October 30, 2013 THE VILLADOM TIMES II • Page 5 Glen Rock Borough man sentenced to eight years in prison by John Koster George Sepero, a 40-year-old Glen Rock man, has been sentenced to eight years in prison for a series of financial frauds including a scam in which he fleeced an elderly paraplegic widow out of her life’s savings. The U.S. Attorney said that Sepero, after being fired from the financial insti- tution that controlled the widow’s for- tune in 2007, made telephone calls to his former employer impersonating her deceased husband and sent the woman’s family a fabricated statement showing that the woman still had $700,000 in her bank annuity fund, while the actual remaining balance fell to $16. Sepero was sentenced to 100 months in prison on Oct. 17 and ordered to pay $5 million in restitution to the woman and other victims. Sepero and two other scammers who have not yet been sentenced ran a Ponzi scheme in which they claimed that com- puters with advanced algorithms enabled them to produce interest of 170 percent per annum on investments in foreign cur- rency. The use of high-speed computer communication in arbitrage, buying and selling foreign currency based on short- term comparative value, is actually used by professional investors, but the computer mechanics Sepero and his two colleagues described to victims did not actually exist. Instead, they used the incoming invest- ments to subsidize a lifestyle including a $14,000 evening at a Hollywood night- club. The total amount of money the three men acquired by fraudulent means is said to be around $3.5 million. In a classic Ponzi scheme, investors who wish to withdraw money are paid with interest from the money of more recent investors. Once the actual source of the fake profits -- arbitrage of foreign postal coupons in the original 1920s Ponzi scheme and land value in the “Mis- sissippi Bubble,” the first such scheme by John Law in the early 1700s -- is exposed as non-existent, the whole scheme col- lapses. Sepero was indicted last year and entered a guilty plea in March. The other two men, who are from Lebanon, New York, have also pleaded guilty. Ordinance proposes restrictions on McMansions An ordinance that would restrict the size of larger houses on some Glen Rock lots is slated for its public hearing and probable adoption at the Oct. 30 meeting of the Glen Rock Borough Council. The ordinance would restrict the size of new houses or expansions on A1 residen- tial zone lots to a maximum of 5,500 square feet, with the actual permitted size of new houses to be determined by the lot space within 175 feet of the front property lines. Houses in the A2 zones, the majority of Glen Rock’s residential lots, would be restricted to a maximum of 4,400 square feet with the actual sizes subject to the land within 140 feet of the front property line. The ordinance had been discussed for many months by the Glen Rock Planning Board before it was endorsed, and was introduced Oct. 9 by the borough council. Many long-term residents had objected to what they called “McMansions” -- very Council election (continued from page 3) Surrago said. She said Glen Rock is cur- rently engaged in long-term planning and has introduced an ordinance to limit the size of “McMansions” on building lots, and a second senior citizen apartment complex is now under serious consideration. O’Hagan said that, in terms of better communication, the Glen Rock Borough Council meetings have been covered on local TV for the past several years and the borough has a website with information for residents. He added that the landlords who own the downtown stores continue to pay their taxes to the borough as long as they own the buildings, whether the stores are vacant or occupied, and that four new businesses have opened, or are opening, to replace several that have closed in recent months as part of a cycle that is national rather than local. “I have the experience to know how to make things happen and to see that they work,” O’Hagan added. large houses built after the original smaller homes on the lots were razed. While some of the objections focused on a dislike of stucco and of the Mediterranean style of the large new houses in a borough where most houses were built of clapboard in modest styles, officials noted that it was all but impossible to legislate aesthetics. Size restrictions, however, proved to be more potentially enforceable. Observers said there was almost no internal objection to the proposed ordi- nance among elected or appointed officials. The recent building slump has generally reduced the incidence of new construction, but the McMansion protest had consider- able support from residents who enjoy a more harmonious appearance of Glen Rock streets and those who see their own property values as being threatened by the encroach- ment of over-sized houses next door. J. KOSTER