NEW ORLEANS – A federal appeals panel has upheld a freeze on the assets of more than 300 employees of Texas financier Allen Stanford, who is charged with running a $7 billion Ponzi scheme involving fraudulent certificates of deposit.

The court-appointed receiver who is gathering assets for Stanford’s investors – Dallas attorney Ralph Janvey – obtained the freeze in February 2009, after a federal judge shut down Stanford’s business.

The employees, including 76 Stanford financial advisers who sold the CDs to investors, argued that the case should go to arbitration; and some argued the court that imposed the freeze abused its discretion since they say Stanford did not operate a Ponzi scheme.

Some of these advisers are from Mississippi, where Stanford had offices in Tupelo, Columbus and Jackson.

But the three-judge panel from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed, finding Stanford’s business did operate as a Ponzi scheme.

The ruling potentially preserves millions of dollars that Janvey wants to distribute among all Stanford investors.

Janvey also has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court against Stanford’s former accountant, Harry Failing.

In court documents, Janvey claims that Failing owes the receiver about $840,000 from bogus bank notes allegedly funneled to him by Stanford companies. Stanford is in a Houston-area jail, awaiting trial on charges that he allegedly masterminded a $7 billion international Ponzi scheme.

Failing’s Sugar Land-based shop, Harry Earl Failing PC, was the principal accounting firm for most of Stanford’s businesses, including the now-defunct Houston-based Stanford Financial Group. Failing was also Stanford’s personal accountant and tax preparer, according to court documents filed on Dec. 15.