SEC v. Marcus A. Luna, et al. (boiler rooms, 2016)

Judgment entered

Checked against the primary document on October 4, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, with sampled and disputed records read a second time. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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In September 2016 the SEC alleged that a lawyer and three associates ran boiler rooms promoting Umax and Azure stock, defrauding investors of $13.6 million. The Central District of California entered final judgments between July and October 2017: Smith, Gomez and Walker received penny stock bars, and Luna was held liable for $13,331,883 in disgorgement with $402,476 interest. Only Smith's $15,000 penalty is recorded.

The record

Structured fields for this action, as recorded in our case library.
Agency	SEC
Release number	LR-23666
Date filed	2016-09-30
Date resolved	2017-10-05
Court	U.S. District Court, Central District of California
Status	judgment
Asset class	equities
Criminal parallel	No
Bars imposed	Penny stock bar (Walker, Gomez, Smith)
Defendants	Marcus A. Luna (individual) ; Norell Walker (individual) ; Paul Gomez (individual) ; Dustin Smith (individual)
Cited as charged or alleged	Exchange Act s.10(b) and Rule 10b-5 ; Exchange Act s.15(a) ; Securities Act s.17(a) ; Securities Act s.5 (statutes and rules cited in the document; not a finding that they were violated)
Techniques	Boiler rooms , Pump and dump

What was ordered

Civil penalty: $15k
Disgorgement: $13.3m
Prejudgment interest: $402k
Total relief: $13.7m
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 this action on September 29, 2016 as release LR-23666, naming Marcus Luna, Norell Walker, Paul Gomez and Dustin Smith in a boiler-room pump-and-dump allegation.

The technique tag is this library's own reading of the conduct the regulator describes; agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

Judgments were entered for Smith and Gomez on July 19, 2017, Walker on September 19, 2017 and Luna on October 5, 2017. Luna's judgment sets disgorgement of $13,331,883 and prejudgment interest of $402,476, a total of $13,734,359, which includes joint and several liability with the other three. Walker's judgment totals $7,867,124 and Gomez's $1,061,087 (both overlapping with Luna's), and Smith's was disgorgement of $237,361, interest of $7,165 and a $15,000 penalty. Civil penalties against Luna, Walker and Gomez were dismissed. Because the amounts overlap, this record stores Luna's figures, the largest, rather than a sum. Walker, Gomez and Smith were barred from penny stock offerings. Checked on 2026-10-04.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with 2 techniques 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.

Boiler rooms — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.
Pump and dump — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

2016-09-30 Litigation release published
2017-07-19 Final judgments entered against Gomez and Smith
2017-09-19 Final judgment entered against Walker
2017-10-05 Final judgment entered against Luna

Primary documents

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

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.

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

Action	Agency	Filed	Technique	Penalty	Status
SEC v. Joseph R. Earle Jr, Barry D. Reagh, William Clayton, Francis T. Dudley, Steven E. Bryant, Upper Street Marketing, Inc. and Project Growth International, Inc. (boiler rooms, 2022)	SEC	2022-12-05	Boiler Rooms , Pump And Dump	—	filed
SEC v. Matthew Nicosia, William Reninger, Fabrizio Di Carlo, and Ronald Touchard (boiler rooms, 2022)	SEC	2022-09-28	Boiler Rooms , Pump And Dump	$453k	settled
SEC v. Francis Biller, et al. (pump and dump, 2022)	SEC	2022-03-17	Pump And Dump , Boiler Rooms	—	settled
SEC v. Talman Harris and Victor Alfaya (boiler rooms, 2019)	SEC	2019-06-28	Boiler Rooms , Pump And Dump	$500k	judgment
SEC v. Jason McDiarmid, et al. (boiler rooms, 2017)	SEC	2017-09-29	Boiler Rooms , Pump And Dump	$3.3m	judgment
SEC v. Jason A. Wallace (boiler rooms, 2016)	SEC	2016-09-27	Boiler Rooms , Pump And Dump	$435k	judgment

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.