Kenneth Mattson is accused of running a real estate Ponzi scheme that cost hundreds of investors millions of dollars. Many of the alleged victims are Christians who trusted Mattson through their church connections. The fallout has reached beyond the investors to his business partner and at least one Christian ministry.
Website screenshot @Lefever Mattson Property Management / Insert of DOJ logo via Wikimedia Commons
Mattson, president of LeFever Mattson, a real estate company in Citrus Heights, California, was indicted and arrested in May 2025 on charges of defrauding investors, many of them nearing retirement or already retired.
The alleged fraud was a “classic Ponzi scheme,” acting U.S. Attorney Patrick Robbins said. Mattson met many of the alleged victims through church connections.
In addition to the criminal case, Mattson faces a civil enforcement action by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). That case was put on hold in August 2025 while the criminal case proceeds.
According to the SEC, Mattson raised $46 million from investors in the five years before the agency filed its complaint. Many were retirees he met through his church community.
Mattson was a part owner of LeFever Mattson limited partnerships that owned residential and commercial real estate. The SEC said he offered investors the chance to buy interests in those partnerships. The agency alleges, however, that the purported investments were never recorded in the partnerships’ official financial records.
For example, from 2009 to 2024, Mattson allegedly solicited investments in Divi Divi Tree, a LeFever Mattson partnership that owned an apartment complex in Riverside, California. The investments were “off the books” and never recorded in the partnership’s financial records, according to the indictment. Investors received distributions, but those payments did not come from rents collected by the apartment complex, the indictment said.
Instead, the Justice Department alleges, Mattson used loans and money from new investors to pay earlier investors and to enrich himself. He allegedly bought property held in a personal real estate entity, as well as a Rolls-Royce.
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According to the complaint, LeFever Mattson discovered Mattson’s alleged fraud in late 2023. After an internal investigation, Mattson resigned as CEO and CFO in April 2024. LeFever Mattson and affiliated entities filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in September and October 2024.
In May 2024, Tim LeFever, Mattson’s longtime friend and business partner, alerted investors to financial irregularities and said he had reported Mattson to the SEC.
Legal Cases
Mattson is charged with seven counts of wire fraud, one count of money laundering and one count of destroying records in a federal investigation.
The obstruction charge stems from allegations that Mattson deleted more than 10,000 files from his personal computer after learning of the federal investigation. He allegedly did so two days before federal agents executed a search warrant at his home in Sonoma, California.
In June 2026, Mattson appeared poised to plead guilty in exchange for a proposed 12-year sentence, KSRO reported, but he abruptly canceled that plan. His trial is set for May 3, 2027. If convicted on all counts and sentenced consecutively, he could face up to 170 years in prison.
In July 2024, a group of investors filed a class action against LeFever, Mattson and several related entities. The filing came after LeFever Mattson told investors that many properties were being sold to return money to them.
The complaint alleged that LeFever Mattson led investors to believe they could expect regular distributions, based on a fixed percentage return, from the net income of the real estate assets. For years, investors received consistent monthly distribution checks. But the complaint states: “LeFever Mattson rarely, if ever, provided investors financial account statements reflecting the profits and losses of the investments, the current fair market value of the properties held by the LPs [limited partnerships], or documentation reflecting that their distribution checks were the product of the properties’ yearly profits.”
The plaintiffs sought relief based on claims of fraud, conversion, breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment and financial abuse of elders. They also asked for a receiver to protect their interests and an accounting of the properties.
The class action was put on hold in December 2024 because of the bankruptcy proceedings involving the LeFever Mattson entities.
In May 2026, a court-approved agreement required Mattson and his wife, Stacy, to vacate their 50-acre, $6.5 million estate overlooking Sonoma by June 15. The property is to be turned over to bankruptcy trustees for sale, SFIST reported.
Victims
Mattson met many of his alleged victims through church connections. According to The Press Democrat, some investors attended Creekside Community Church in San Leandro, while Mattson met others through First Covenant Church in Oakland and Parkway Community Church in Fairfield, all in California.
Several alleged victims spoke at Mattson’s detention hearing in 2025. Janice, who used only her first name during the hearing, said, “We’ve had Ken for over 29 years as our financial adviser,” The Press Democrat reported.
She said much of her husband’s family also invested, as did her sister. Janice said her sister attempted suicide two months before the hearing because she “couldn’t see a way out” of the financial devastation caused by the loss of her investment distributions.
Some victims are finding solace by meeting, praying and supporting one another. In December 2025, a group of 13 former investors met and calculated that they had invested about $20 million combined.
“When we all started meeting one another, what stood out immediately was the caliber of the people,” said Jean Kelly, one of the alleged victims. “These are good people. Religious people.”
She added that cheating such trusting people was as easy as taking candy from a baby.
Another alleged victim, SJ, is a divorced mother who lost her savings. She invested with Mattson in March 2024 and said she trusted Mattson and LeFever as “fellow Christians.” The group of former investors helped cover two months of her rent.
The group also prays for Mattson to have a “heart change.” They compare it to the transformation of Zacchaeus, the tax collector who met Jesus in Jericho in Luke 19.
LeFever
LeFever has not been criminally charged. In February 2026, however, he reached a settlement with the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the bankruptcy proceedings. He agreed to contribute $4.725 million to a trust for investors and creditors, with $472,500 due initially and the remaining $4.25 million to come from asset sales.
The settlement also requires LeFever to waive a $290,000 promissory note that the Laurel Wreath Foundation holds against one of the LeFever Mattson entities. The foundation, a charitable nonprofit founded by the LeFevers, had about $1.6 million in assets at the end of fiscal year 2024. Its revenue was reported as investment income rather than contributions.
The agreement says the $4.725 million is a “very substantial portion of LeFever’s assets and is secured by real estate assets he owns.”
The settlement is not an admission of wrongdoing. LeFever denied allegations that he failed to stop Mattson’s alleged Ponzi scheme and maintained that he acted appropriately. The agreement states:
“LeFever asserts that he acted diligently and appropriately at all relevant times and that once Mattson’s scheme was revealed, LeFever retained and relied upon professionals, including attorneys and forensic accountants, and took appropriate action, including removing Mattson from his positions as Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer and reporting Mattson to the relevant federal authorities. LeFever also denies that he received any fraudulent transfers.”
The Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors also sought permission to subpoena records from Youth for Christ Ministries Sacramento, where LeFever served on the board of directors. The committee identified $75,000 in payments from LeFever Mattson to the ministry from October 2022 to December 2023, in monthly installments of $5,000. It sought the records to investigate whether the payments were a self-serving transaction that depleted resources available to creditors. The bankruptcy court granted the request.
SEC Advice for Avoiding Ponzi Schemes
The scheme Mattson is accused of operating also illustrates affinity fraud, a type of investment fraud in which fraudsters use shared religious, ethnic, professional or other community ties to gain the trust of potential victims. Many of Mattson’s alleged victims were retirees he knew through church connections.
The SEC has advice for avoiding investment fraud in a faith-based community.
“[S]ometimes fraudsters try to take advantage of that trust by targeting people of faith — the fraudster may even be (or pretend to be) part of the very group they are trying to cheat. We urge you to be on the lookout for investment fraud, even in your faith-based community,” the SEC says.
The SEC’s tips include:
- Check the credentials of the person offering the investment.
- Understand the investment and get its terms in writing.
- Avoid any investment that sounds too good to be true.
- Don’t feel rushed or pressured to buy immediately.
- Verify the investment and the person offering it independently, rather than relying on information from the person soliciting the investment.
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