Allen Stanford has been detained on fraud and obstruction charges over an alleged $8 billion investment scam.

Stanford’s attorneys said the Texas billionaire was not a flight risk, but Judge Hannah Lauck said: “I do think there’s sufficient evidence here to warrant a detention hearing.”

Stanford, who surrendered to agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) last night, choose Houston over Virginia for the detention hearing.

The entrepreneur already faces civil charges from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the financial regulator, over the sale of $8 billion worth of certificates of deposit with his Antigua-based Stanford International Bank. But the criminal charges are more serious, carrying a maximum prison term for Stanford of 250 years.

Stanford was charged along with four associates with 21 counts of fraud, money-laundering and obstruction of justice, accused of masterminding a decade-long eight-billion-dollar scam with a global reach.

The SEC alleges that Mr Stanford, his chief financial officer, Jim Davis, and chief investment officer, Laura Pendergest-Holt, ran a “Ponzi” scheme similar to the $65 billion fraud committed by Bernard Madoff, who will be sentenced in New York next Tuesday.

According to the SEC, Mr Stanford’s customers were paid implausibly high returns using money placed in his companies by new investors.

The regulator, which claims that the fraud ran for at least a decade, said this morning that it had filed new civil charges against accountants and an Antiguan regulator.

The SEC said that the accountants, Gilberto Lopez and Mark Kuhrt, falsified financial statements for Mr Stanford's business and that Leroy King, head of Antigua's financial regulatory, facilitated the fraud.

Before today, only Ms Pendergest-Holt had been charged with any criminal wrongdoing. She was arrested by the FBI in February and is on bail. She maintains that she is innocent of the accusations, which include obstructing investigations into the bank.

Mr Stanford, who is known in the UK as a cricket sponsor, has said that he will fight the criminal and civil charges against him.

The Texan, whose personal wealth has been estimated at $2.2 billion (£1.3 billion), made his money by investing in property before widening his activities to investment and banking.

He has joint US and Antiguan citizenship.

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