Marion County job investment in shambles as CEO charged in $30 million fraud scheme [View all]

MARION, S.C. – In March 2013, a Miami-based global resources company announced the largest initial investment in Marion County -- a $54 million rice repackaging plant promising to employ at least 215 people over the course of five years to package imported rice and manufacture diapers at the old Blumenthal Mills property. After months of anticipation, it’s now apparent the deal is in shambles.

The former Chief Executive Officer of Essex Holdings, Inc. Navin Shankar Subramaniam Xavier was charged with two separate fraud schemes totaling more than $30 million, according to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office Southern District of Florida.

The first scheme involved nearly 100 investors who purportedly purchased interests in sugar transportation and iron ore mining in Chile. The second scheme involved unlawfully obtaining economic development funds from the State of South Carolina.

Wifredo A. Ferrer, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and George L. Piro, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Miami Field Office, made the announcement last week.

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