The prominent plaintiff attorney (Bernstein, Liebhard & Lifshitz), is seeing some dirty laundry aired thanks to his guilty plea on charges that he falsified his 2005 tax return. Along with resigning from BLL, he'll pay a cool $4.8 million to make it right.
Should corporations be held liable for the actions taken by employees that violate company regulations? That is the question at the heart of a case currently before U.S. Court of Appeals in New York. In the middle is Greek shipping company, Ionia Management, which was recently convicted in Connecticut for illegal dumping.
In an interesting twist, Ionia is being represented by former Federal prosecutor, Andrew Weissmann, who's name may be familiar to you for his former role as the Director of the Justice Department's Enron task force. All the talk is that the Ionia case is headed straight for the Supreme court, but that would first require a ruling for the government at the appeals level.
Did they take down the information you mentioned? I dont see it. I think it is hilarious and ironic that Cuban is the majority partner of a site out to find frauds....what a great guy, thanks Mark.
Nicholas is quite the colorful fellow - one of the original dot com billionaires and the kind of guy that would build a "sex cave" under his mansion.
The information possessed by Gunther, given his years as major domo of the Nicholas household, could no doubt be quite damaging to his former boss.
As per his plea agreement, Gunther plead guilty to two misdemeanors and he is expected get as little as probation in exchange for his cooperation with prosecutors.
As was revealed early in the week, name partner Michael Hausfeld of Cohen Milstein sent notice to clients and colleaues that he had been abruptly expelled from the firm, via a note left on his office chair. No one is one the record with a specific reason why Hausfeld got the boot after almost fourty years of service (although various message boards are awash with speculation). Hausfeld has already retained representation and office space from Venable and is talking retribution against his former colleagues. He also passed a few words with the WSJ Law Blog about the road ahead. Needless to say, there has got to be a a rather large and thorny issue hiding behind all the bluster and BS.
This is quite the significant indictment. Raoul Weil, come on down. Weil oversaw cross-border private banking for UBS from 2002 to 2007, overseeing a division that allegedly helped hide $20 billion from U.S. tax authorities.
The SEC has given itself a clean bill of health in the handling of the Pequot Capital hedge fund investigation. The SEC's inspector general and Senate investigators reached the opposite conclusion in their independent probe of the matter.
SEC inspector general pointedly recommended disciplinary action against SEC enforcement chief Linda Thomsen as well as Mark Kreitman assistant enforcement director and Robert Hanson the supervisor of whistleblowing SEC lawyer, Gary Aguirre.
Given the contradictory conclusion, inspector Kotz and the Senator Charles Grassley who had orignially requested the Senate investigation of the matter both balked at the outcome of the SEC's administrative proceeding.
So what was Gary Aguirre blowing the whistle on in the first place? In a nutshell:
Aguirre was the lead attorney in an investigation of suspicious trades at hedge fund Pequot Capital. In pursuit of the investigation Aguirre sought to interview John Mack, chief executive of Morgan Stanley and longtime friend of Arthur Samberg, founder of Pequot.
According to Aguirre, his SEC higher-ups declared hands-off on Mack. When Aguirre pushed the point, he claims he was fired. His subsequent whistleblowing resulting in congressional hearings, which have in turn produced several reports highly critical of the SEC's conduct in the matter. For a full recap of our Pequot coverage click here.
John Tuli can breath a sigh of relief these days, as the SEC has dropped all charges against him in connection with their long running probe into revenue inflation that took place during the AOL Time Warner merger. Several of Mr. Tuli's former colleagues at AOL have not been so fortunate. More at the WSJ.
All eyes are on Thomas Flanagan, a former Deloitte VP who resigned a few weeks back, rather abruptly. On October 29th Delottie filed suit against Flanagan for allegedly buying stock in an unnamed company (Option Care, Inc.) just a week before a Deloitte client (Walgreens) announced their acquisition of the firm.
Deloitte had been the auditing firm contracted to review the deal. Falanaga had been the Deloitte client contact on the matter. In their lawsuit Deloitte claims ignorance of this an other questionable conduct on Flanagan's part - at least until regulators began asking them questions.
Profits for Marsh & McClellan fell 78% in the 3rd quarter of 2008. Earnings in Kroll's division were down 3.4%. Interested Kroll buyers, Marsh is apparently still interested in selling...
The specter of such troubles has dogged Spitzer since the story of his frequent interstate sexcapades hit the newspapers.
Spitzer was only one of nine clients involved in the Emperor's Club bust from earlier in the year. At this point, the rest of the names, we'll probably never know.
They've set aside a$1.3 billion to help resolve the ongoing corruption probes in Europe and the U.S. While some had suggested that closing out the various investigations could prove much more costly, market analysts have referred to the probes as "essentially over" at this point. More on this at CFO.com, along with some additional detail fits into the bigger picture of the current state of European business ethics.
The recent appointment of Michael Alix to a key post has ruffled more than a few feathers in the investor community. Alix was formerly the chief risk officer from 2006 to 2008 and global head of credit risk management from 1996 to 2006 for the now defunct house, Bear Stearns.
It was on the chilly night of January 3rd in Iowa, with this speech from Barack Obama- one that made people believe:
And when the state of Ohio was called for Obama last night, you knew that the race was over. The rest was academic. At 11PM California, Washington and Oregon would tell the tale. It just so happened that Virginia and Florida were called then too, with many more states to follow - a wave of validation, an outpouring of support, a course correction for a nation that had come loose from its bearings.
Seeing the folks dancing and cheering up on U Street in DC last night was a deeply emotional experience. These are the very same streets that burned to the ground not so very long ago, with people full of rage and despair. Today, it is a different story. I was so moved that I had to get my baby girl up to see it, and to see Barack Obama accept the honor of becoming America's 44th President.
My wife and I sat (and at times stood, and paced and cheered and hugged) holding Clara in our arms and watched together, as living history unfolded before us. Throughout the evening we spoke to distant friends and family, and connected with many more over the internet, sending out tense, nervous missives that later gave way to an outpouring of congratulations, warm well wishes and shared hopes for a better tomorrow.
Of course, not everyone is waking up happy today in America, but hopefully we can all agree that the last eight years have been a rough road and that a little change is a good thing. Despite the honest, sincere disagreements Americans may have about the issues we face, I hope that we can all support Barack Obama has he ascends to the Presidency.
For your role in defrauding your investors of $2.9 billion, you have been found guilty of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering.
Tell him what he's won Roddy!
Well, Bob, sentencing has yet to take place, but Lance is looking at up to thirty years behind bars. This is on top of the current ten year sentence he's serving after being caught trying to bribe a key witness.
Anything illegal gets punished, right? A proven anecdotal handed down from generation to generation: one good deed gets good karma and vice- versa.If there’s a crime, there’s imprisonment waiting or so there is. Lance Poulsen isn't going to need a cash advance loan ever again. He won't need one because Lance Poulsen is going to be in prison for the rest of his life, in all likelihood. The 65 year old was convicted of corporate fraud, and after being handed a ten year sentence several years ago, has had another 30 years tacked onto the time he already has. His associates Karl Demmler, convicted of bribery, and Rebecca Parrett have also been convicted and sentenced, although Parrett has been a fugitive for months. Parrett and Poulsen are both liable for about $3 billion in restitution. However, it will take Lance Poulsen a long time to make that in license plates.