A high-profile Georgia Republican who ran a massive Ponzi loan scheme that brought losses of more than $76 million to more than 300 investors was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison on Monday, according to federal prosecutors.
The man, Edwin Brant Frost IV, 69, of Newnan, Ga., pleaded guilty in May to wire fraud following an investigation into his business, First Liberty Building and Loan.
The pitch, as federal prosecutors described it, was simple. Mr. Frost told investors their money would fund short-term, high-interest “bridge loans” to small companies, and he promised monthly returns of between 8 and 18 percent, prosecutors said.
He told investors that revenues would come from transaction fees and interest‑rate spreads, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia said in a statement.
Many of those loans were never repaid, however, and First Liberty soon lacked the revenue to meet its obligations. Rather than disclose the shortfall, Mr. Frost used funds from new investors to pay earlier ones, prosecutors said.
All the while, Mr. Frost was helping himself, federal prosecutors said. He personally took at least $5 million from investors for his own use, they said, buying a vacation rental home in Maine, spending more than $140,000 on jewelry and paying more than $335,000 to a rare coin dealer. Over the years, he also gave out more than $570,000 in political donations, prosecutors said.
“Like a false prophet and ravenous wolf in sheep’s clothing, Frost used religion, politics, and promises of profitable returns to lure investors into giving him their hard-earned money,” said Theodore S. Hertzberg, the U.S. attorney for the district. “He wickedly exploited their faith to plunder their accounts and enrich himself.”
Mr. Frost has publicly apologized for the losses, saying in 2025 that he took “full responsibility” for his actions and intended to repay his victims. A judge ordered him to pay restitution in the amount of $76.5 million.
His lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mr. Frost, a donor to Republican causes and a prominent backer of the party in Georgia, ran the scheme through his firm from 2021 to 2025, according to federal prosecutors. He has long been involved in politics, including his management of the state campaign for the televangelist Pat Robertson, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination in 1988.
A federal judge has ordered Mr. Frost to report to Federal Prison Camp Montgomery in Alabama by noon on Nov. 30, according to court records.
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