Ex-Broker Gets Life in Prison for Crimes Tied to Death of Client

What You Need to Know

Keith Todd Ashley murdered one of the clients he was stealing from and tried to stage it as a suicide, police and prosecutors said.
Police investigating the shooting found evidence of a Ponzi scheme.
Ashley was found guilty of wire fraud, mail fraud, bank fraud and a gun charge in October 2022; a murder case is pending in Dallas County.

The former Parkland Securities broker who was charged with murdering a client in 2020 while he was already under investigation for a Ponzi scheme has been sentenced to life in prison for multiple federal crimes including a gun charge tied to the client’s death, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas, Damien M. Diggs, announced Thursday.

Keith Todd Ashley, 51, was indicted by a federal grand jury on Nov. 12, 2020. He was later found guilty by a jury of wire fraud, mail fraud, carrying a firearm in relation to a crime of violence and bank fraud in October 2022.

On Thursday, Ashley was sentenced to life in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Amos L. Mazzant.

Murder Case

Ashley was charged with the murder of 62-year-old James “Jim” Seegan after his arrest in 2020 in Carrollton, Texas.

The Justice Department did not charge Ashley with murder. A separate murder case against him was initiated by the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office. A trial has yet to begin, according to online court records at the District Court of Dallas County’s website. It wasn’t clear on Friday when a trial is expected to begin. A spokesperson for the District Attorney told ThinkAdvisor on Friday only that it is “still an active pending case.”

On Feb. 19. 2020, Seegan’s wife “found her husband dead of a gunshot wound to the head when she returned” to their Carrollton home, Carrollton police said at the time, adding: “Directly next to him was a typed note indicating it was a suicide.”

However, during a nine-month, “complex investigation, detectives found evidence that Ashley actually incapacitated, then murdered Seegan in an attempt to gain control of his finances,” Carrolton Police claimed.

In addition to serving as Seegan’s financial advisor, Ashley was a friend who would periodically visit the Seegan home, Carrollton police said, adding: “During the course of the investigation, detectives also identified several other victims of a ‘Ponzi’-type scheme Ashley orchestrated.”

Industry Bar

Ashley joined Parkland Securities in 2002 and remained with the firm until 2020, when the company terminated him.

In a disclosure on his report at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s BrokerCheck website, the firm said there was “reason to believe that the representative engaged in undisclosed outside business activities and also failed to provide the firm with prior notice of private securities transactions involving his privately held company.”

Stealing From Clients

According to information presented at trial:

Starting in 2016, Ashley, a registered nurse who also started working as a financial advisor and life insurance agent, began stealing money from his clients.

Ashley promised his clients he would invest their money in financial products but instead used their funds to pay other clients, to keep his struggling brewery in business, to pay his personal bills and to fund a lavish lifestyle, according to the Justice Department.

In May 2016, Ashley started stealing investment funds from Seegan. The scheme included transferring the client’s money into Ashley’s own personal accounts and changing the beneficiary of the man’s life insurance to a trust Ashley controlled.

That scheme later resulted in the Feb. 19, 2020. After Seegan was killed, Ashley went through elaborate steps to collect on the life insurance policy, transfer funds from Seegan’s bank account to himself, and attempt to obtain a copy of the victim’s autopsy report.

“Today’s sentence brings a sense of relief and justice to the victim’s family and friends, who have endured pain and grief as a result of the defendant’s horrific actions,” Diggs said in a statement. “Mr. Ashley’s actions of defrauding and ultimately taking the victim’s life [are] reprehensible and indefensible.”