ST. LOUIS • Martin Sigillito's comfortable world came crashing down on one day.

May 24, 2010. It was the day FBI agents swept into Sigillito's Clayton office, their first stop on a quest to seize nearly everything he owned.

Later came raids of his homes in Webster Groves and near the wineries of Marthasville. No more fine wines, expensive cigars or $65,000 trips to Acapulco. No more warm reception from pals at the exclusive Racquet Club of St. Louis.

Agents confiscated nearly 500 antique books and papers, from prayer texts to Turkish history. They hauled off old magazine prints and rare coins. Out went six Persian rugs, a Volvo and boxes of pricey liquor, including 60 bottles of champagne. Officials seized nearly $60,000 from bank accounts.

Nine months later, Sigillito — a lawyer, international lecturer and bishop of an American Anglican church that meets in a St. Louis area mortuary — has not been charged with anything. But court filings outline what the FBI continues to investigate: that he allegedly ran a more than $65 million Ponzi scheme, cheating up to 100 investors across the Midwest.

He said their money was going to a lending project in England that would refill their pockets through smart land buys. In reality, investigators say, most of the cash stopped with Sigillito and some unidentified cohorts.

Court documents allege that a decade of steady illicit income helped Sigillito evolve from a frugal lawyer with a $28,000 salary to a millionaire who charged up to $25,000 a month on credit cards and dropped $21,000 for wine and liquor in a two-week period.

A federal court fight over his assets, and civil lawsuits filed by angry investors, provide an uncommonly detailed public picture.

The suits contain heated accusations that drew at least one prominent name into the fray, Lynn Ann Vogel, president-elect of the Missouri Bar.

Sigillito hired attorneys, themselves former organized crime prosecutors, who called the seizures 'such shams they are defective on their face." In an Aug. 23 motion, they used terms such as "rush to judgment" and "bizarre."

The lawyers included David Helfrey, once chief of the Kansas City organized crime strike force, who prosecuted the Las Vegas skimming case memorialized in the movie "Casino," and Douglas Roller, once chief of the Cleveland and Chicago strike forces that brought down Teamsters President Roy Williams for trying to bribe a senator.

"The lengths to which these officials have gone in their attempt to bring Mr. Sigillito to his knees prior to the initiation of any judicial proceedings are both mind boggling and frightening," they wrote in one court filing.

They claimed the government used threats and relied on documents stolen by Sigillito's then-secretary. They also said that by seizing assets needed to hire lawyers, officials have denied his Sixth Amendment right to counsel.

Sigilitto declined to speak directly to a reporter.

The FBI and Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Holtshouser, who is handling the case, have declined to comment. In court papers, Holtshouser calls Sigillito's lawyers' allegations 'spurious, false and baseless."

He wrote, "The government has a legal and moral obligation to protect as many forfeitable assets as possible to make a dent in the losses suffered by victims."

The case has been moved from the Eastern District of Missouri to the Western District, because Sigillito's wife, Mandy Finan, is a law clerk for U.S. District Judge Henry Autrey in St. Louis. Holtshouser's bosses have kept him on the case.

The government's intrusion left Sigillito broke at 61 and ostracized in his upper crust St. Louis circle, his attorneys said. He is separated from his wife and now lives in a studio apartment.

The government has claimed $19,500 that Sigillito used to pay his attorneys, forcing them to withdraw. If he is indicted, the former millionaire may need a public defender.

PROMISE OF EASY MONEY

Sigillito was easy to trust.

He graduated with honors from the University of Missouri with a degree in classical languages and ancient history. He has a master's degree in European history from Cornell University and a law degree, cum laude, from St. Louis University. He was a Phi Beta Kappa member and Woodrow Wilson fellow.

He hobnobbed with affluent friends, lectured on international law and practiced in merchant banking and international business consulting. In 2003, he was consecrated as a bishop of the Anglican American Convocation.

Stan Kuhlo, 64, a brick contractor from St. Charles, recalls being introduced to Sigillito a few years ago by a friend who had invested millions with him. Sigillito exuded confidence and offered a deal so good that Kuhlo remembers joking it must be a Ponzi scheme.

"Usually, if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. I'm a firm believer in that now," said Kuhlo, who invested about $500,000 his parents left him when they died.

