For three years, Rishi Kapoor was the easiest kind of Miami story to write: a University of Miami grad in a leased McLaren, a 68-foot Princess yacht, an 18-karat gold Rolex Daytona, a secluded Coral Gables mansion bought with other people’s money. That story has been told. A smaller one, buried in the bank-fraud counts of his federal indictment, is more revealing — and it fits on a single statement.
Kapoor, 42, ran Location Ventures, a Coral Gables development company that raised roughly $89 million from more than 50 investors for condo and mixed-use projects across Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, and Miami Beach. Most were never built. The firm collapsed in 2023; the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued, a court-appointed receiver took over what was left, and federal prosecutors indicted him on 37 counts of fraud, money laundering, and tax crimes. Last month, he pleaded guilty to two of them and now awaits sentencing. Investors are owed tens of millions they are unlikely to fully recover.
When he needed banks to lend him money, prosecutors allege, Kapoor didn’t build elaborate shell companies or forge signatures. He added a digit. In December 2022, the indictment says, he submitted a statement for his personal account showing a balance of $9,148,426.44; the real figure was $148,426.44 — a “9” added to the front. He ran the same play in February 2023, prosecutors allege: $9,100,424.67 on paper, $100,424.67 in fact. Months earlier, a $356,806.23 balance had become $2,356,806.23 with a “2.” On one personal financial statement, the indictment says, he claimed $3.1 million in a checking account that held less than $25,000…