The Disney Channel star who skated through “Brink!” and voiced Sid in “Toy Story” is now accused of steering a couple in their 80s and 90s into $2.1 million worth of gold coins.
Erik Von Detten, 44, is accused of financial elder abuse and fraud in a lawsuit filed May 11, 2026, in Los Angeles Superior Court by Norman Greenberg, 97, and Sheila Greenberg, 85, as trustees of their family trust. The suit names Von Detten and his employer, Rosland Capital, a Los Angeles precious-metals asset management and sales firm where he worked as an account representative. The case burst into public view Tuesday, Oct. 20, when the court documents were first reported. The allegations have not been proven in court.
His name has surfaced somewhere else, too. Rosland’s creditors’ committee is seeking to subpoena Von Detten as it investigates the company’s failure, saying it appears he “played an instrumental part in the Debtor’s business and its financial collapse.”
They Asked for the Top Advisor
The Greenbergs called Rosland in 2020 after watching its commercials, spots the lawsuit describes as “designed in large part to appeal to senior citizens.” They asked the firm for its top advisor. They were connected with Von Detten.
In the phone calls that followed, according to the complaint, Von Detten told the couple he had special knowledge of gold and could help them with the roughly $2 million sitting in their retirement accounts. The Greenbergs say they were blunt with him: they had never bought precious metals, knew very little about them, were of advanced age, and wanted an advisor they could trust.
The Coins Never Came Home
They started with about $1 million on two Lady Liberty gold coins. Von Detten then put another $1 million of their money into more coins, the suit alleges, and additional purchases between 2020 and 2021 pushed the total to roughly $2.1 million. Another $114,000 went in through the family trust. The coins went into a storage facility instead of to the couple’s home.
The holdings are now worth about $1.3 million, according to the complaint — a loss of roughly $900,000. The Greenbergs say they learned the scale of the shortfall in 2025, after independently checking what their gold was actually worth. The coins carried excessive premiums and were worth little more than the metal inside them, they allege, and Rosland used high-pressure tactics to sell precious metals far above market value.
The complaint lays out five claims: financial elder abuse, fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, constructive fraud and conversion. Under California law, financial elder abuse can involve wrongfully obtaining an older person’s property through fraud or other conduct likely to cause financial harm. The couple seeks about $900,000 in compensation plus punitive damages.
William Devane and a Free Safe
Rosland’s commercials ran on Fox News and Newsmax, starring actor William Devane, who pitched gold coins as a hedge against inflation. Retirees were urged to convert their IRAs into gold-backed funds, with a free safe thrown in for storage. The company reported $151 million in revenues in 2021.
Then came net losses of $24 million from 2022 to 2025. Sales representatives were paid 15 percent to 35 percent of the profit on each order, even if that order was later refunded. Rosland ceased operations and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on July 2 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California, listing some $64 million in liabilities against just $500,000 in assets. Bankruptcy filings show the firm has drawn scrutiny from the New York Attorney General’s Office and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Von Detten’s acting career began in 1992 with a 55-episode run on “Days of Our Lives.” He voiced Sid Phillips in “Toy Story” in 1995, starred in the 1998 Disney Channel movie “Brink!,” played Clu Bell on “So Weird” from 1999 to 2001 and voiced Erwin Lawson on “Recess,” which ran from 1997 to 2001. In 2001 he played Josh Bryant, the love interest who dumps Anne Hathaway’s Mia Thermopolis in “The Princess Diaries.” Other credits include “Escape to Witch Mountain” and “Complete Savages.” He largely stepped away from acting around 2010, moved into sales and finance, and joined Rosland in 2018 — the year he married his wife, Angela, a real estate agent. In 2024 he took his first role in more than a decade, in the Lifetime movie “My Acting Coach Nightmare.”
Rosland’s bankruptcy could limit what the Greenbergs recover from the company, though their claims against Von Detten personally remain a separate matter. A case conference in the Los Angeles Superior Court case is scheduled for Nov. 9.
When Rosland shut down, about 470 messages and voicemails were waiting at the company, from customers demanding refunds or demanding their gold.