A federal grand jury in the Northern District of Texas indicted Damien Moran, 36, of Dallas on 10 counts of wire fraud for allegedly running a precious-metals scheme that drained retirement savings from more than 100 victims, most of them elderly or near retirement age. The indictment, dated May 20, 2026, follows a civil enforcement action that accused Moran and two affiliated companies of collecting more than $7 million through high-pressure sales of gold and silver products funneled through self-directed individual retirement accounts.
How self-directed IRAs left older investors exposed
The case against Moran highlights a gap in how retirement money moves when investors use self-directed IRAs to buy physical precious metals. In a traditional brokerage IRA, a registered custodian typically screens investments and flags unusual withdrawals. Self-directed accounts, by design, give the account holder full control over asset selection, which means an unregistered dealer can receive large transfers with little independent oversight. According to a federal court order in the civil case, victims sent funds from their self-directed IRAs directly to entities Moran controlled, and the money was allegedly diverted rather than used to purchase the metals investors expected.
That structural weakness helps explain why the alleged fraud persisted long enough to reach more than $7 million in total receipts from over 100 people. Victims believed their retirement assets were backed by physical gold or silver held in storage. Without a broker-dealer acting as gatekeeper, the only check on the transaction was the custodian’s administrative processing of the transfer, not a suitability review of the product or the seller.
Regulators have long warned that self-directed IRAs can be attractive targets for promoters of alternative assets, including metals, real estate interests, and private notes. The accounts themselves are legal and widely used, but the looser guardrails can make it harder for inexperienced investors to distinguish between legitimate dealers and operations that simply use the language of “safe” or “tangible” assets to mask misappropriation.
Criminal and civil cases built on parallel tracks
The criminal indictment is the latest step in a two-track enforcement effort. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed a federal civil complaint naming Moran alongside Bright Future Financial LLC, doing business as Oakhurst Metals, and Crown Bullion, Inc. In a statement from Commissioner Kristin N. Johnson, the agency said the case illustrates how “gold IRA” pitches can target seniors by pushing high-markup, low-liquidity products into retirement accounts. The civil case, docketed as Civil Action No. 3:23-CV-2077-L in the Northern District of Texas, resulted in an emergency restraining order after the CFTC alleged misappropriation of investor funds…