MIAMI AP – The Securities and Exchange Commission charged a prominent Miami couple with operating a $135 million Ponzi scheme through a real estate investment scam that defrauded hundreds of people, mostly elderly Cuban-Americans.

The SEC complaint filed Wednesday in Miami federal court claims that Gaston Cantens, 71, and his wife Teresita Cantens, 73, promised unusually high returns of between 9 percent and 16 percent on investments in their Royal West Properties Inc.