SEC v. Kent R.E. Whitney, David Lee Parrish, The Church for the Healthy Self a/k/a CHS Trust, and CHS Asset Management Inc. (ponzi schemes, 2019)

Settled

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In March 2019 the SEC charged Kent Whitney, David Parrish and their Church for the Healthy Self over an alleged $25 million Ponzi scheme aimed at Vietnamese investors in Orange County. On 14 July 2023 a California federal court entered consent judgments against Whitney (disgorgement and interest of $11,914,829.47, joint with the church entities) and Parrish ($166,574.10), both deemed satisfied by criminal restitution and receivership recoveries. Whitney was sentenced to 14 years in prison in a parallel case.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

—

Disgorgement

$10.3m

Prejudgment interest

$1.8m

Total relief

$12.1m

Alleged gain

—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The SEC announced the case on March 18, 2019 (LR-24426), filed in the Central District of California, with a temporary restraining order and asset freeze. It alleges Whitney, released from federal prison for an earlier commodities scheme, and Parrish stole millions and paid returns through Ponzi payments, and kept soliciting after the FBI seized the main account. The SEC sought injunctions, disgorgement and penalties.

The record originally ran the first three names together; the four defendants are now listed separately.

This library tags the matter as ponzi schemes because the document describes it as a scheme paying earlier investors with later investors' money. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

Outcome. Two final judgments filed on 14 July 2023 in the Central District of California, both on consent, resolve the claims against the two individuals. Whitney is enjoined from the antifraud provisions and is liable, jointly and severally with CHS Asset Management Inc. and The Church for the Healthy Self, for $10,086,465.95 in disgorgement plus $1,828,363.52 in interest (total $11,914,829.47); the judgment treats that as satisfied in light of his criminal sentence of 14 years and $22,662,668.58 in restitution and the receiver's recoveries, and imposes no civil penalty. Parrish is liable for $166,574.10 in disgorgement, treated as satisfied by a restitution order entered on 5 November 2021. The record's money fields add the two individuals' figures (the church entities' share is already inside Whitney's joint amount). The two entities' own judgments were not found and the relief defendants were not checked. The judgments rest on consent, so the allegations were not tried civilly.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Ponzi schemes — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2019-03-18 Litigation release published
2. 2023-07-14 Final consent judgments entered against Kent Whitney and David Parrish

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• SEC litigation release
• Final judgment as to Kent R.E. Whitney (SEC-hosted court filing)
• Final judgment as to David Lee Parrish (SEC-hosted court filing)

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.