‘Grandfatherly’ accountant Joe Pezzano died last Christmas. One year later, where are the millions he was entrusted with?

At first, there was shock and grief. Joseph Pezzano, a longtime tax accountant and financial adviser in Collegeville, died unexpectedly last Christmas Day at the age of 73. He’d been widely respected, trusted, and loved.

Then, it was confusion. Pezzano’s clients couldn’t get answers about their investments when they called or visited his accounting firm, Bond, Pezzano & Etze.

Panic followed when an office manager began sending out emails stating the accounting firm had “no affiliation” with Pezzano’s investment arm, JPA R/E Associates — even though they shared an address and phone number.

Now, one year after Pezzano’s death, there is anger, embarrassment, despair, and a lot of lawyers. But few answers and no money returned.

Dozens of people who’d invested tens of millions of dollars are confronting the reality that they might not see that money anytime soon — if at all.

A 65-year-old health-care worker who was planning on retiring says she is now working harder than ever. She’s putting in overtime to make ends meet.

A former owner of a successful semiconductor company is living off his Social Security income in a two-bedroom apartment.

Retired Peco employees who rolled their pensions into Pezzano’s investment operation have been left “without the necessary money that they need to survive,” according to a federal lawsuit.

Even a longtime colleague of Pezzano’s, who retired weeks before he died, has filed a claim against his estate in Montgomery County, seeking to recover $150,000.

Investors have yet to receive any solid information about where their money might be.

“It’s ridiculous,” said Adam Sager, a lawyer representing two investors. “It’s just frustrating beyond belief.”

Pezzano, a U.S. Marine who grew up in South Philadelphia, was a workaholic who lived frugally in a Collegeville rancher that he and his wife, Paula, purchased in 1979 for $63,900.

But lawyers searching for their clients’ money have questioned whether Pezzano might have been running a Ponzi-like scheme involving rental properties in Ocean City, N.J. At least two condominiums were sold just days before Pezzano died. More recently, Sager said, there have been rumors of sports cars parked in a garage.

Meanwhile, the estimates of the amount of money that’s missing keep growing.

Last month, 14 Pezzano investors filed claims in the Montgomery County court case seeking to recover $18.6 million. That is in addition to 23 others who had previously filed claims totaling $8.5 million.

Lawyers representing Pezzano’s wife, Paula, and Pezzano’s estate declined to comment on the case this week, as did a lawyer representing Bond, Pezzano & Etze, the accounting firm where Pezzano was a senior business adviser.

The firm’s website, which had been operating as recently as last week, went dark after The Inquirer reached out to attorneys connected to the case.

Michael F. Rogers, the court-appointed receiver who is handling the claims, said he is aware of at least 42 Pezzano investors, although that number could increase.

“There could be people out there that we don’t know about,” Rogers said. He said Pezzano investors who have not received a letter regarding the court case should contact his office.

Forensic accountants are poring over Pezzano’s financial records, including the bare-bones statements he provided clients. Rogers said they don’t know yet if those records are complete or accurate — or even correspond to actual investments.

“This is my personal optimism, but I would hope that those statements can be verified and those funds are somewhere,” he said.

In May, prior to Rogers being appointed as receiver, lawyers for Pezzano’s estate wrote in a court filing that they had been “unable to locate or identify investments made by [Pezzano’s investment arm] JPA that would correspond to investments shown on the statements the decedent prepared and delivered to investors.”

The FBI and SEC are both believed to be investigating, according to Rogers and people who have been interviewed by federal investigators. An FBI spokesperson last week declined to comment on the status of the case.

“Right now, we’re on hold,” said Anne Bortner, who lives in South Jersey and invested $180,000 with Pezzano about five years ago. It was money she’d received when her mother died. She had depended on quarterly disbursements from the fund to cover her health insurance and medication.

She was thinking about retiring soon. Now, she’s putting in more hours than before. She doesn’t have money to hire a lawyer.

“It’s really affecting me,” Bortner, 65, who works with people who’ve suffered traumatic brain injuries, said last week. “I have no retirement, no pension, nothing.”

Bortner’s sister, brother, and his wife were also Pezzano investors.

Earl Peacock, a longtime friend of Pezzano’s, said he is out more than $3 million. He once ran a company that manufactured silicon wafers. His income now is $1,500 a month from Social Security.

“I just live on that,” he said. “It sucks, but I’m getting used to it.”

Peacock, 66, said he is holding out hope that some of his money might be recoverable.

“I have no idea,” Peacock said last week, sounding exasperated when asked about the status of the case. “He was like one of my best friends.”

Peacock said he has not yet seen any strong evidence of malfeasance.

But the ongoing federal lawsuit accuses Pezzano, a “grandfatherly tax accountant turned purported investment broker,” of outright fraud. The suit, filed by 14 investors, including former Peco employees and their relatives, claims Pezzano misappropriated their “life-savings and retirement funds by, among other things, transferring funds to family members and business partners, purchasing real estate for himself and family members, and/or failing to invest the funds at all.”

The lawsuit also alleges that Pezzano handled his clients’ tax returns for free and selected a friendly lawyer to prepare their wills to avoid scrutiny from outside accountants and lawyers “who may have recognized the numerous red flags of fraud.”

One financial adviser whose client had invested with Pezzano said he was alarmed when he saw their account statements. He said they appeared “bogus” and reminded him of the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme — they looked like they could have been typed up on a laptop using Microsoft Excel.

“I could tell right away this is not good,” said the adviser, who requested anonymity to protect the identity of his client. “It was horrible.”

Eric Lechtzin, a lawyer who has represented victims of securities fraud, said Pezzano investors should prepare for a protracted legal ordeal, with the estate and a growing number of investors competing for any funds that might be recovered.

“Untangling something like this is going to take a very, very long time,” said Lechtzin, who is not involved in the Pezzano case.

Lechtzin represents victims of Par Funding, the Philadelphia small-business lender that operated as a Ponzi scheme and was taken over by a receiver in 2020. It wasn’t until last week that the court approved the first distribution of money.

“These matters typically take many years to get resolved,” he said.

Bortner said she is remaining optimistic that her money can be found. She has to. There is no Plan B.

“Right now, we’re on hold,” she said during a lunch break at work last week. “We’re all just sitting around waiting for it to crack open.”