A Sacramento, Calif., life insurance agent was recently arrested as the alleged mastermind behind a multi-million dollar Ponzi scheme to furnish his lavish lifestyle.

William Arthur Sassman II, 41, faces up to 52 years in prison if convicted on all 100 of the charges, which include grand theft and misrepresentation or omission in the sale of a security, according to the California Attorney General’s Office.

Sassman is being held on $3.2 million bail at the Sacramento County Jail.

According to authorities, Sassman used four companies to solicit investments ranging from $10,000 to $500,000 from more than 50 individuals across Northern California and elsewhere. The companies are InTex LLC; Formulating Insurance Agency (FIA); Formulating Investments (FI); and Systematic Management Services (SMS). In September 2009, Sassman and his companies filed for bankruptcy.

A licensed life insurance agent, Sassman allegedly convinced investors, many of whom were senior citizens, to shift their savings from IRAs, annuities, life insurance accounts and other vehicles to “high return” investments with his companies, authorities said. These investments included foreclosed properties and real estate in Georgia; a strip mall in Folsom, Calif.; the production of a laptop computer stand called the “Notefloat”; and annuity, stock and foreign currency investments.

The state attorney general’s office alleges that Sassman made few, if any, investments and rarely paid the double to triple returns promised, instead spending investors’ millions of dollars on various expenses, including $1.1 million on charges to his American Express card, $300,000 on automobiles, $75,000 at Polo Ralph Lauren and three residences.

One of Sassman’s investors, a Sacramento resident, invested more than $250,000 in FIA in October 2004 with a promise of a 7% annual return. The woman’s money was combined with money from other investors for a total of more than $700,000, authorities said, with $400,000 spent on Sassman’s personal expenses, $50,000 going to Sassman’s wife, and more than $34,000 paid in returns to other investors.

The woman lost $170,000 of her investment of her investment.

Those funds that were invested by Sassman were channeled into other illegal operations, such as a “stock trading program” run by a group of individuals indicted in federal court earlier this year for running a Ponzi scheme of their own, authorities said.

Investors are still owed close to $4.4 million and additional losses could reach $3 million, according to the state attorney general’s office.

“William Arthur Sassman solicited millions of dollars from California investors with promises of high returns on business and real estate investments,” Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr.  said in a statement. “In reality, Sassman looted their savings to prop up a Ponzi scheme, so he could buy homes and Ferraris.”