{"id":4592,"date":"2026-08-11T23:36:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T23:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=4592"},"modified":"2026-08-11T23:36:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T23:36:14","slug":"judge-fed-up-with-gop-megadonor-who-spent-60-million-on-yachts-and-jets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=4592","title":{"rendered":"Judge fed up with GOP megadonor who spent $60 million on yachts and jets"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

U.S. District Judge Max Cogburn is losing patience with a billionaire Republican donor as he delays his 12-year sentence, according to the Charlotte Observer.<\/p>\n

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\u201cA federal judge warned Durham billionaire Greg Lindberg during a heated Monday morning hearing that he was \u2018overestimating his intelligence\u2019 by continuing to shuffle through lawyers and fight about how much restitution he must pay for bribing a North Carolina official and orchestrating a $2 billion scheme to defraud insurance companies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lindberg, founder and CEO of the private equity firm Eli Global LLC \u2014 renamed Global Growth \u2014 was recently sentenced to more than a decade in prison. But that was a \u201clighter sentence\u201d option made possible by Lindberg\u2019s proactive payments to his victims, U.S. District Judge Max Cogburn pointed out. <\/p>\n

A special master in charge of determining Lindberg\u2019s restitution said he still owes more than $1.6 billion, but Lindberg says he doesn\u2019t and has pulled in a new attorney to argue that the special master should be disqualified and is acting unconstitutionally.<\/p>\n

The Observer reports Lindberg \u201csiphoned more than $2 billion\u201d from his insurance companies and used \u201cmore than $60 million of money on yachts, jets and women.\u201d Lindberg\u2019s attorneys said Lindberg had already paid victims $1 billion before the court ordered him. That, says the Observer, was the largest restitution ever paid in the state.<\/p>\n

Lindberg was once the biggest political donor to the North Carolina Republican Party before pleading guilty last year to leading a $2 billion fraud and money laundering scheme that profited off of thousands of people insured through his Durham-based companies. In a separate trial, Lindberg was convicted of attempting to bribe NC Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey, a Republican, who wore a wire for the Federal Bureau of Investigations to record Lindberg. <\/p>\n

A special master in charge of determining Lindberg\u2019s restitution said he still owes more than $1.6 billion, but Lindberg says he doesn\u2019t and has pulled in a new attorney to argue that the special master should be disqualified and is acting unconstitutionally.<\/p>\n

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Judge Cogburn wasn\u2019t having Lindberg’s stalling.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe defendant, and possibly strategically, wanted to show he was going to pay restitution for a lighter sentence,\u201d Cogburn said, and now that Lindberg\u2019s been sentenced, \u201che wants that money back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lindberg\u2019s original attorneys had withdrawn from the case, and other attorneys had started filing motions without any signed paper designating them as Lindberg\u2019s new counsel.<\/p>\n

In the minutes before the hearing began, Cogburn said that Lindberg\u2019s new attorney, Vivek Ramachandran, and another attorney, Kenneth Barnes, had filed 10 motions in Lindberg\u2019s docket: \u201cWhat\u2019s the deal? We\u2019re not playing games,\u201d said Cogburn. \u201cThis court has given a fair sentence. This sounds like a delay!\u201d<\/p>\n

The judge also cautioned: \u201cWe\u2019re not dummies here. We know fraud when we see it,\u201d according to the Observer.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the judge appears weary of Lindberg’s tactic, said the Observer.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a long case,\u201d said Cogburn, who has presided over the case since 2019 and is expected to rule on the restitution by Aug. 24. \u201cAnd apparently, it\u2019s going to be longer.\u201d<\/p>\n

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U.S. District Judge Max Cogburn is losing patience with a billionaire Republican donor as he delays his 12-year sentence, according to the Charlotte Observer.\u201cA federal judge warned Durham billionaire Greg Lindberg during a heated Monday morning hearing that he was \u2018overestimating his intelligence\u2019 …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4591,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nJudge fed up with GOP megadonor who spent $60 million on yachts and jets - Next Address America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=4592\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Judge fed up with GOP megadonor who spent $60 million on yachts and jets - 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