An indictment will move forward in a case involving a real-estate company based in Phoenix.
A federal judge Friday declined to dismiss charges against Brian Block, the former CFO of American Realty Capital Properties Inc., a real-estate investment trust.
Charges from 2014 accuse Block of inflating financial data and misleading investors by plugging fake numbers into a spreadsheet later used to report results.
At the time, the real-estate investment trust, or REIT, reported $1.5 billion in revenue. Market value dropped by about $4 billion after news originally broke.
Block is charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud, securities fraud and making false filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The trust has since been renamed.