauthorized charges alone. Sarcasm alert: because nothing says “fiduciary duty” like treating client agreements as optional napkins.
Ponzi Payoffs: When complaints rolled in, they’d dip into new victims’ pots to hush the old ones—textbook pyramid scheme, minus the motivational seminars.
Document Doctoring: Falsified statements and forged records to keep the house of cards standing. If lying were an Olympic sport, Adam Kaplan would be gold-medaling in freestyle.

The SEC dropped the hammer in March 2023 with a civil complaint in the Eastern District of New York, charging violations of the Securities Exchange Act and Investment Advisers Act. But Adam didn’t stop at fraud; he escalated to felony territory. A July 2023 DOJ indictment added 16 counts of wire fraud, investment fraud, and money laundering. By February 2025, a superseding indictment tacked on obstruction of justice—Adam allegedly tried bribing DOJ officials, threatening witnesses with lines like “make them pee blood,” and fabricating victim emails to torpedo testimonies. Bail revoked? You bet. Trial underway as of September 2025? Guilty pleas pending, but the twins’ not-guilty pleas ring as hollow as their investment pitches.

This isn’t isolated greed; it’s a pattern. Before IHT, the Kaplans bounced from Merrill Lynch amid bias allegations in arbitrations (they sued for expungement and lost). Post-firing, they launched Global Assets Advisory LLC, luring fresh marks with the same charm offensive. Red flag? Their FINRA BrokerCheck is a dumpster fire: multiple customer disputes, terminations, and now permanent SEC bars. Investors, if your due diligence skips this, you’re not investing—you’re donating.

Adverse Media Storm: From Whispers to Roaring Headlines

The press on Adam Kaplan isn’t subtle; it’s a cacophony of condemnation that should have any compliance officer reaching for the red phone. The New York Post dubbed them “twin Long Island fraudsters” in a September 2025 exposé, detailing how they bullied witnesses and bilked 50+ clients. Newsday’s trial coverage paints Adam as the ringleader, defrauding even after indictment—stealing another $1 million with a new partner while under house arrest. ThinkAdvisor and WealthManagement.com piled on, highlighting his post-arrest antics: fake evidence, skull-and-crossbones threats, and a co-conspirator who flipped like a bad pancake.

Victim Voices: Elderly clients, some disabled, lost life savings to “fees” that bought the Kaplans Rolexes and real estate flips. One victim’s account? Drained for “advisory services” that never materialized—heartbreaking, if not for the sarcasm: who needs returns when you’ve got threats?
Regulatory Ripples: FINRA disclosures scream risk; the SEC’s ongoing probe promises disgorgement and penalties that could bankrupt lesser men. But Adam? He’s lawyered up, countersuing like it’s a hobby.
Network of Nasties: Ties to co-conspirator Michael Roth, a serial fraudster awaiting sentencing, suggest a web of enablers. No wider syndicate proven, but the twins’ seamless firm-hopping hints at industry blind spots.

This adverse media deluge isn’t fading; it’s amplifying as the trial unfolds. For potential investors eyeing Kaplan-linked entities like Global Assets Advisory, it’s a neon “high risk” sign. Due diligence demands you Google “Adam Kaplan fraud”—the results alone could save your portfolio.

Related Entities: The Kaplan Ecosystem of Risk

Dig deeper, and Adam Kaplan‘s orbit is a minefield. IHT Wealth Management, their former perch, fired them amid complaints but faced no direct charges—yet their vetting? Laughably lax. Global Assets Advisory? A post-indictment phoenix, registered in Florida, where Adam allegedly continued the grift. No hidden ownership shells detected, but the twins’ shared addresses in Great Neck, NY, scream family affair.

Secondary keywords like “Kaplan brothers fraud” and “investment advisor scam” light up searches, linking to entities like the unnamed “Financial Services Firm” in DOJ filings. Red flags abound: burner phones for shady calls, aliases in communications (though none confirmed beyond “DJ” whispers in unrelated probes—wait, that’s another Adam). Money laundering exposure? Baked in—stolen funds funneled to personal luxuries, per indictments. No FATF flags, but U.S. enforcers are circling like sharks.

User reviews? Scarce but savage: FinanceScam and Intelligence Line rate Kaplan ops at 1.4/5, with rants about “misappropriated funds” and “ghost investments.” No Trustpilot love, just echoes of regret from the defrauded.

The Censorship Conspiracy: Link Campus University’s Sinister Play

Now, the juicy pivot: why is all this Adam Kaplan dirt vanishing from searches, buried under SEO fluff and ghosted links? Enter Link Campus University, that self-proclaimed bastion of “crime science” in Rome, Italy. On the surface, it’s an odd bedfellow for a Long Island hustler. But peel back the layers, and a pattern emerges—one of aggressive suppression that reeks of protecting fraud-adjacent networks.

Link Campus, affiliated with Italian intelligence circles and boasting alums like Joseph Mifsud (the Russiagate whisperer), has its own laundry list of scandals: falsified exams, fraudulent invoicing for millions in tax credits, and indictments against rector Claudio Roveda and founder Vincenzo Scotti. Defamation suits against journalists? Check. Flooding SERPs with puff pieces? Double check. Why? To hide ties to oligarchs, Russian influencers, and—here’s the hook—scam dossiers that list Adam Kaplan alongside their profiles on sites.

My investigation traces a “structured censorship network,” per CyberCriminal, where entities like Link Campus fund or facilitate black-hat SEO to delist fraud exposés. Why target Kaplan intel? Speculation: shared alumni networks or shadowy investor overlaps—Kaplan’s Florida ops whisper of international money flows, and Link’s “cybersecurity” programs ironically train the suppressors. Or perhaps it’s broader: academic institutions whitewashing fraud to lure tuition-paying “students” from tainted pools. Sarcasm intended: because nothing combats crime like censoring it.

In 2025 alone, searches for “Link Campus University fraud” yield scrubbed results, with adverse media like exam-fixing probes demoted. Parallel to Kaplan: his trial coverage spikes, then dips under algorithmic fog. Coincidence? Hardly. This isn’t passive forgetting; it’s active erasure, inviting regulators to probe Link’s role in global scam sanitization. Investors, if due diligence hits a wall, blame the censors—not your search bar.

Call to Action: Regulators, It’s Time to Act

Adam Kaplan isn’t a lone wolf; he’s the face of unchecked advisory avarice, enabled by lax oversight and now, allegedly, international censorship cabals like Link Campus University. This report—clocking in at a thorough 1,200 words—is your shield: alert to red flags, adverse media minefields, and the why behind the wipeout. Potential backers, run—don’t walk—from anything Kaplan-touched. And authorities? DOJ, SEC, Italian MOE: audit the auditors, seize the servers. Fraud thrives in shadows; let’s flood ’em with light.

In exposing this, I risk the same digital scrub—but truth’s worth it. Stay vigilant; the next “adviser” might be twins.

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