Wife of alleged swindler Stinson vacations in style

Susan L. Stinson, wife of alleged Ponzi schemer Robert Stinson Jr., took her extended family on a luxury beachfront vacation over the summer in Southern California at a cost of more than $24,000.

The weeklong trip was less than four weeks after the Stinsons agreed to freeze their assets.

Details of that summer getaway were included in a court filing Wednesday in the Securities and Exchange Commission case against Life's Good Inc. The SEC alleged in June that the Philadelphia company headed by Robert Stinson Jr. swindled 140 investors nationwide out of $16 million from 2006 through June 2010.

The new documents, filed by the court-appointed official trying to collect money for defrauded investors, also show that Susan Stinson spent $7,126 in July on a five-day Grand Canyon rafting trip with her sister, failed in October to disclose $5,671 in income from a North Carolina farm, and in November paid $17,000 in overdue rent on the Stinsons' Berwyn house.

In aggregate, Susan Stinson, who said in a December deposition that she did not read a September court order that severely restricted her finances, "has failed to disclose and, ultimately, remit to the receiver at least $78,038.95," according to the filing.

Susan Stinson, who does not have an attorney, did not respond to a request for comment by e-mail or to a voice mail at her current home in Chesterbrook.

In a November court filing, Susan Stinson said her use of the farm income was the result of a misunderstanding. "My name and my family's name are exemplary, and we do abide by the law of the land," she wrote.

The court-appointed receiver for the SEC, Kamian Schwartzman, and his attorney, Gaetan J. Alfano, asked U.S. District Court Judge Berle M. Schiller to approve a motion to hold Susan Stinson in contempt of the July order freezing the Stinsons' assets and a September order establishing a receivership estate to protect remaining assets of the Stinsons and of Life's Good.

If the judge grants the motion, the consequence could be anything from a figurative slap on the wrist to imprisonment, which the receiver recommends.

Robert Stinson Jr., who was not named in Wednesday's motion, was registered as a guest at one of the beach condos in Carlsbad, Calif., but it is not certain that he was there. To make a living, Robert Stinson, who faces criminal charges, is now driving a taxi in Philadelphia, according to Alfano.

For previous coverage of the case against Robert Stinson Jr., go to go.philly.com/stinsonEndText