Sports stars are naturals for investment scams

— -- Willie Gault is best known for his fancy footsteps for the Chicago Bears that burned the New England Patriots in 1986's Super Bowl and a rap song with his teammates called the Super Bowl Shuffle.

But far from the cheering crowds and Soldier Field, Gault, one of the fastest wide receivers to ever play in the NFL, has become the latest public face of yet another kind of fast move, the kind that authorities say burns investors to the tune of millions of dollars a year: alleged financial fraud.

A huddle of ex-pro athletes have been accused of abusing their built-in trust and hero status from a previous life in sports to help orchestrate or perpetrate sweeping financial frauds. Gault, among other professional athletes, is a target of an ongoing crackdown by the Securities and Exchange Commission on financial ploys that use sports stars to separate unsuspecting victims, often sports fans, from their money.

The SEC doesn't disclose a tally of the number of ex-athletes it has targeted. And to be sure, many retired athletes move on to successful, upstanding careers. But in addition to Gault, other sports heroes the SEC has accused in civil cases filed in U.S. district courts within the past 12 months include Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger, whose efforts to overcome challenges to join Notre Dame's football team inspired the movie Rudy.

The SEC's focus on high-profile athletes highlights a common weak spot for many investors: allowing adulation of sports heroes or other celebrities to cloud skepticism when investing their money.

"When you have a famous athlete fronting for a company or shilling for an investment, it causes people to lower their guard and assume … it must be legitimate," says Andrew Stoltmann, a financial fraud attorney at Stoltmann Law Offices. "Recently, we've seen how dangerous of a belief that can be."

The SEC declined to comment on its actions against former professional athletes. Gault could not be reached and has not yet filed a response to the charges against him. Ruettiger, who could not be reached, settled the case against him without admitting or denying guilt and agreed to pay $382,866.

Experts in financial crime say cases such as these are likely connected with:

•Regulators' eagerness to set an example. After failing to give early warnings to investors in giant Ponzi schemes such as Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford, regulators are eager to show they're turning up the heat. When athletes are found to be part of cases such as these, regulators can generate awareness of the alleged crime and the severity of the penalties for those who are caught, Stoltmann says.

"These are big-headline cases," which can serve as a deterrent, Stoltmann says.

•Athletes' position to take advantage of investors' distrust of financial advisers. Situations such as Madoff and Stanford — on top of the financial crisis and subsequent bailouts of banks — have shaken investors' trust of traditional financial advisers. And athletes, with the right pitches, can be magnets for investors looking for someone they think they can trust, says Stanley Teitelbaum, a clinical psychologist and author of Athletes Who Indulge Their Dark Side.

"These guys can be made the figureheads for sinister schemes," he says.