Robin Hood Gautham Shankar Receives Probation in Insider Trading Case

Gautham Shankar, one of the traders who received illegal insider trading tips from Zvi Goffer, received probation because he gave away some of his illegal gains to the homeless. He was rewarded with probation also because he also assisted prosecutors for more than a year to pursue Zvi Goffer, Emanuel Goffer, Michael Kimelman, Franz Tudor, David Plate, and Thomas Hardin. Last November David Plate was also sentenced to three years’ probation and six months’ house arrest.

U.S. District Judge Richard Sullivan said the following about Robin Hood Gautham Shankar (source: Bloomberg):

“The key variable for me is not only that you’re a good person, but it’s that you cooperated early,” the judge said. “You did it substantially and you did it in a timely way that allowed the government to pursue investigations.”

…“As the government learned during its meetings with Mr. Shankar, he has always, quite literally, given large sums of money away to the homeless on the streets of New York, including cash given to him by his co-conspirators for passing tips from Hardin,”