Fraudulent Marijuana Pioneer Forsakes Paseo Miramar Home

By GABRIELLA BOCK | Reporter

Under pressure from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, a self-proclaimed marijuana pioneer has handed over the keys to his mansion in Pacific Palisades.

Over the last decade, Vincent Mehdizadeh has built a colorful reputation, first as a “fake” attorney offering bogus green cards to immigrants and then as a peddler of a new cannabis technology.

In both cases, according to investigators, he was a fraud, conning the vulnerable and the hopeful out of millions of dollars.

Some of the proceeds were invested in a sprawling estate on the 700 block of Paseo Miramar, a seven-bedroom, nine-bathroom mansion that neighbors said resembled a ship.

Mehdizadeh bought the new-build in 2014, at the height of his adventure in cannabis, but as the SEC investigators tightened their grip he put it back on the market.

Mehdizadeh, meanwhile, has agreed to pay $12 million to settle SEC allegations that he inflated the revenues of his marijuana appliance company Medbox in a scheme to attract investors.

From 2012 to 2014, Medbox promoted itself as an innovator in the infant cannabis industry by showcasing a device that combined two of a stereotypical pothead’s favorite things—marijuana and a snack-vending machine.

The machine would act as a stand-alone pot shop, maybe inside a pharmacy, without the cost of employing staff. Promoters claimed it would identify clients via their fingerprints.

The Beverly Hills High School alumnus demonstrated a prototype but, according to the SEC, instead of building more to cash in on the medical marijuana business, he set up a dubious shell company that appeared to be bankrolling Medbox to encourage others to join the venture. New-Age Investment Consulting, Inc. was run by his fiancée Yocelin Legaspi.

Through New-Age, said the SEC, Mehdizadeh drafted fake documents to create the appearance that the consulting company had provided Medbox with services valued at $552,000. In reality, New-Age paid nothing for those shares.

He then sold the 26,000 Medbox shares back into the public market.

In short, New-Age earned more than $3.1 million from those shares before quickly funneling them back into Medbox.

In 2013, Medbox valued at more than $200 million, but then the SEC knocked at the door.

Last week, an SEC spokesman said: “Investors were misled into believing Medbox was a leader in the burgeoning marijuana industry when the company was just round-tripping money from illegal stock shares.”

This isn’t the first time Mehdizadeh, who has described himself as a “self-made man,” has found himself in legal hot water.

Born Pejman Mehdizadeh, the 38-year-old has also been known as Vince Zadeh.

Under that name, investigators said, he hoodwinked desperate immigrants into believing he was a practicing attorney and could get them green cards. Some of his victims were forced to leave the country due to their failure to file appropriate government documents.
He also fraudulently offered marriage and divorce paperwork.

In 2013, he pleaded guilty to offering bogus legal counsel that earned him more than $100,000, according to the LA County Consumer Affairs department.

He was ordered to pay $450,000 in restitution.
Investigators believe Mehdizadeh used money from the Medbox green rush to pay off those restitution fees.
And buying into the Palisades.
According to the SEC, Mehdizadeh used $640,000 of New-Age’s illicit stock sales to help pay for a newly constructed luxury home.
Built in 2013, Mehdizadeh purchased the villa directly from the developer. It became his corporate headquarters during his Medbox years.
With extraordinary Pacific views, the 7,000-square-foot mansion, now owned by Cardinal Equities, is back on the market.

In a rare example of losing money in the local real estate market, the price has been set nearly half-a-million dollars below what the fraudulent tycoon paid for it. At press time, Mehdizadeh had not responded to requests for information from the Palisadian-Post.