Narrator: In this episode of "American Greed"...
He was born at the top of the world
and the bottom of the ladder.
Lobsang Dargey, a poor Buddhist monk from Tibet.
He comes to America with dreams of climbing that ladder
and trading his robe for riches.
He was a force of nature.
Well, he's a fascinating person.
Narrator: He marries a woman who can open doors...
from a family of American sports royalty.
Zlab: He's engaging. He's unstoppable.
This dude's... This dude's doing stuff.
Narrator: This dude's living the American dream
and selling it to wealthy Chinese investors.
A record number of Chinese are looking
to get into the United States,
and they are willing to pay big money to make it happen.
He did something bat[bleep] crazy.
Wilkinson: This was a fraud that was snowballing
and just getting bigger and bigger and out of control.
Narrator: $120 million are on the table,
and the dreams of 250 immigrant investors
are about to go up in smoke.
They would be asked to leave the country immediately.
They would be deported.
Narrator: And when the feds come calling,
his own dream becomes a nightmare.
The former monk isn't talking,
but "American Greed" has the inside story
from those who thought they knew him best.
He's a driven person where nothing gets in his way.
If you are asking me, "Did he need to be stopped?"
Absolutely.
♪♪
Narrator: Dawn breaks on the upscale Seattle suburb of Bellevue.
Tucked into the hillside is a multi-million dollar mansion
with a swimming pool in the backyard
and a Bentley in the garage.
It's the home of a prominent Seattle real estate developer
named Lobsang Dargey and his wife Tami Agassi,
the sister of tennis great Andre Agassi.
Lobsang and Tami would appear to have it all,
but a knock at the door is about to change all of that.
Agassi: So, Lobsang's sleeping.
I'm up early with the twins,
and the FBI knocks on our door.
Moran: Mr. Dargey came out in his underwear.
We told him to put some clothes on
and then we sat down and tried to talk to Mr. Dargey.
Narrator: The feds have a lot of questions for Lobsang,
like how he financed his mansion and his Bentley,
what is he doing with his investor's money
and why is he lying about it?
Money was continuing to come in and being misappropriated.
There's no way to defend falsifying a bank statement.
And it was clear to us that there were
going to be huge losses for investors.
Narrator: On the same day, federal agents raid Dargey's offices,
leaving his long-time colleagues stunned.
There's men and women in FBI windbreakers everywhere,
pulling computers off desks and shoving stuff in boxes.
It was very scary.
There was probably 15 FBI agents looking at you,
wondering what you did wrong.
Narrator: Tami Agassi is suddenly looking at her husband
and wondering the same thing.
Our world blew up, 'cause I needed to know
if I was married to a criminal.
Narrator: Tami will soon discover that her husband is more than
just a common criminal.
His life is a corruption of the American dream.
It was, in all respects, an American success story
if he didn't take a wrong way turn.
♪♪
Narrator: Born in 1973, Lobsang Dargey comes from stark beginnings,
the youngest of three sons toiling on a small Tibetan farm
without electricity or running water.
It's a far cry from a mansion in Bellevue.
From what I understand, Lobsang had a very,
very hard upbringing.
I know that they were very poor,
that he didn't even get his first toothbrush
till he made it to India at 19 or 20.
He grew up in a small hut.
They would burn yak dung for fuel.
It was that humble.
Narrator: At 13, Lobsang is shipped off
to a Buddhist monastery to become a monk.
It's not the boy's choice. It's economic necessity.
Conditions there are harsh.
Lobsang is lonely, and eventually in great danger.
Reporter: Over the past two years, the Chinese Army
has clashed with local people four times.
Tibetan monks led demonstrators in demanding independence
from Chinese rule.
Narrator: The uprising in Tibet sends Lobsang running for his life.
He treks 2,800 miles across the Himalaya mountains
to find refuge at the Dalai Lama's Kirti Monastery
in Dharamshala, India.
For a devout Buddhist monk, Kirti is a holy place,
but Lobsang finds another calling here...
