Barred Broker's Probation Revoked After Unauthorized Caribbean Trip
On March 29, Shillin informed pretrial services he was invited to a stay in Antigua as part of a conference hosted by his employer, Best Version Media. He explained he didn’t plan to go but was being pressured to by his employer because it wanted him to be a presenter at the conference.
On March 30, his attorney asked the officer of the court and assistant U.S. attorney assigned to the case if they would support his request to travel for his work conference. He was told that neither party would support his travel request, according to court documents.
On April 1, Shillin emailed the officer of the court and his defense counsel that his employer was fine with not pressuring him to travel anymore as long as his girlfriend, Ashley Romatoski, could attend events instead of him. Shillin notified them that Romatoski would be making the trip to Antigua and asked whether there would be an issue with her using their joint checking account while abroad.
On April 9, the officer of the court received notification that Shillin had been stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at the Cyril E. King International Airport in St. Thomas while he was attempting to travel home, according to court documents. He and his girlfriend allegedly traveled to St. Thomas on April 4 and stayed five nights at the Emerald Beach Resort.
Shillin had a ticket to board a Sun Country flight bound for San Juan, Puerto Rico, then Minneapolis. The officer of the court advised that Shillin should be allowed to continue his travel home and Shillin was directed to notify the officer upon his return home and report to the U.S. Pretrial Services Office on the morning of April 11, according to the court documents.
Barred From the Industry
Shillin was a registered representative and broker with Raymond James from 2014 to 2018 and served in the same roles at Alliance Global Partners from 2018 to 2020, according to his report on the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s BrokerCheck website.
On Nov. 18, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin entered a partial judgment against Shillin in a civil action that was filed by the SEC on Sept. 23, charging him with defrauding at least 100 clients.
According to the SEC’s complaint, Shillin, while acting as an advisor, fabricated documents and made misrepresentations to clients, many of whom were older adults.
Shillin was the subject of 37 client disputes, according to his BrokerCheck report. All were filed after he was terminated by Raymond James on May 21, 2018, and resigned from AGP on Oct. 2, 2020, while under investigation for alleged securities violations. In the disputes, many of which are still pending, Shillin was accused of making a diverse array of misrepresentations to clients.
In December, Shillin was barred from the industry by FINRA after he refused to produce information or documents or give on-the-record testimony as requested by FINRA staff.
The SEC issued an order in January permanently barring Shillin from the financial services industry.
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