Carl Rinsch, director of the 2013 Keanu Reeves-starred film "47 Ronin," was arrested Tuesday in West Hollywood and charged with wire fraud and money laundering after allegedly misappropriating $11 million in funding from a "prominent streaming platform," which multiple reports ostensibly cite as Netflix.
Prosecutors allege Rinsch requested additional funding from a streaming service to complete his sci-fi series "White Horse" in 2020 but instead transferred the money to personal accounts and began trading securities.
His production company was previously paid $44 million before the additional funding request, prosecutors claimed.
"Rinsch orchestrated a scheme to steal millions by soliciting a large investment from a video streaming service, claiming that money would be used to finance a television show that he was creating. But that was fiction," acting U.S. Attorney Matthew Podolsky wrote in a statement.
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By late April 2020, he had lost more than half the funds through risky investments, including "highly speculative options and cryptocurrency trading," as well as an ETF tracking the S&P 500 index, per the statement.
Rinsch also used these funds to "speculate on cryptocurrency—which eventually proved profitable," the indictment reads.
According to the indictment, Rinsch allegedly used these gains to spend $2.4 million on five Rolls-Royces and a Ferrari, $3.7 million on furniture and antiques, $652,000 on watches and clothing, and $638,000 on two mattresses, as well as $295,000 on luxury bedding and linens.
Previous reports from 2023 claimed Rinsch liquidated his Dogecoin positions, initially worth $4 million, and flipped this into $27 million by May 2021. Rinsche allegedly used Kraken to purchase crypto through transfers from Schwab Bank.
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Prosecutors claim Rinsch never delivered the completed television show to Netflix and never returned the money despite finishing "six short-form episodes."
Discovery materials on the case alleged he spent $1.1 million on lawyers to sue the streaming company for additional funds and for his divorce proceedings.
If convicted of wire fraud, Rinsch could face up to 20 years in prison. The money laundering charge carries an additional maximum 20-year sentence, while five counts of engaging in monetary transactions with criminally derived property each carry up to 10 years.
That could bring his total consecutive sentences to 90 years in prison if found guilty on all counts.
Edited by Sebastian Sinclair
