A lawyer from Kansas has been sentenced to nearly four years in prison over a $2.3 million Ponzi scheme in Texas.

A federal judge in Beaumont on Tuesday sentenced 62-year-old Clifford R. Roth of Leawood, Kan. Roth pleaded guilty March 14 to interstate transportation of money taken by fraud. Roth also must repay more than 20 investors.

Investigators say Roth in 2007 began offering an investment opportunity to purchase a bank in Oklahoma and open a branch in Beaumont. Roth instead used the funds to pay his personal expenses and early investors.