From today's SEC Digest:
SEC SUES SOLUCORP INDUSTRIES LTD. AND OFFICERS AND DIRECTORS FOR FRAUDULENT CONDUCT SPANNING FOUR YEARS
On December 13, the Commission filed a civil injunctive action in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging that senior officers and directors of Solucorp Industries Ltd., a Canadian company which develops, markets and licenses products used in decontaminating soil, engaged in a deliberate and systematic scheme to defraud investors over a four year period. The scheme involved senior management falsely claiming through press releases and other publicly disseminated materials that Solucorp had contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars when the contracts either did not exist or were subject to undisclosed material contingencies. Additionally, senior management falsified financial statements filed with the Commission and disseminated to the public during the period December 1997 through April 1999 by improperly recognizing license fees which were subject to material contingencies. Further, senior managers sold Solucorp securities while in possession of non-public inside information and failed to file or timely file insider trading reports with the Commission.
Charged in the action are Joseph S. Kemprowski, a former officer and director of, and currently consultant to, Solucorp; Peter R. Mantia, the president and a director of Solucorp; James G. Spartz, a vice president and a director of Solucorp; Robert Kuhn, a former vice president of Solucorp; Victor Herman, CPA, the former chief financial officer of Solucorp's two principal operating subsidiaries and the preparer of Solucorp's consolidated financial statements; Arle Pierro, a senior vice president and director of Solucorp; and W. Bryan Fair, a director of Solucorp. [SEC v. Solucorp Industries Ltd., et al., 99 Civ. 11965, WCC, SDNY] (LR-16388)
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