EV startup founders have been making big claims. Now someone could go to jail.

The founder of an electric truck company is expected to face significant prison time when he is sentenced Monday in a fraud case that highlights the financial carnage left by a series of electric vehicle startups and their promoters.

A federal judge in Manhattan will sentence Trevor Milton, the founder and former CEO of trucking company Nikola, after a jury found him guilty last year of one count of securities fraud and two counts of bank fraud. Mr. Milton was accused of inflating the value of Nikola shares by making extravagant claims about the company.

Mr. Milton told investors that Nikola had working prototypes of zero-emission long-haul trucks, had billions of dollars in binding orders and was producing cheap hydrogen fuel. All of those statements were false, said prosecutors, who have asked the judge to impose an 11-year prison sentence and a $5 million fine. Mr. Milton’s lawyers, who denied the allegations, asked for him to be placed on probation.

Few electric vehicle executives have been convicted of crimes, but Nikola was hardly the only new car company that attracted billions of dollars in investment without generating profits or producing many cars or trucks, leaving shareholders with huge losses.

Inspired by Tesla’s success, investors have poured money into startups like Canoo, Lordstown Motors and Lucid Motors in recent years. Their supporters and executives saw electric vehicles as an opportunity to challenge established automakers like Ford Motor and General Motors — and get rich in the process.

With far fewer parts than gasoline cars, electric vehicles should theoretically have been easier to manufacture. But building thousands of cars, establishing brands and meeting safety standards proved to be much more difficult and expensive than many startup executives and their backers expected. Some companies proved more adept at filing lawsuits than cars.

Many of the electric vehicle startups have listed themselves by merging with special purpose acquisition companies, allowing companies to avoid much of the disclosure and regulatory scrutiny that comes with conventional IPOs of shares.

Investors who bought these stocks suffered huge losses. Shares of Nikola, which is still active but warned investors in November that it could run out of money in the next 12 months, have lost 99 percent of their value since 2020.

One group of investors benefited: short sellers, who make money by betting that a stock price will fall. Companies that specialize in uncovering overvalued stocks enjoyed Nikola and other electric vehicle startups.

Mr. Milton’s false claims about Nikola were first reported by Hindenburg Research, an investment firm that specializes in uncovering corporate wrongdoing.

Hindenburg also published a report about it Mullen Automotive Last year the company was accused of marketing electric vehicles imported from China as its own, claiming it was on the verge of offering advanced solid-state batteries, a technology that many larger companies like Toyota are still years away of perfecting it. Mullen shares, which peaked at more than $3,600 in 2020, recently traded for 13 cents.

A spokesperson for Mullen said that “many of the points in Hindenburg were inaccurate at the time and are now dated, making them all completely inaccurate now.” In recent press releases, Mullen has said it has begun production of electric trucks at a factory in Mississippi.

Another Hindenburg target was Lordstown, a potential electric truck manufacturer that took over a former GM plant in Ohio with help from the Trump administration. President Donald J. Trump hosted Lordstown CEO Steve Burns at the meeting White House in 2020, calling the company’s car “an incredible concept.”

Mr. Burns resigned after Hindenburg accused him of exaggerating the number of orders for Lordstown’s pickup. The company filed for bankruptcy protection in June. (In October, an investment vehicle that Mr. Burns manages bought machinery and other assets from Lordstown.) Lordstown declined to comment.

Mr. Burns said in an email that he never inflated the orders, noting that an investigation by an outside law firm had found inaccuracies in the Hindenburg report. He bought Lordstown’s assets and hired some of the company’s engineers, Mr. Burns said, because he believes the company has unique technology.

“Under the LandX brand, we plan to build several exciting vehicles and we look forward to announcing our full range soon,” said Mr Burns.

Short sellers have also targeted Faraday Future, a Los Angeles-based company that has so far delivered nine of its “ultra-luxury” electric vehicles after a decade in business.

After J Capital Research, another short seller, published a report on Faraday in 2021, the company admitted that it misled investors when it claimed to have 14,000 reservations that were in fact unpaid expressions of interest.

In September, Faraday said in a filing with the regulator that the company’s “corporate culture failed to sufficiently prioritize compliance.” The company also disclosed that it is being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of Justice.

Faraday is cooperating with authorities, a spokesperson said in an email, adding that the company has “made substantial changes and improvements to its processes and procedures to strengthen our governance and internal controls.”

Even for companies that haven’t publicly accused short sellers of exaggerating their performance and prospects, producing vehicles has proven to be a huge challenge.

Canoo has announced orders worth $750 million from Walmart and other customers for its electric vans. The company is increasing production at a plant in Oklahoma, a spokesman said, but he declined to say when it would start delivering vehicles in large numbers.

Canoo told investors in November that there was “substantial doubt” it would survive. Although accounting rules required the warning, Canoo has raised $380 million to fund its expansion, said Chris Nguyen, the spokesman.

Investors have even become skeptical of companies that have managed to produce thousands of cars. Shares of Fisker, which delivered about 3,000 vehicles in early November, are down 95 percent from 2021 highs. Shares of Lucid, which has said it will produce at least 8,000 luxury electric sedans this year, are down 93 percent down. Shares of Rivian, a maker of electric pickups and SUVs where many analysts believe the startup is most likely to survive, have fallen 80 percent.

Less sophisticated investors often bore the brunt of the losses. Mr. Milton, prosecutors said in a sentencing memo, “engaged in a sustained scheme to take advantage of individual, non-professional investors.” That included posting a video on YouTube of a prototype rolling down a hill, giving the false impression that the company had a working vehicle.

Mr. Milton also lied about his personal history, prosecutors said. He had said he dropped out of college to pursue his entrepreneurial dreams, even though he was expelled for paying someone to do his academic work.

After selling some of his Nikola shares for $100 million in mid-2020, Mr. Milton spent $83.5 million on luxury items such as a plane and an estate in the Turks and Caicos Islands.

Nikola investors lost more than $660 million, prosecutors said in the memo. Nikola shares “became effectively worthless as soon as the truth became known.”