Jordan Belfort, the author of two books about his life as the rapacious “Wolf of Wall Street” and now a prominent motivational speaker, is sending mixed messages, federal prosecutors say.
Mr. Belfort is the felon whose life as a crooked, drug-addled stockbroker is portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio in the Martin Scorsese movie released last month. He has taken to social media to defend himself after a flurry of publicity that has sometimes been unflattering. But the prosecutors who sent him to jail are not buying Mr. Belfort’s account.
The United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York said that Mr. Belfort owed $100 million to investors who lost money in the 1990s doing business with Stratton Oakmont, the now-defunct Long Island brokerage firm that Mr. Belfort founded. And Mr. Belfort wants the public to know that he’s doing everything he can to make those investors whole.
“For the record, I am not turning over 50 percent of the profits of the books and the movie, which was what the government had wanted me to do,” he wrote on his Facebook page on Dec. 29, referring to his contributions to a court-ordered restitution fund. “Instead, I insisted on turning over 100 percent of the profits,” he said.
Mr. Belfort added that his proceeds “should amount to countless millions of dollars and hopefully be more than enough to pay back anyone who is still out there.”
The comments were also published on Mr. Belfort’s Twitter account, @wolfofwallst.
Robert Nardoza, a spokesman for Loretta E. Lynch, the United States attorney in Brooklyn, took issue with Mr. Belfort’s claims.
“Belfort’s Facebook comments are substantially inaccurate,” he said. “The government has seen nothing to suggest that even 100 percent of Belfort’s profits from his book and the movie ‘Wolf of Wall Street’ would yield, in his words, ‘countless millions,’ much less the approximately $100 million that is still owed to the victims.”
Nicholas M. De Feis, a lawyer for Mr. Belfort, said that he did not have a crystal ball to divine the final tally, but his understanding was that the movie and the books “are succeeding well beyond expectations.”
Among the extensive publicity surrounding the release of the movie have been articles that refer to Mr. Belfort’s obligation to give back half of his gross income for three years after his supervisory release from prison, which was April 28, 2009.
Mr. Belfort’s lawyers have said in letters to the United States attorney that the obligation to turn over half his income is over and that they have made repeated offers to pay 100 percent of the profits from the movie and the two books in a forbearance agreement.
Mr. Nardoza, however, said that even before Mr. Belfort’s supervisory release, the government had to take aggressive steps to claim portions of Mr. Belfort’s income. After the government learned about Mr. Belfort’s deal to publish the book “The Wolf of Wall Street” in 2007, it served subpoenas and restraining notices on Bantam Books, Warner Brothers and Appian Way for any payments they might have been obligated to make to Mr. Belfort, Mr. Nardoza said.
Similarly, the United States attorney served a restraining notice on Red Granite Pictures, the production company for the movie, after it became aware of Mr. Belfort’s movie contract. As a result, the government has received $125,000 from Red Granite and expects to receive a second payment of $125,000 “in the near term,” Mr. Nardoza said.
Mr. De Feis said that it had always been Mr. Belfort’s position that he would turn over all of his book and movie proceeds to the government and that the Facebook post was “completely true.”
Mr. Belfort has offered several accounts of how much money his victims might receive from his book and movie deals and of the status of his negotiations with the government. New York magazine said in an article published in November that Mr. Belfort claimed to have signed over all the proceeds and profits from his story to the government, but no signed agreement has been executed. Both the United States attorney and Mr. Belfort’s lawyers say the two sides are negotiating.
As for the amount that investors might see from his books and movie, along with his estimate of “countless millions,” he has also told Bloomberg Businessweek that his books and movie revenue “will probably be 20, 30 million dollars.”
Mr. Nardoza said that Mr. Belfort is giving the wrong impression in his claims. “He insinuates in his Facebook post that he’s going to make victims whole by all this money from the book and movie,” he said. “But he still owes victims $100 million,” which is not a realistic amount to expect from the movie proceeds in Mr. Nardoza’s view.
“We’re seeking to get assets from Belfort and people that owe him and to do our best to get money back to victims,” Mr. Nardoza said. “Whatever money that may be, we’re going to look to seize it.”
Since the release of the film on Christmas Day, there has been a tidal wave of news coverage, and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law of Yeshiva University is even sponsoring a program titled “The Wolf of Wall Street: Behind the Scenes at Stratton Oakmont” later this month. The evening will feature panelists and speakers including Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Gregory Coleman, the F.B.I. special agent who led the investigation of Mr. Belfort, among other prominent lawyers.
In the meantime, Mr. Belfort has garnered hundreds of mostly supportive comments from Facebook followers, including “You are a good man Jordan!” and “Bayside’s got your back.”
Mr. Belfort rallied his troops in late December with a Facebook post that pointed out that all publicity is good publicity. “Ahh, the haters!” he wrote. “No one spreads the word for you faster than they do. They’re the best PR in the world.”
Those who know him best might even wonder whether it was all another example of his genius at manipulation. Even Mr. Belfort’s pesky prosecutors — and the journalists who write about him — might agree that every criticism and every article simply furthers the fame of the broker who fleeced investors of millions.