Kuhlo is one of 24 investors, from Arkansas to Michigan, who sued Sigillito on June 30 under the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, claiming they were defrauded of at least $45 million. Sigillito also faces two similar suits in St. Louis and St. Louis County circuit courts.

Investors say Sigillito told them the money they were lending would go to an Englishman named Derek Smith as "asset lines" for acquiring properties worth tens of millions of dollars through his company, Distinctive Properties. Smith was to option the land — buy rights to it at a set price — and resell it later for a substantial profit.

Investors say they were promised a 16 to 23 percent annual return. (Court documents say the FBI suspects that some were promised up to 48 percent.). Lenders were told it was low-risk because Smith had real estate assets of more than double his debts.

The FBI thinks the reality was far different.

In an affidavit, Special Agent Kevin Consentino wrote that over the course of a decade, Sigillito collected more than $50 million but only gave Smith about $4 million — money Smith used to escape foreclosure.

The rest, Consentino wrote, was deposited first into Sigillito's attorney trust account, then transferred to bank accounts in Kansas controlled by an attorney in Leawood identified only as J.B.

Other court cases make it clear that "J.B." is J. Scott Brown, who reportedly brought Sigillito into the loan program and is the link to many of the investors. Brown could not be reached for comment.

Sigillito and unidentified others are suspected of using those accounts to carry out the alleged Ponzi, a scheme that uses money from new investors to pay returns to earlier investors.

They paid themselves "exorbitant, undisclosed 'fees,'" Consentino wrote, and also paid "finders fees" to unidentified individuals who helped recruit new investors, and also invested their own money.

ALLEGATIONS FLY

Paul and Lynn Vogel, who are married, sued Sigillito in St. Louis County, claiming he fraudulently used their names in connection with the loan program.

They also referred questions to an attorney.

Lynn Vogel was listed as 'solicitor" on a number of the loan agreements, she says unbeknownst to her.

Paul Vogel, president of the Clayton investment company Argos Partners, visited England and wrote a due diligence assessment that was given to potential investors. Sigillito's attorneys referred to it as "a glowing" report, and noted that Paul Vogel received 5 percent of Sigillito's finder's fee for his effort.

An attorney for investor Patricia Ahrens, who sued Sigillito in St. Louis, has accused the Vogels of legal malpractice.

But the Vogels' lawyer, Dudley McCarter, says they were duped like everyone else. He said Sigillito not only fabricated part of the due diligence report but also fraudulently stamped Lynn Vogel's name on what appear to be sloppy, mass-produced loan agreements.

He said the Vogels, who invested $590,000 of their own, caught on only after getting calls from across the country from aggrieved investors.

"As you can imagine, they are very distraught; they feel they were betrayed," he said.

In their 75-page motion for return of property, Roller and Helfry, the Sigillito lawyers, say the loan program was not as simple as the government suggested. The heart of their argument is that the loan agreements spell out very clearly that investors' money would help with the cash flow of the business, in essence giving Distinctive Properties license to use the loans as it pleased.

THE PLAN CRUMBLES

Cash flow problems —and growing suspicions by investors — ultimately took down the loan program.

Kirkwood native Phillip Rosemann, 64, decided in 2007 he wanted to free up some of the $15 million he invested but received "one excuse after the other" from Sigillito. "Eventually I didn't have any more questions," Rosemann said. "Just, 'Where is my money?'"

With the economy in free-fall, other investors wanted out. By the time Rosemann filed suit against Derek Smith in March 2010 (later winning a $1 million default judgment), others were asking the same questions.

The FBI got involved in mid-May, after Sigillito's secretary came forward with concerns. At that point, according to court documents, FBI agent Consentino suspects the lenders were owed more than $65 million and the alleged pyramid scheme was a decade old.

There are hints the investigation will grow. Some lenders have referenced another Distinctive Properties project in Turkey. Sigillito also has been tied in a news report to an international financier in Kansas, Kevin Cooper, whose raising of money for a hovercraft project raised questions.

Roller has said little outside of court filings but did predict to a reporter that Sigillito would ultimately clear his name.

"If the government had not swooped in and just grabbed all the records, shut the business down, could (Distinctive Properties) have eventually gotten ahead and paid everyone off?" he asked. "The answer is probably yes. But we'll never know."