From Ponzi schemes to drug rings, these 5 Indiana men deceived their way into infamy
But their wealth didn't come from run-of-the-mill business dealings. Instead, they obtained the money that fueled their grandiose lifestyles through scamming and other illicit activity.
From a money manager parachuting from a small plane to fake his death to a nursing home executive skimming from sham contracts, these stories of privilege and white-collar crime have repeatedly thrust Indiana into the national spotlight.
Here are five Hoosiers who became infamous for living double lives:
Indiana money manager Marcus Schrenker lived the good life. He stayed in a waterfront mansion in an affluent neighborhood on Geist Reservoir with his wife and three children, drove a Lexus, and threw extravagant parties. He dressed in Armani suits and even owned his own plane.
But Schrenker's glamourous life would come crashing down — much like his aircraft during an infamous getaway flight where he tried to fake his own death after clients came forward and accused him of conning them.
Schrenker's scheme unraveled during the 2008 economic downturn. At the time , his clients — who included friends, family and others — wanted to shift to safer investments. They thought they were investing in a foreign fund that, unbeknownst to them, didn't exist. Schrenker, instead, used their money to finance his lavish lifestyle.
Under pressure from clients trying to claw their investments back, he made risky bets to recoup their money and conceal his tracks. He couldn't cover the losses though.
Facing lawsuits from angry clients and a personal life in crisis, Schrenker boarded his plane in 2009 and took off toward the Gulf of Mexico. Over Alabama, he issued a distress call, claiming that he was running out of fuel. The small plane crashed into a swampy area near a residential neighborhood, about 200 miles from the Florida Panhandle. Schrenker was nowhere to be found.
Authorities suspected the plane crash was a ploy Schrenker used to fake his own death and escape his personal and financial troubles. They weren't wrong. In actuality, Schrenker had parachuted out of the plane over Shelby County, Alabama, fled on a motorcycle he had stashed there, and was found days later at a Florida campground. He attempted to take his own life there.
In custody and facing jail time, Schrenker pleaded guilty to security fraud charges. A Hamilton Superior Court judge sentenced him up to 10 years in prison and ordered Schrenker to pay $600,000 in restitution. He also received a consecutive 4-year federal sentence in Florida for placing his plane on autopilot and leaving it to crash.
Read the full story here.
More: From Geist mansion to homeless, Marcus Schrenker's daughter struggles to move on
Former Indianapolis attorney and businessman Tim Durham has been called the "The Playboy of Indiana" and the "Madoff of the Midwest." Durham lived in a mansion with seven bedrooms, eight full bathrooms, and five half baths. He mingled with beautiful models, sailed on a 100-foot yacht and collected exotic sports cars.
But Durham didn't come into his lavish lifestyle by honest means.
Instead, he and two associates mastermind a scheme to swindle more than $200 million from more than 5,000 clients, many of whom were elderly or of modest means. Durham and his associate, James F. Cochran, acquired Ohio-based Fair Finance Co. in 2002. Durham assumed the role of chief executive and was a member of the firm's board. Cochran served as chairman of the board. Rick Snow, an accountant and another associate, was chief financial officer.
Under their leadership, the men turned the once-reputable investment firm into a personal piggy bank as the trio deceived investors and used investments to finance their lavish lifestyles and make loans to family and friends. They bought mansions, hosted elaborate parties — including one that was Playboy themed — and vacationed at luxury resorts.
More: Tim Durham ordered to pay $1.3M in federal securities fraud case
The scheme came to an end when a whistleblowing director tipped off the FBI that the company had become a Ponzi scheme. In 2012, Durham, who reportedly masterminded the scheme, was convicted of securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud and conspiracy. He was sentenced to 50 years in prison. Cochran was convicted of six counts of wire fraud while Snow was found guilty of three.
