Stifel, Nicolaus Broker Jon Schmidhammer Has History of Regulatory Problems
By: David P. Meyer, Esq., Founding Partner of Meyer Wilson
An elderly client living in Upper Arlington, Ohio, had $500,000 stolen from her by her own stockbroker, according to police. As reported by the Columbus Dispatch today, “Upper Arlington police arrested financial adviser Jon Schmidhammer after they say he confessed to stealing more than $500,000 from an elderly client.”
Mr. Schmidhammer is employed by the brokerage firm Stifel, Nicolaus & Company and worked in the firm’s Dublin office. He has been employed with Stifel, Nicolaus since May 26, 2009. According to regulatory filings, he remains employed at the firm as of the writing of this blog. Prior to joining Stifel, Nicolaus, Mr. Schmidhammer worked in Merrill Lynch’s Upper Arlington branch from March 2006 through May 2009. Prior to Merrill, he was employed by UBS Financial but was fired in 2004 for providing inaccurate statements on his pre-employment application, according to regulatory filings.
In 2004, Mr. Schmidhammer was the subject of a regulatory action and was sanctioned $10,000 for inappropriately extending credit to a customer to satisfy margin requirements and for misleading his firm in an attempt to avoid detection.
Back in 2001, I represented former clients of Mr. Schmidhammer in a dispute against him while he was employed with Salomon Smith Barney.
As an investment fraud attorney based in Columbus, I have represented numerous senior citizens who have been the victims of broker theft. This case is certainly not the first time an Upper Arlington family has been the target of theft by their brokers. I represented an elderly couple in Upper Arlington whose broker stole in excess of $1,000,000 from them over several years. The broker worked for a major brokerage firm and our law firm successfully recovered the couple’s hard-earned money. In addition, a financial advisor working for another large brokerage firm in Upper Arlington recently stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from a disabled daughter of an Upper Arlington man. Meyer Wilson represented her as well. In that case, the broker was sentenced to 5 years in jail.
Founded in 1999, Meyer Wilson is a boutique law firm based in Columbus, Ohio, devoted solely to investor claims and class action lawsuits. As a niche firm, our investment fraud attorneys have the ability to focus their time on what they do best: recovering losses for investors with claims against financial advisors, stockbrokers and brokerage firms. Meyer Wilson has achieved jury awards, arbitration awards and settlements with a combined value of hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of our clients. When it comes to choosing an attorney to handle your case, results matter. In 2015, Meyer Wilson recovered more than $350,000,000 for our clients.