Business.
He has a gift for haggling at the local market
that earns him the formal role of "Business Monk."
You don't really think of ambition
when you think of Tibetan monks,
and he was the business side of the monastery,
and so maybe that started the little seed
of being an entrepreneur,
being in charge of the money at the monastery.
Narrator: As Business Monk, Lobsang befriends Western travelers
visiting the monastery.
While the tourists see a charming young holy man,
he may see a ticket to pursue his true calling in America.
Agassi: One of the Western travelers that he met,
he would cold call her all hours of the day.
And finally, just because he badgered her to death,
she finally said okay and sent a letter of invitation.
Narrator: Dargey's ticket is punched and his bags are packed.
The enterprising young business monk is on his way to America.
♪♪
In this strange new land of milk and honey, Dargey is broke,
but wide-eyed with ambition.
He sees freedom, wealth, and opportunity all around him,
and he wants some.
He gets here to America and it's like,
"Hey, man, this is like a circus.
Everything's gravy after what I've been through."
Joe Zlab, Dargey's friend and former vice president,
has a front row seat to his transformation.
"Rules? Sure, I'll obey the rules,
but I don't necessarily know all the rules,
and I'm just going to go whole hog.
I'm going to do everything I can.
I'm going to be unstoppable."
Narrator: In Seattle, Lobsang finds many of the locals
sympathetic to the plight of an exiled Tibetan monk.
With their help, he picks up odd jobs.
He's known around town as "the painting monk."
Agassi: I actually know a realtor who knew him as the painting monk,
and how he would carry his ladder and paints on the bus,
which was against all the rules.
[ Phone dialing ] Narrator: And before long, he puts down the paint brush
and picks up a phone, selling commercial phone service.
Agassi: He would cold call all day until his whole face would be red.
His ear would be red,
but they said he always closed the deal at the end of the day.
Narrator: A closer, earning enough to buy a small house.
And with roots now planted in America,
Dargey sheds the robes that never really fit.
Poverty and chastity?
Why not give money and women a try?
And a chance encounter with Tami Agassi in 2003
offers up just the kind of woman he's looking for.
I was executive director for a non-profit in Seattle.
As part of my job, I held a lot of relationships
with a lot of people who were very philanthropic.
Narrator: Tami rubs elbows with wealth and power
and her brother is a superstar.
You have often said, Andre, that your sister Tami
is your best friend.
For sure he knew my brother was a sports superstar.
And at the beginning I thought it was really refreshing,
because he pretended that he didn't know.
Narrator: At the time, her brother, Andre,
is the #1 ranked tennis player in the world.
Opportunity is knocking,
and the fearless young salesman is dialing.
Agassi: He proceeded to cold call me for over a year to go on a date.
This was the call.
"Hello, Tami, this Lobsang. You want to go dinner sometime?"
He was very aggressive.
He had no understanding of protocol.
You shot him down, he acted like he didn't really register it
and would tell you to call him
if you wanted to go to the movies sometime.
Narrator: After a year of saying "no,"
Tami finally says, "Okay already."
And, much to her surprise, resistance gives way to love.
Agassi: Well, he's a fascinating person.
He's highly intelligent. He's very charismatic.
He knows how to live in the present.
He doesn't adhere to any social protocol,
which makes him hilarious.
Narrator: Lobsang closes perhaps the biggest deal of his life
when the couple marry in December, 2004.
Now headed for U.S. citizenship in a well-connected family,
Lobsang is set up to carve out
his own slice of the American pie.
Looking back, Tami now wonders
how much of the groom's affection was heartfelt
and how much was hustle.
I think Lobsang is an opportunist.
It doesn't mean that he didn't care about me,
but I think his eyes lit up
with the circle that was around me.
♪♪
Narrator: Up next...
Narrator: Charity begins at home.
For this hustler, so does greed.
Agassi: At the time, I didn't think anything of it.
We were building a life together.
Looking back, that's flat-out insane.