Just two years after Durham's conviction, a federal appeals court overturned two of the 10 fraud counts he was found guilty of, citing prosecutors' failure to enter supporting evidence into the court record. His original sentence was upheld in 2015 and the Indiana Supreme Court disbarred him in 2016.
Read more.
Former real estate broker Bert Whalen lived comfortably in a waterfront mansion on Geist Reservoir while Indianapolis tenants suffered in dilapidated and neglected homes his companies managed. The houses — typically duplexes and single-family homes — had mold, rodents, broken toilets, rotted floors and sewage-filled basements, among other things.
Whalen made his money buying and selling the low-end homes to investors across the country who wanted in on Indianapolis' hot rental market. Those people doled out thousands of dollars, believing that Whalen would fix up and manage the properties on their behalf. But a 2019 IndyStar investigation found he didn't uphold his end of the bargain. Properties his companies managed racked up code violations, turning unsuspecting out-of-state investors into slumlords.
IndyStar found that Whalen and his then-business partner, former Fox & Friends co-host Clayton Morris, sold more than 700 dilapidated homes from 2017 to 2019. Morris operated a popular YouTube show about real estate investing and often connected investors with Whalen. Disgruntled investors sued them.
The allegations led federal prosecutors in New Jersey to indict Whalen on fraud charges. He pleaded guilty in November 2019, and in February 2025 he was sentenced to 41 months in federal prions.
Morris was never charged with any crimes.
Revisit IndyStar's investigation into how inadequate government oversight allowed slumlords like Whalen to pray on vulnearable tenants.
More: 'The opposite of justice': Nearly 3 years after conviction real estate fraudster still free
A Baptist pastor, a farm in New Palestine, and an illegal, international drug ring that ensnarled two Hendricks County sheriff deputies and an Indianapolis public school teacher. The details are surreal and the tale could have been scripted for TV — think "Breaking Bad."
But it took place in real life in Central Indiana.
At the center of the story is Robert Jaynes Jr., a fire-and brimstone preacher who founded the fundamentalist Irvington Bible Baptist Church in 1998 and lead a flock of parishioners there. From April 2011 to October 2013, Jaynes manufactured, packaged and sold more than 500,000 packages of spice, a potentially deadly synthetic marijuana also known as "K2."
Jaynes even lured some of his church members into the criminal venture. They wrote checks to foreign suppliers, laundered profits through their personal bank accounts and packaged drugs at warehouses run by Jaynes and his brother-in-law Kirk Parsons.
The operation reportedly netted $2.6 million over a nine-month period in 2013.
Court documents and an IndyStar 2015 investigation revealed the local spice operation was part of an international conspiracy stretching from the United States to China and back to two Indianapolis warehouses and a farm in New Palestine. Jaynes pleaded guilty in 2016 and was sentenced to 11 1/2 years in prison. But in a surprising move, former President Joe Biden commuted Jaynes' sentence in December 2025 as part of what the White House largest single-day act of clemency in modern history.
Revisit IndyStar's investigation into the spice road.
James Burkhart was supposed to be in the business of caring for some of Indiana's most vulnerable senior citizens, but in reality he and several co-conspirators operated a massive fraud and kickback scheme involving Indiana's largest nursing home operator.
The former top executive for American Senior Communities, Burkhart pleaded guilty in 2018 to his part in orchestrating a nearly $20 million scheme that funneled money through a web of shell companies. An IndyStar investigation revealed that most of the stolen money came from the Health & Hospital Corporation of Marion County. The scheme spanned six years and involved various aspects of ASC's business. The company managed 70 senior care facilities throughout the state.
More: 5 were prosecuted in American Senior Communities fraud. A secret report accuses 20 more.
Burkhart spent the money on diamonds, gold bars, vacation homes and private jets. Meanwhile, nursing home residents often went without care they needed, mainly because of understaffing. Meanwhile, residents at poorly staffed nursing homes often went without the care they needed. Burkhart executed and skimmed money via sham contracts and business deals. In some instances, he created shell companies that inflated vendors bills or submitted false bills for fictitious services. He also demanded kickbacks from vendors.
