Ross Gregory Erskine, a Los Angeles-area investor solicitor who operated through two personal entities, Meridian Point, LLC and Personal Group, LLC, has been permanently enjoined from acting as a broker and ordered to pay $176,075 in disgorgement, interest, and civil penalties after a federal court in Los Angeles entered a final judgment against him on May 20, 2026, exactly five years to the day after the SEC filed its original complaint. Erskine was one of four individuals recruited by Stephen Michael Thompson, a repeat securities law violator who exercised hidden de facto control over LFS Funding Limited Partnership, a Wyoming limited partnership based in the Los Angeles area, while concealing his involvement behind nominee general partners.
Between May 2018 and May 2019, Thompson’s network raised more than $618,000 from approximately 14 investor households through a fraudulent offering of limited partnership interests that claimed the funds would be used to open two podiatry clinics in Henderson, Nevada and Dallas, Texas. In reality, Thompson was running a skimming operation and the offering documents concealed more than $170,000 in commissions being paid to unregistered salespeople. The final judgment follows a summary judgment ruling the SEC won in August 2023, in which the court found that Erskine violated the registration and antifraud provisions of federal securities law without the need for trial. The case is one of two SEC enforcement actions in which Erskine appears as a defendant — he was also named in a 2022 action involving TKO Farms and Agravitae, two California companies accused of raising nearly $20M from investors through unregistered telephone solicitors.
Stephen Thompson Ran a Hidden Control Scheme and Recruited Erskine to Sell the Fake Offering
Thompson is the central figure behind LFS Funding but deliberately kept his name off the partnership’s official records. According to the SEC’s complaint, Thompson had a documented history of state securities enforcement actions and understood that his visible involvement would deter investors. He instead installed nominee general partners whose names appeared in official documents while retaining actual control over the partnership’s operations and finances. Thompson then recruited Erskine along with two other individuals, Steven Robert Comisar and Dale Jay Engelhardt, to serve as the public-facing salesforce for LFS Funding’s offering.
None of the three were registered as brokers or dealers with the SEC. Registration is required under Section 15(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 for anyone who solicits securities transactions in exchange for compensation. Erskine solicited prospective investors directly and through others working under him, providing them with private placement memorandums that described the investment as a vehicle for funding two podiatry clinics. The PPMs contained materially misleading statements because they failed to disclose Thompson’s control over the partnership, the true destination of investor funds, or the commission structure being paid to unlicensed salespeople.
The Offering Promised Podiatry Clinics While Thompson Was Running a Skimming Operation
The two podiatry clinics in Henderson, Nevada and Dallas, Texas were real enough as a concept — they were the stated purpose of the offering and gave investors a plausible-sounding use for their money. What the offering documents did not say was that Thompson also controlled a separate purchasing agent entity that would supply equipment and services to those clinics at inflated prices. The plan was to use investor capital to buy goods and services from Thompson’s own supplier at unjustified markups, funneling a portion of investor funds back to Thompson personally through the excess charges.
The offering documents also failed to disclose that more than $170,000 of the $618,000 raised would be paid out in commissions to unregistered salespeople including Erskine, Comisar, and Engelhardt. Investors reading the private placement memorandums had no way to know that a substantial portion of their capital was earmarked for unlicensed sales commissions before any clinic operations began. The LFS Funding Forms D filed with the SEC also contained materially misleading statements about who controlled the partnership and how salesperson compensation was structured.
Erskine Collected Commissions Through Two Personal Entities on Each Successful Solicitation
Erskine did not receive his commissions directly. Each time he successfully solicited an investor to purchase interests in LFS Funding, his compensation was routed through Meridian Point, LLC and Personal Group, LLC, two business entities he controlled. The court found Erskine jointly and severally liable with those entities for the full disgorgement and penalty amounts, meaning Erskine cannot shield the commission income behind the corporate structure of his LLCs.
The final judgment entered May 20, 2026 permanently enjoins Erskine from violating Sections 15(a) and 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act and Rule 10b-5, as well as Sections 5 and 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933. He is also permanently barred from soliciting any person or entity to purchase or sell any security. The court ordered him to pay $60,625 in disgorgement, $15,450.03 in prejudgment interest, and a $100,000 civil penalty, totaling $176,075.03. The litigation was handled by Charles Canter and supervised by Stephen Kam of the SEC’s Los Angeles Regional Office.
Conclusion
Erskine was not the architect of the LFS Funding scheme — Thompson designed the hidden control structure, the skimming mechanism, and the nominee general partner cover. But Erskine was the one who walked into investor conversations with misleading documents, collected commissions through his own LLCs, and did so without a broker registration. The court needed no trial to reach that conclusion. The summary judgment ruling in August 2023 found the violations established as a matter of law, and the final judgment three years later formalized a permanent solicitation ban and $176,075 in payments that close the SEC’s case against him. The TKO Farms action, filed separately in 2022, suggests Erskine’s role in the LFS Funding offering was not an isolated event.
