Some of the people convicted in the state’s largest real estate fraud, the collapse of Colonial Realty’s $2 billion empire two decades ago, are now tangled in lawsuits over defaulted loans and failed real estate deals, some worth millions of dollars.
West Hartford-based Colonial Realty imploded into bankruptcy in September 1990, costing more than 6,000 investors as much as $350 million. Many investors lost their life savings. Most of the nearly 20 people convicted in the scandal got probation, six were sent to prison and Colonial chief financial officer Frank Shuch killed himself while awaiting trial on fraud charges.