Narrator: And later, where does
a young American entrepreneur go to raise capital?
Communist China, of course.
Reporter: Cash-heavy Chinese increasingly want U.S. citizenship.
He was offering a green card guarantee.
And he sold them on the American dream.
♪♪
Narrator: In Bellevue, Washington,
Lobsang Dargey chases a new dream...
Real estate development,
with his new wife, Tami, as his angel investor.
The second we got married, he had quit his job,
lived off my salary for a year and a half,
and started pulling money out of my assets to buy real estate.
Narrator: He convinces Tami to mortgage her house,
taking out a loan of $300,000 against her equity.
At the time, I didn't think anything of it.
We were building a life together.
Narrator: Tami is not the only one in the Agassi family
charmed by Lobsang.
Her father, Mike, immigrated to America from Iran
and he sees in Lobsang a younger version of himself.
He invests $300,000 with his son-in-law.
The young developer gets to work
buying and renovating old buildings
in the working class town of Everett, Washington,
and they are happy to have him.
The city was happy because Lobsang had potential.
You bring in a young, ambitious, aggressive, developer?
They're going to be happy. It's good for the city.
[ Tools whirring ] Narrator: In 2008, he graduates to new construction
with a large residential and retail complex.
He calls it Potala Village,
named after Potala Palace in Tibet,
once home to the Dalai Lamas.
Lobsang funds the project by raising $22 million
through Tami's personal connections and a bank loan.
He got a loan in 2008, when no one was getting loans,
or it was very difficult to get loans, especially,
you know, for millions of dollars to build a building.
Most developers were kind of curling up
into the fetal position at that point,
and he's like, "No, we're gonna do this thing."
And so we did.
He built it out when most people were not building.
He kind of got a name for himself at that point
of like, "This dude... This dude's doing stuff."
[ Singing ]
Narrator: And though he is no longer a monk,
Buddhism is still part of his life and part of his brand.
Potala village is adorned with symbols
that play well here in the progressive Seattle area,
where Dargey's heritage gives him cachet.
He was very spiritual. He would bring in monks.
When he'd buy a new construction site,
before the groundbreaking, that would be part of the ceremony,
where they'd come out and bless the ground.
It was really important to him to have
that kind of energy in his projects.
Probably some of it was just natural to him to do.
Some of it was probably also a little bit of marketing.
This is what I would say about Lobsang's Buddhism
and how it benefits him...
When it provides and an opportunity for him,
he makes the right choice.
When it doesn't provide an opportunity for him,
he can weaponize that Buddhism.
"I need to follow my karma and let go and move on."
He could switch back and forth
from that dimension all day long.
[ Laughing ]
Narrator: But Lobsang's dedication to the discipline of non-attachment
is about to be put the test.
Agassi: Good luck!
♪♪
Kirkland, Washington is only 20 miles south of Everett,
but in the real estate game, it's a world away.
For his next venture, Dargey eyes this quiet, upscale town
and a plot of prime real estate
a stone's throw from Lake Washington.
He commits to buying the property for $8.6 million
and pitches another high-density residential project,
fully outlined in his blueprints
and striking promotional materials.
But this time, he hits a wall,
and learns a new American concept... N.I.M.B.Y,
"Not In My Backyard."
Developing in Kirkland
is nowhere like developing in Everett.
He was cramming a lot of units into the property,
just like he would do in Everett,
and that did not go over well with the community.
They basically said no.
Narrator: Dargey's Business Monk routine rings hollow
with the toney residents of Kirkland.
They are turned off by size of the project
and the aggressive style of the builder.
Agassi: He would stand up at meetings.
They would voice concerns and he would bark at them and say,
"You don't need to worry about that,"
versus addressing their concerns.
If he would have courted them
the same way he courts an investor,
he probably could have resolved a lot of these concerns.
But instead, he was a bull in a china shop.
Narrator: Dargey locks horns with a vocal citizen's group,
and his building permits are blocked.