Burkhart pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud, money laundering conspiracy and to violating the health care anti-kickback statute. He was sentenced to 9.5 years in federal prison, but in a surprising move former President Joe Biden granted him clemency before leaving office. Burkhart was among 1,500 people whose sentences Biden commuted as part of what the White House described as the largest single-day of clemency in modern history.
Revisit IndyStar's nursing home investigation "Careless".
More: 16 falls. An amputated leg. An infected tailbone. Dire conditions in Indiana nursing homes.
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Indianapolis Star
4 hours ago
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Yahoo
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Indianapolis Star
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The EPA wants to rollback climate regulations. Here's how Hoosiers can have a say.
Hoosiers have limited time to voice their opinions as the U.S. EPA prepares to roll back rules meant to curb the effects of greenhouse gas emissions. The announcement in Indianapolis last month to rescind a major climate rule was one of the Trump administration's many pushes to deregulate major greenhouse gas polluters — in this case, the transportation industry. And with a rich history of auto manufacturing, Indiana stands to benefit, according to a statement made by U.S. Rep. Jim Baird during the announcement. Meanwhile, Americans will become more vulnerable, said Shannon Anderson, the director of advocacy at Earth Charter Indiana. While greenhouse gas emissions are not directly toxic to human health, they are the driver behind human-caused climate change, which is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of natural disasters across the globe. 'People sometimes feel like climate change is a problem that's coming later, but we're starting to experience it now,' Anderson said. She pointed to extreme heat events and increased flooding across the continent. Sam Carpenter, the executive director of the Hoosier Environmental Council, warned denial of climate science is bad for individual Hoosiers, communities, and the economy. The EPA has regulated greenhouse gases for over 15 years, but now the agency wants to quash a 2009 ruling that anchors its ability to fight climate change. The agency will no longer regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants or oil and gas operations. And all greenhouse gas standards for new motor vehicles and motor vehicle engines will be repealed, according to the EPA. Before the ruling is finalized, the public has until Sept. 15, 2025, to submit comments on the proposal. Indiana's greenhouse gas emissions — which come from compounds like carbon and methane — are hefty compared to similar states. Indiana releases the most energy-related greenhouse gases per capita in the Midwest and eighth in the nation, according to the HEC. About 21 percent of Indiana's total emissions come from the state's transportation sector. But as a desire to mitigate climate change impacted consumer choice and federal policy, like the Inflation Reduction Act, Indiana became a leader in electric vehicle manufacturing. Related industries now employ over 240,000 Hoosiers. The repeal of greenhouse gas emission standards could reduce the incentives helping Indiana pursue electric vehicles and battery manufacturing. 'We were starting to get a foothold in the U.S. under the Inflation Reduction Act, and Indiana has benefited mightily from those investments,' said Carpenter of HEC, nodding to the state's push toward clean energy. 'That's all being kind of pushed away through the current stance of denial on climate change. And so, it really has impacts on our health, on our communities, and in our economy.' Despite the agency's new stance on regulating greenhouse gases, 74 percent of Americans think that carbon dioxide should be regulated as a pollutant, according to the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. Anderson thinks the EPA will soon have to face the masses during the required public comment period, where the agency must consider input before the ruling is finalized. 'We know there are so many Americans who stand with us on this issue, and it won't even take all of them to speak out on this, but as many as possible that are willing to just take a minute to write a public comment, to send a message to their legislators, that can be tremendously powerful,' Anderson said. The EPA is "going to have to acknowledge that they are flying in the face of overwhelming public consensus.' The public can submit written comments to the EPA through an online portal, email or by mail. Earth Charter Indiana also created a toolkit to help Hoosiers find out how to comment and contact their elected officials. Comments are due Sept. 15, 2025. IndyStar's environmental reporting project is made possible through the generous support of the nonprofit Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
