We broke down an 825-page court document filed in the Daryl Heller bankruptcy: Here’s what we learned

• By Brett Sholtis and Chad Umble/LNP | LancasterOnline

A private jet loaded with bundles of cash. Creditors and vendors clamoring over unpaid bills. A company owner coolly insisting that needed funds would soon arrive. And company executives unable to say, under oath, that Paramount Management Group was not engaged in fraudulent activity.

These are just a few of the takeaways from an 825-page document filed by attorneys, part of Heller’s personal bankruptcy proceeding.

Just over a year ago, Heller’s company, Paramount Management Group, stopped paying investors in its cash machine network. People from Lancaster County and beyond lost more than half a billion dollars. The investor funds sued Paramount. Unpaid creditors sued Heller.

In December, the FBI raided Paramount’s office. Now, with Heller preparing for the possibility of criminal charges, the legal filing offers insights into what those close to Heller knew.

Most of the document — over 600 pages — is made up of texts between Heller and Paramount Management Group Chief Executive Officer Randall Leaman. It also includes recent depositions with Leaman and two other executives held by attorneys for the investor funds.

Here are some top takeaways from what Heller and his colleagues said — under oath, and in private.

• In depositions, Leaman and Paramount Chief Financial officer Dennis Ream were unable to say Paramount was not a Ponzi scheme — a fraudulent financial operation that relies on new investments to keep it from collapsing.
• Heller and his associates used a private jet to fly “large amounts of cash” related to Heller’s cryptocurrency business to Michigan, with Ream saying he had been on two flights.
• In texts with Heller, Leaman worried that they had committed fraud, pointing in particular to a document they had signed in a settlement with a Michigan-based ATM company.
• Heller and Leaman used money they pulled from Paramount, in the form of “ownership draws,” to purchase a multi-million dollar beach house in New Jersey.
• As Paramount struggled to pay basic bills, Heller repeatedly described being on the cusp of securing major, new funding.

Texting was the primary way Heller and Leaman communicated during Paramount’s final months, meaning their text messages offer a detailed look into the last days of a company that caused one of the largest business losses in Lancaster County history.

For more details drawn from depositions and Heller’s texts with Leaman, check out these stories:

As Daryl Heller’s ATM network collapsed, text messages show chaos and desperation

Under oath, Paramount execs could not say ATM company wasn’t a Ponzi scheme