The conflict escalates and Lobsang digs in,
deploying both lawyers and monks to the battleground.
Agassi: Lawsuits, complaints, him flying in monks
[ Monks chanting ] to unearth the demons in the earth
so he could get his permits.
It was a constant source of needing to come up with money.
Zlab: So it was time and energy and expense
that I think he would have probably not gone into
had he known what he was getting himself into.
However, once he was into it, there was no backing out.
Narrator: Dargey's dreams are sinking in Kirkland,
and he needs to come up with money
to keep his enterprise afloat.
In a strange twist of fate, he's about to get a lifeline
from the country that once oppressed him.
A record number of Chinese
are looking to get into the United States,
and they are willing to pay big money to make it happen.
They're doing it through an investor immigrant visa program
that's called the EB-5 program.
Narrator: Dargey hears about an obscure government program
called EB-5.
Reporter: EB-5 is the technical name for the program,
which was designed to trade job growth for U.S. citizenship.
Narrator: Under EB-5, foreign nationals from countries
all over the world can earn permanent residency
or "green card" status for themselves and their families.
To qualify, they must invest at least $500,000
in a job-creating American venture.
But the key is that that money actually be spent,
all of it, on the job-creating enterprise.
And so the fundamental requirement
is that all $500,000 goes to create jobs.
Narrator: Dargey's mind lights up.
He knows that China is full of wealthy entrepreneurs
who covet American residency.
The global business of passport portfolios...
This is where the wealthy get a portfolio passport...
Is booming.
But should we sell passports? We absolutely should!
Investment is good. Creating jobs is good.
America has set the table for Lobsang Dargey.
He gets here to America and it's like,
"Hey, man, everything's gravy after what I've been through."
Narrator: And he's about to turn his old nemesis
into the ultimate gravy train.
Next on "American Greed"...
Dargey puts a huckster spin on EB-5,
calling it a "green card guarantee."
What could possibly go wrong?
Wilkinson: From the very first check that he got from an investor,
he was essentially stealing from the project.
♪♪
Narrator: In August 2011, Lobsang Dargey is approved
for a federal program called EB-5.
It's a lifeline connecting him to millions of dollars
from foreign investors eager to become American residents.
These investors were not primarily drawn
to invest to make money.
The main motivation of immigrant investors in this
is the green card.
They want to be able to move to the United States.
Narrator: Dargey lures EB-5 investors
with glossy promotional materials
for a huge project in Everett, Washington.
He calls it the "farmer's market,"
an inviting mixed-use building
of apartments, retail space, and a hotel.
The estimated cost to build is $50 million,
and Dargey plans to raise most of that from Chinese investors.
He built the argument
that he needed to go to China for a month.
I would ask him how, "Who do you know in China?"
This guy had three contacts in China.
He dropped himself in China and built an empire.
Narrator: Dargey gets the ball rolling in China
by paying fees to Chinese migration agents
who connect him to a steady stream of prospects,
people with dreams of immigration just like his.
He speaks Mandarin,
so he can communicate directly with investors,
and he got them very interested,
because he had a great story to tell.
Narrator: Federal prosecutors see things a little differently.
We felt that Mr. Dargey used his immigration status
as a tool to help him enable his fraud.
And knowing that their dreams were similar to his dreams,
he took advantage of that to make money for himself.
We are really excited to build this...
Narrator: Dargey's sales pitch is great,
but it's riddled with false claims.
He was offering a green card guarantee.
What he was promising people in all different ways
in his written materials is that if they invested with him,
he would get them permanent residency in this country.
And there's just no way that Mr. Dargey
could have guaranteed a green card,
because that is given by the U.S. government.
Narrator: But the lure of Dargey's life story
and his so-called green card guarantee is powerful.
In March 2012, Dargey bags his first Chinese investor,
and promptly begins playing fast and loose with their money.
Days after receiving that very first check from an investor,
he was spending the money not on the projects
he was supposed to be spending them on,
but on his own personal projects that were running out of money
and that he was trying to salvage.
