The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a lawsuit against John Sterling Myers, Sterling Capital, LLC, and Sterling Capital Management, LLC.

The SEC’s complaint, submitted at the Illinois Northern District Court on June 5, 2026, alleges that the defendants engaged in misappropriation of investor money, falsification of investor account statements, and other misconduct while acting as investment advisers to a pooled investment vehicle, Sterling Capital Investments, LLC (the Fund).

Myers began operating this so-called “premier” and “exclusive investment pool” in 2022, through Sterling Capital and SCM, and raised approximately $4 million from approximately 28 investors over several years.

Without the knowledge of the investors, Myers perpetually drained the pool through unsuccessful trading and personal spending. As of the end of 2025, the defendants had only repaid investors approximately $398,000, and over $3.6 million of investors’ money was gone.

The complaint further alleges that, from January 2022 through at least July 2025, Myers offered and sold limited liability interests in the Fund to family, friends, and other investors in approximately five states, including Illinois. Myers touted his prior experience as an investment banker on Wall Street and his purported personal success trading securities. Myers routinely assured investors the Fund had outperformed the S&P 500 and, accordingly, their individual interests had grown in value.

Also, the complaint alleges that Myers lied to investors about, among other things, the Fund’s historical and current performance and his use of investor money. In truth, Myers regularly lost money trading, and he misappropriated at least $1.8 million by diverting Fund assets to his personal financial accounts, through which he engaged in further unsuccessful trading and paid for various personal expenses.

According to the complaint, Myers sent investors fabricated quarterly account statements depicting accumulated net gains and positive performance beyond that of the S&P 500. On an annual basis, the statements portrayed investment returns between 16% and 54% (depending on the specific investor), even though Myers often traded away or otherwise depleted investor contributions to the Fund in just a matter of days.

Myers generated the sham account statements from internal spreadsheets he used to calculate the net asset value (“NAV”) of the Fund and the capital account balances of investors. Myers inflated the NAV by, among other things, incorporating assets the Fund did not actually own, such as his father-in-law’s home and retirement accounts. To offset his mounting trading losses, Myers also inflated the NAV by recording his hypothetical future income as a million-dollar “asset” of the Fund, even though he had not earned any income for many years.

The complaint alleges that Myers further concealed the Fund’s actual results by failing to issue tax forms to investors, as required by the Fund’s offering documents, to inform them of their distributive share of the Fund’s losses. Instead, Myers claimed all trading losses on his own personal tax returns without making any disclosure to Fund investors.

Myers failed to pay certain investors who requested the value of their Fund investments as reflected in their account statements, offering various excuses without disclosing that he misused and lost their money.

Myers solely owned and controlled both Sterling Capital and SCM and, through these entities, directed all activities for the Fund.

The SEC accuses the defendants of violations of the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws, including Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (“Exchange Act”) and Rule 10b-5 thereunder, Section 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933 (“Securities Act”), and Sections 206(1), (2), and (4) of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 (“Advisers Act”) and Rule 206(4)-8 thereunder.

The Commission is seeking: (a) injunctive relief; (b) disgorgement of ill-gotten gains; (c) pre-judgment interest on those ill- gotten gains; (d) civil penalties; and (e) all other equitable and ancillary relief to which the Court determines the Commission is entitled.