Report: Current and former NHLers “totally devastated” after massive fraud scheme.

We have yet another story involving scam artists defrauding professional athletes out of millions of dollars. This time the victims are both current and former NHL players, a list that includes names like Sergei Gonchar, Michael Peca Joe Juneau, Darryl Sydor and more. Journalist Laura Hensley recently penned an article for the National Post that shares the story of former NHLer Bryan Berard and tells how he fell victim to the scam. More from Hensley's report:

Bryan Berard met Phil Kenner when he was a 17-year-old defence phenom fresh from Woonsocket, Rhode Island, playing junior hockey in Detroit. Kenner was a 25-year-old financial advisor, and a buddy of NHL veteran Joe Juneau. Over the course of his 15-year career, the hockey star would give Kenner millions of dollars for what Berard thought were Hawaiian real estate developments and a lucrative debit card business.

It's at that time, towards the end of his career, that Berard started to realize his finances didn't add up, and that Kenner was less than legitimate in his dealings.

“I started paying attention to a lot of the operating deals we were in, and Kenner had more equity than a lot of the players that I knew had hard cash in the deals. Kenner had a larger piece of the pie than he should have,” Berard said.

He belives that Kenner deliberately played on professional athletes because he knew they would be preoccupied with their careers, and would trust their finances to someone like Kenner.

“He knew when guys were playing hockey, we were concentrating on hockey,” he said.

Unfortunately for Berard he was left financially ruined as a result of Kenner's scam, however his role as a victim in this story has motivated him to help future NHL players avoid a similar fate.

“It totally devastated my earnings. And now that’s pretty much why I’m back working. When it was all gone, it was all gone,” Berard said. “I’m working in finance now. It’s almost like I am trying to recruit the younger players and really help them so they don’t have to go through anything like I did with Kenner.”

Kenner was found guilty last week and could be looking at the rest of his natural life behind bars, but given the description of his crimes, it's hard to feel sorry for him.

“Driven by personal greed, Kenner and Constantine spent years lying to investors and stealing their money, and then attempted to conceal their fraud by repeatedly and brazenly avoiding responsibility, shifting blame and scapegoating others,” Kelly Currie, the acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said when they were convicted last Thursday.

Each conviction carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.