Narrator: Dargey illegally diverts
$306,000 of that first $500,000 investment
to other uses,
especially the loan surrounding his Kirkland property
and his mounting legal bills,
which now exceed a quarter million dollars.
Arnold: We found pretty early on that
Mr. Dargey's Kirkland project
had created significant issues for him.
We also saw him spending a lot of money on personal items,
and so we had concerns,
because there was a very significant risk
that he was personally profiting from this fraud as well.
Narrator: Lobsang Dargey has flipped the script
on his life story.
The country that once oppressed him
is now bankrolling his American dream.
Over the next six months, he raises $41 million
from 82 Chinese investors,
and an additional $3.7 million in development fees.
And while most of the Chinese capital
is actually going to build the farmer's market,
in the EB-5 game it's got to be all or it's nothing.
So the main requirement is that all of the money
had to stay in the project,
so anytime that the promoter, like Mr. Dargey in this case,
would divert that money to either his own projects
or his own personal spending,
that would mean that the capital contribution was misused
and would have serious negative consequences
on the immigrant investor's ability to get a green card.
Narrator: As investments pour in,
Dargey's misuse of the money multiplies.
He even uses EB-5 funds to purchase a $2.5 million mansion
in Bellevue for himself and his family.
Agassi: You helping Daddy cut the grass?
At the time, his wife Tami has no reason to doubt
that Lobsang is anything other than an all-American husband,
father, and provider.
Say, "Thank you, Daddy."
Agassi: I didn't care how much he was raising.
Buildings were being made. He was doing his thing.
When you ask if my lifestyle improved,
my lifestyle improved for the fact
that I didn't have to worry about certain camps
I wanted to put my kids in.
But was I walking around in designer clothes?
No. He was. Not me. I was a mom.
Narrator: But Dargey is now providing for his own family
by putting his investors and their loved ones at risk.
82 investor families
could have their pending green cards cancelled
if Dargey's fraud is discovered.
These investors put their trust in Mr. Dargey
to live the American dream.
They had often sold all of their assets in China,
had moved to the U.S., had put their children in school,
had purchased a house here, and were really relying upon him
to do what he had promised that he was going to do.
And so he clearly made the deliberate decision
not to follow through with that promise,
but to instead put the money in places that benefited him.
Narrator: To say that the stakes are high is an understatement,
and they are about to triple in scope.
Next on "American Greed,"
Lobsang Dargey's business and his fraud
grow to new heights.
Agassi: "Honey, I think I have to buy a Bentley for clients."
The next day, there's a Bentley in my driveway.
♪♪
Narrator: Lobsang Dargey is having no trouble
recruiting investors
for his first EB-5 funded real estate project
called the Farmer's Market.
So he decides, why not launch a second?
Zlab: Lobsang brought up the skyscraper subject...
We were well into building the farmer's market
and then the thought of like, "Hey, let's do a tower."
[ Laughs ]
Narrator: Dargey's promotional materials for investors
showcase his plans to build a 41-story skyscraper
in downtown Seattle.
It's also named after Potala Palace.
He calls it Potala Tower.
It's an undertaking that is both hugely ambitious and risky.
It's just a much, more complicated,
high-pressure situation, and I warned Lobsang, just like,
"Hey, we're going from minor leagues to major leagues here.
This is completely a step up,
and um, we're not ready for it yet."
Narrator: The tower is budgeted at $190 million.
Dargey plans to fund the project
mainly through Chinese investors,
while promising to invest $30 million of his own capital.
To attract investors,
Dargey repeats his Farmer's Market EB-5 playbook
with another round of trips to China,
and he's traveling in rarified air.
Zlab: EB-5 investors were not middle class Chinese.
These are the upper class of China.
These people are entrepreneurs, they're business owners,
they're millionaires.
They expect nice things.
They don't go out to a crummy restaurant.
They don't expect to get picked up
in a smelly pickup truck from a construction site.
Narrator: If Dargey is going to play with this crowd,
he'll have to pay.
