A disbarred Irvine attorney and financial adviser was sentenced Friday to about three years in federal prison for ripping off his clients’ money and sinking it into a debt-laden ticket company.

Ash Narayan, 55, of Irvine, pleaded guilty in June of last year to wire fraud and filing a false tax return, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. U.S. District Judge Josephine Staton sentenced him to 37 months in prison and ordered him to pay $18.8 million in restitution.

Narayan, an investment adviser at RGT Capital Management Ltd.’s office in Irvine, was disbarred April 1. He represented current and former professional athletes, prosecutors said.

He was also on the board of directors for Illinois-based The Ticket Reserve Inc., which allowed its customers the option to buy a ticket for a game that they could cash in if the team made the playoffs, but the company never turned a profit, prosecutors said.

Narayan steered his clients to invest in the ticket company from December 2009 through early 2016, but neglected to mention his personal interest in the company as well as the fact that the company was unprofitable, prosecutors said. He also forged his clients’ signatures at times to transfer their money into the company without their permission, prosecutors said.

He claimed an income of $543,072 in 2012, when he actually earned $1.1 million, prosecutors said.

The Securities and Exchange Commission previously ordered Narayan to repay nearly $15.5 million and a $350,000 civil penalty, prosecutors said.

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