Yachts, jets and women: NC billionaire Greg Lindberg to pay for billions he stole
Billionaire Greg Lindberg, now convicted of trying to bribe a state official on top of masterminding what federal prosecutors call “one of the biggest insurance frauds in history,” was sentenced Tuesday to 12 years in prison.
Lindberg, 55, “siphoned more than $2 billion” from his insurance companies, assistant U.S. attorneys wrote in their sentencing memorandum. The federal prosecutors said he used about $30 million on private jets, $21 million “in connection with various women,” and $12 million on “yacht expenses.” And when North Carolina insurance regulators started poking around, he tried to bribe state Commissioner of Insurance Mike Causey.
With four years in jail-time credit, Lindberg will be released in 2034 after he serves eight years. By that time, according to his personal notes, the Durham businessman hoped to have a $100 billion net worth and the ability to live to 120 years old. His notes, included in prosecutors’ files, also mentioned “longevity research” and cloning.
“Hopefully Mr. Lindberg is going to take that big brain and do some good,” U.S. District Judge Max Cogburn Jr., said as he sentenced the billionaire.
Lindberg owed about 2,000 policyholders at the time of his sentencing, as well as $1 billion to insurance companies in Puerto Rico and $4 million to the National Organization of Life & Health Insurance Guaranty Associations, assistant U.S. attorney Lyndie Freeman told Cogburn.
By Tuesday, Lindberg had paid $1 billion in restitution, his attorneys said. That is the largest amount ever paid in the state and one of the largest in the country, his attorney James Wyatt, said in court.
But about 30,000 victims died before seeing any of the money they lost, Freeman said. That’s about how many people live in Cornelius.
“Unlike the victims one often sees in large investment fraud schemes, most of Lindberg’s victims were middle class folks who wanted a safe place to put their hard-earned retirement savings,” prosecutors wrote. “They did not or could not afford to risk their savings on speculative stocks or trendy funds at the mercy of the markets. Rather, they chose annuities, which gave smaller but reliable interest rate returns, and believed their money was ‘guaranteed’ to be safe under the law.”
One victim couldn’t pay for a funeral for her murdered son. A couple lost access to more than $600,000 in life savings as their daughter desperately needed cancer treatment.
That’s how much Lindberg spent on “reproductive services,” assistant U.S. attorneys wrote when detailing the money he spent on women, which included:
- over $15.4 million in direct payments to women.
- over $2 million to purchase matchmaking and dating services.
- over $1.6 million in housing related payments for women.
- over $1.3 million in payments to party planners hired to host private events for Lindberg, including events for the purposes of meeting potential romantic partners.
Lindberg was indicted in two federal cases related to his scheme. In the bribery case, he and his employee, John Gray, were in 2019 charged and later found guilty at trial on a count of conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud and another count of bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds and aiding and abetting.
In the insurance fraud case, Lindberg was indicted alone in 2023 on one count each of conspiracy to defraud the United States, money laundering conspiracy, and wire fraud; four counts of making false insurance business statements to regulators; and six counts of making false entries about the financial conditions or solvency of an insurance business.
After a jury found him guilty in a retrial of the bribery case, Lindberg pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United States and money laundering.
“Lindberg liked to claim he was the next Warren Buffett,” prosecutors wrote, “but he was much closer to being the next Marty Frankel or Doug Cassity, two notorious insurance fraudsters.”
In the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina on Tuesday, Lindberg sat in a black and gray jail uniform while six attorneys and his employee, Gray, surrounded him in suits. Gray was also sentenced Tuesday to the time he’d already served, which was about three years.
The government’s attorneys asked Cogburn to “honor victims, including those who have already passed” with his sentence and wrote off Lindberg’s sizable restitution payments as a product of all the money he had access to from stealing.
On the bribery case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Dana Owen Washington said “the public as a whole was a victim” when Lindberg tried to bribe an official with $200 million to turn the other cheek.
Lindberg told Cogburn: “I am deeply regretful and apologize to the policyholders. They didn’t sign up for this.”
He did not address the bribery in his statement to the judge.
In a post on social media site X on Tuesday afternoon, soon-to-be Wake County District Attorney Wiley Nickel said he would launch an investigation into possible state criminal charges related to this case.
“The federal convictions established serious efforts to corrupt public decision-making in North Carolina and influence state regulators for private gain,” the former congressman wrote. “North Carolina has its own laws, its own courts, and its own responsibility to hold people accountable when our laws are broken.”
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the length of Greg Lindberg’s prison sentence.
This story was originally published May 26, 2026 at 1:31 PM with the headline "Yachts, jets and women: NC billionaire Greg Lindberg to pay for billions he stole."