He illegally pulls funds out of the EB-5 accounts
to spend lavishly on his investors-to-be.
He courts them with junkets to Las Vegas casinos,
elaborate dinners, and the purchase of a Bentley
for airport pickups and tours.
Agassi: And he said,
"Honey, I think I have to buy a Bentley for clients.
I can't send my driver in the Range Rover."
"Really, you're thinking about that?"
"Yeah." [ Scoffs ]
And the next day, there's a Bentley in my driveway.
Narrator: This former monk
who once didn't even own a toothbrush
is now closing deals in his chauffeured $200,000 car.
That was not a legitimate excuse
to be spending the money in that way.
And so when he chose to take money
that was supposed to go to create jobs
and build these projects and spend these
on his own promotional business expenses
to try and get new investors,
he was essentially stealing from the project.
Narrator: Dargey raises $86 million from 171 Chinese investors.
But his promised contribution of $30 million
goes unfulfilled.
In August 2014, Dargey holds a ceremonial groundbreaking
for the Potala Tower.
[ Applause ]
Reporter: When crews broke ground on this Belltown construction site,
there was so much pomp and circumstance,
even the mayor and actor Tom Skerritt were there.
Narrator: Far removed from the smoke of yak dung fires,
Lobsang Dargey, builder of a skyscraper,
is rubbing elbows with players
at the highest levels of American power.
But despite all his success in America,
he is still restless,
haunted by nightmares from his tormented past in Tibet.
Agassi: You're seeing somebody lose it in the middle of the night.
And I had no idea what Lobsang was going through
or what he was struggling with.
It wasn't until many years later
that he actually acknowledged he's struggling with PTSD.
Narrator: Dargey's nightmares are well-founded.
By now, he's diverted nearly $17 million
from the EB-5 accounts to other projects,
along with millions more for perks
like his mansion, his limousine, and entertaining investors.
On the shores of Lake Washington,
he's lost the Kirkland lawsuit.
The chanting monks and crippling legal fees were all for naught.
And while he's come so far and flown so high,
he's about to crash.
Up next on "American Greed,"
Agassi: The FBI knocks on our door and our world blew up,
'cause I needed to know if I was married to a criminal.
Narrator: Want more "Greed"?
Follow us on Instagram, connect on Facebook,
and listen to the American Greed podcast
wherever you get your podcasts.
We'll be right back.
♪♪
Narrator: In the spring of 2015, developer Lobsang Dargey
is in the midst of two massive projects
under the federal government's EB-5 program.
Chinese nationals have invested more than $120 million
in the projects in order to gain U.S. residency.
This man was working all angles
for anyone who could benefit him.
Narrator: But the high-flying developer
is beginning to pique some suspicion in Seattle.
Acting on a confidential tip, federal authorities
get a search warrant for Dargey's bank records.
They quickly find proof that he's raiding the EB-5 accounts
for unauthorized, illegal spending.
So as we started to look through the bank records,
we noticed that there were a large number
of cash withdrawals at casinos, which was a red flag,
because that's not what you typically expect
to see in a business account.
And then we also saw that money was being diverted
for the personal purchase of Mr. Dargey's house.
Narrator: To fill shortfalls in his EB-5 accounts,
Dargey falsifies a bank statement
to qualify for a $25 million loan.
He needed to show that he had a certain amount of liquidity.
And to do that, he doctored an HSBC bank statement
to the tune of over $9 million,
when in reality, the account had about $440,000 in it.
And there's really just...
There's no way to defend falsifying a bank statement.
Narrator: By now, Dargey's finances are in freefall
and all the stress is finally catching up with him.
[ Phone dialing ]
Agassi: I saw mental decline, big time.
[ Indistinct phone conversation ] He was so chaotic.
There was a time when I
only spoke to him first thing in the morning.
The rest of the day was me hanging up on him.
"Call me back when you're coherent." Click.
