He conned Travis Kelce, athletes and others out of millions. Who is Sid Jawahar?

On Sept. 15, a federal judge in Missouri sentenced Siddharth Jawahar to 11 years in prison for using his Texas-based investment company to run a Ponzi scheme that swindled millions of dollars from investors including Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.

Kelce was named as one of 64 victims in court by prosecutors during Jawahar's sentencing hearing, as first reported by a KMOV St. Louis reporter who was in the room and later confirmed by USA TODAY Sports, which obtained a court transcript of the hearing. It is not known how much money Kelce lost to the scheme. Along with Kelce, several NBA players were listed as investors in Jawahar's Swiftarc fund in a 2021 Forbes article.

Jawahar declined to be interviewed by USA TODAY Sports for this story but provided a comment through his attorney, Doug Passon.

"My client is ultimately responsible for making Travis Kelce a victim of fraud," Passon wrote in an email. "But the government has re-victimized Mr. Kelce by unnecessarily invoking his name at sentencing, which is the direct cause of this media frenzy. For an entity that purports to respect the rights of victims, the choice made by AUSA Derek Wiseman is difficult…

Original source: https://www.usatoday.com/sports/