American authorities have filed the first criminal charges against Sir Allen Stanford's financial empire after his chief investment officer was accused of lying to investigators.

Laura Pendergest-Holt, who has been dubbed the “ice maiden”, was last night charged with obstruction after being arrested by the FBI.

The 35-year-old will appear before a magistrate in Houston, Texas, today.

Sir Allen, a cricket impresario, is accused of masterminding an alleged $8 billion fraud that has cheated more than 50,000 investors worldwide.

Pendergest-Holt is one of two senior employees who was implicated in the alleged fraud by US financial watchdog the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The SEC has frozen all of Stanford's assets and seized his fleet of private jets as it continues an investigation of what they say is a “massive, ongoing fraud”.

Pendergest-Holt is accused of lying to SEC investigators during a meeting in Houston as they examined allegations of Sir Allen's fraud.

According to the FBI, Pendergest-Holt met several Stanford Financial Group executives in Miami at the beginning of this month.

She is alleged to have discussed with them a $1.6 billion loan to a shareholder from one of the investment portfolios and used a computer-generated pie chart to explain the distribution of the money.

A week later when she met SEC investigators at a pre-arranged interview she allegedly lied under oath and denied taking part in the Miami meeting.

Pendergest-Holt also allegedly misrepresented her own preparatory work for the testimony, saying she had met no one other than her lawyer so that she could ready herself for the session with the SEC. She is also said to have lied to SEC investigators when asked if she was a member of Stanford Bank's investment committee.

An FBI spokesman said: “Laura Pendergest-Holt, the chief investment officer of Houston-based Stanford Financial Group, was arrested by agents of the FBI's Houston field office on a criminal complaint charging her with obstruction of a proceeding before an agency of the United States.”

Pendergest-Holt, who recently married for the second time, owns a $2 million home in North Carolina. She worked at the SFG's Houston office, one of a global network of offices run by 58-year-old Sir Allen.

He has since gone into hiding after being served with legal papers detailing the allegations of the fraud. He has yet to be charged with any offence.

The SEC has issued him with civil papers so they could freeze his assets and stop him leaving the country. His homes in Antigua and the Virgin Islands have been seized and he has been forced to surrender his passport.

Sir Allen is estimated to have been worth $2.2 billion and he once bragged that his empire controlled about $50 billion of assets.