[ Dial tone ]
♪♪
Narrator: In the dawn's early light of August 25th, 2015,
Lobsang Dargey's American dream
officially becomes a waking nightmare
when federal investigators arrive at his doorstep.
Agassi: So Lobsang's sleeping.
I'm up early with the twins, and the FBI knocks on our door.
Mr. Dargey came out in his underwear.
We told him to put some clothes on,
and then we sat down and tried to talk to Mr. Dargey.
Agassi: And I watched him defend himself for
maybe 45 minutes, an hour,
'cause I needed to know if I was married to a criminal!
Moran: He said he was allowed
to take all this money as developer fees,
the loans between the entities with EB-5 money was allowed.
Everything was disclosed.
He literally said to her, "I'm happy to work with you.
Come back on Friday after my investors leave,
and I will show you everything."
And she said, "That's not gonna happen.
You need a criminal attorney."
Our world blew up.
Narrator: That same day, investigators have a court order
to freeze Dargey's assets,
and the FBI executes search warrants at his two offices.
Men and women in FBI windbreakers everywhere,
pulling computers off desks and shoving stuff in boxes.
It was very scary.
There was probably 15 FBI agents looking at you,
wondering what you did wrong.
So I just kind of like, stand in a corner
with some of the other consultants
that were sharing that space
They're like, "What's going on here?"
Narrator: Dargey's employees are rattled by the FBI searches,
but investigators conclude that he alone orchestrated the fraud.
Moran: Mr. Dargey was the only person who knew the entire story.
He kept most employees in their specific areas,
and they didn't know the whole picture.
Reporter: At issue is the man who owns this Bellevue house.
The SEC has filed a complaint
and is seeking a restraining order
alleging Dargey bilked 250 Chinese investors
out of millions of dollars.
Narrator: With his assets frozen,
all of Dargey's company activities abruptly cease.
Dozens of construction
and development personnel drop everything.
Reporter: Today we found just three workers on site
after legal papers have put the 41-story Potala Tower in limbo.
Boom, they just shut it down.
All the equipment on site was just frozen.
There were leases on that equipment.
Erickson: I was in charge of paying every single bill
for all the buildings.
I couldn't pay anybody. I couldn't pay payroll.
I couldn't pay payroll taxes. I couldn't do anything.
Narrator: And even worse for the investors,
the EB-5 status of both the Farmer's Market
and Tower projects are revoked.
For 253 investor families,
the dream of permanent American residency
is suddenly in extreme peril.
There was a significant fear from each of the investors
they would be asked to leave the country immediately.
They would be deported.
Narrator: Investigators total up the loss to investors
at a whopping $24 million.
Four months later, Dargey is under extreme duress.
He suffers a violent nervous breakdown
and attempts to ingest a pile of pills.
Agassi: He was sitting on the couch, starting to rock,
felt his whole-body itching.
"Hold me, hold me, hold me." He's rocking. He's rocking.
Eyes glossed over like a zombie.
The next thing I knew, he walked back to the bedroom
and just started downing pills.
[ Police radio chatter ]
I called 911 and he got put in the cop car
and he was hallucinating.
He thought he was on his way back to China,
that he was going to prison in China.
He got into the psych ward. He saw things shooting at him.
He was gone. He was mentally gone.
Dargey: No camera.
Narrator: Next on "American Greed,"
the price of Dargey's fraud becomes personal
If I didn't have family to help me and support me,
we could've been homeless.
♪♪
Narrator: After a severe mental breakdown and weeks in psychiatric care,
Seattle developer Lobsang Dargey returns to relative health,
but he still has to face
the magnitude of his business crimes.
I didn't meet Lobsang before the SEC
came knocking at his door with the FBI.
I'm sure that prior to that day, he was a force of nature.
The Lobsang that I met was more reserved
and in many, respects defeated.
Narrator: Bradley Sher led an effort to take over
development of Dargey's EB-5 projects
and save them from total collapse.
To help cover the $24 million dollar loss
he's foisted on his investors,
Dargey surrenders his majority equity stake
in both the Farmer's Market and the Tower projects.
