Firm Says Webster's Statements Are False
latimes.com
NEW YORK -- One of the nation's biggest accounting firms Monday accused William H. Webster, who has been tapped to head the new federal accounting oversight board, of making "false and misleading statements" about his awareness of financial problems at a small company for which he had been a director.
The lawsuit by BDO Seidman deepens the controversy over Webster's appointment to the board, though he said Monday he stood by his previous statements about the company and his dealings with BDO.
Revelations about Webster's service as a director at U.S. Technologies Inc. last week triggered a new crisis of confidence in Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Harvey L. Pitt, who had championed Webster for the oversight post.
BDO Seidman said it told Webster of accounting troubles at U.S. Technologies a month before the company fired the accounting firm in 2001.
Webster's comments last week to the Washington Post, in which he said BDO did not inform him of the problems until after the termination, are "false and misleading," the firm said in a lawsuit filed in federal court in Washington.
BDO petitioned the court for permission to release confidential information the firm said would prove that it warned Webster and other members of U.S. Technologies' audit committee on July 13, 2001, about significant "internal control" problems. U.S. Technologies replaced BDO as its auditor Aug. 16, 2001.
The timing of the warning has become an "issue of national interest" because of the controversy over Webster's appointment to the accounting board, the suit said.
Webster, 78, is a former federal judge and former director of the FBI and the CIA.
|