He said his mission now
is not to make any money out of the project,
but to make sure that the EB-5 investors were repaid
and that they get their green cards.
Dargey: No camera!
Reporter: Lobsang Dargey refusing to talk
as he left federal court.
He had just agreed with the U.S. attorney to plead guilty.
Narrator: Although he still claims ignorance of his wrongdoing,
Dargey pleads guilty to charges of wire fraud
and lying to the U.S. government.
While prosecutors seek a prison sentence of 10 years,
Dargey's family floods the judge
with more than 70 letters of support
from his friends, contractors, and Tibetans all seeking mercy.
Lobsang's former vice president of construction,
Joe Zlab, submits one of those letters.
I thought that there was kind of an injustice being done to him.
I believed that if he had been warned,
you know, with a strongly worded letter from the SEC,
"Hey, cut out what you're doing,"
he would have cleaned up his act.
People had accused him of running a Ponzi scheme
and it was like, no.
He wasn't running a Ponzi scheme.
He was building buildings.
Narrator: Prosecutors counter Dargey's letters of support
with letters of their own from jilted Chinese investors
who feel betrayed by Dargey's fraud.
Many of these were people who had sold their homes,
taken their kids out of school
in preparation to move to the United States.
Many of them did move to the United States,
and then they received notices from the government saying,
"Your money was spent improperly,
and so we're planning to cancel your application."
Narrator: On August 4, 2017,
Judge Robert Lasnik takes pity on Dargey.
Instead of 10 years, he gets 4.
So he goes off to prison and I'm left with 2-year-old twins
and a 10-year-old, living off the generosity of my brother.
Narrator: Tami's brother, former tennis champion Andre Agassi,
keeps the family afloat.
And while in prison, Lobsang convinces Tami
that divorce is necessary to shield her
and their children from his $24 million restitution.
Agassi: And he said, "We have to get divorced
to protect you financially.
We will go through this together,
but I don't want you to worry.
I know how to make money. I will pay back your family."
Narrator: While Lobsang does time, his former EB-5 projects
are completed by new developers and their EB-5 status restored.
As for the Chinese investors,
the vast majority are being made whole,
with their investments recouped and green cards awarded.
The story would appear to be on course for a happy ending
when Lobsang earns an early release from custody in 2020.
But soon after he's in street clothes, another shocker.
Come to find out the moment our divorce was final,
this guy secretly gets married.
Narrator: Turns out that divorce wasn't just to protect Tami.
It also freed him up to secretly marry a wealthy Chinese woman.
Agassi: It was diabolical.
Had I known what this guy was capable of or what he was doing,
I wouldn't have been visiting him.
I wouldn't have paid his legal fees.
I wouldn't have done any of this.
Narrator: Lobsang Dargey came from nothing
and rose to extraordinary heights of success.
Wilkinson: It was tragic that someone who had come from difficult origins
and understood the importance of coming to this country
and getting citizenship and what that can mean,
that he sort of turned that on his head and exploited that.
And when one of his projects hit a snag,
he just decided to defraud all these immigrant investors
who had placed not just their money in his hands,
but in fact, their whole future.
Agassi: No one invested more in Lobsang Dargey
than his wife Tami.
She gave him 16 years of her life
and lost her assets defending him in court.
And now she believes that he has taken all he can from her,
and he is moving on in more ways than one.
So Lobsang has told me he doesn't like this country.
He never should have left Tibet and he belongs back in Tibet.
He's told other people I know
he wants to go back to China and do big business in China,
and I believe firmly that's what he's planning.
He's actually far more comfortable moving forward
and looking forward.
"I need to follow my karma and let go and move on."
Which means good luck to me and the kids.
Narrator: For now, Lobsang and his new wife
remain in the Seattle area.
Tami won't be surprised if the restless Seattle monk
detaches from America and vanishes
into the same mountain mist from which he came.
Captions by VITAC...
♪♪