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Gold/Mining/Energy : BRE-X, Indonesia, Ashanti Goldfields, Strong Companies. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: oilfinder who wrote (27918)	6/3/1998 9:37:00 PM
From: Walter	Respond to of 28369

Wednesday, June 3, 1998 Bre-X's Walsh suffers stroke By SANDRA RUBIN The Financial Post Bre-X Minerals Ltd. president David Walsh, beset by lawsuits, his reputation in tatters and his assets frozen by his company's bankruptcy trustee, was close to death last night after suffering a massive stroke in the Bahamas. Walsh, 51, insisted in an affidavit just two weeks ago he believed the company at the heart of one of the biggest stock swindles in history had made a "discovery of rich gold reserves" at its Indonesian site. The chain-smoking stock promoter was admitted to Doctor's Hospital on Sunday. Neighbors said an ambulance was seen leaving his Cable Beach house outside Nassau around 7 a.m. He is in intensive care. The hospital refused to comment on widespread reports he is brain dead. "We have a patient of that name and he is in critical condition," said Kelly Knowles, vice-president of nursing services at the Bahamas hospital. She refused to release any further details about his condition. Walsh's two sons Brett and Sean and his wife Jeannette were keeping a vigil at his bedside. Montreal-born Walsh, who had been a resident of the Bahamas since 1995, has been fighting off class action lawsuits filed by angry Canadian and U.S. investors in the wake of the multibillion fraud. He suggested in a May 15 affidavit filed as part of a Texas-based suit that he was a victim too. "I am not a geologist," he said in the sworn statement. "John Felderhof, a renowned geologist, managed and supervised the Indonesian properties." The Walshes made about $45 million trading in Bre-X shares before the stock's collapse, according to an affidavit filed in the Bahamas on April 30. It was part of a request for a Mareva injunction freezing the couple's assets brought by Bre-X's bankruptcy trustee, Deloitte & Touche. The injunction was granted the next day and the couple was put on an allowance of US$3,000 a week. They were appealing the injunction at the time of his collapse. A hearing had been scheduled for tomorrow. BREAKING NEWS MARKET WATCH BIZ TICKERS MUTUAL FUNDS MONEY RATES BIZ SEARCH Bre-X lawsuits likely unaffected by ailing Walsh: lawyers Boeing closing Toronto plant Newbridge stock drops in heavy trading on TSE Martin dismisses critical report from Gundy CANOE home \| We welcome your feedback. Copyright c 1998, Canoe Limited Partnership. All rights reserved. Please click here for full copyright terms and restrictions.

To: oilfinder who wrote (27918)	6/3/1998 9:51:00 PM
From: Walter	Respond to of 28369

Apparently, David Walsh has a couple of suitcases with him at the PEARLY GATES. We still don't know what is in them. Strutech (sp?): I for one will not shed one tear for David Walsh or his family. David has caused a lot of emotional pain to many many investors. Even drove a few to commit suicide. What goes around comes around. Guess where I am hoping Walsh, Felderhof and others spend the rest of eternity. Hint: a place just a little hotter than where they were going to retire with their ill-gotten $ millions. Wednesday, June 3, 1998 Bre-X lawsuits likely unaffected by ailing Walsh: lawyers TORONTO (CP) -- Legal efforts to recover billions of dollars in shareholder losses from the Bre-X Minerals gold mining swindle are proceeding despite the failing health of the company's founder. David Walsh remained comatose and in critical condition in a Bahamian intensive-care unit Wednesday after he reportedly suffered a massive stroke on the weekend. But lawyers say the former Bre-X president's condition is unlikely to impede international efforts to recover nearly $3 billion in losses suffered last year when the company's fabled Indonesian gold find was exposed as a fraud. "Walsh had a story to tell, and I guess for the short-term he won't have that opportunity," said Alberta lawyer Clint Docken, one of several involved in class-action suits against Bre-X in the United States and Canada. "Ultimately we may miss that opportunity, but this isn't going to have an effect on the litigation." Officials at Doctors Hospital in Nassau said Walsh's condition was unchanged but refused to divulge any details without the permission of the family. Hospital sources told Reuters that family members, including wife Jeanette and sons Sean and Brett, are trying to decide whether to keep the 52-year-old former stock promoter on life support. Jeanette Walsh refused to talk to reporters Wednesday but promised a statement "as soon as we know what is going on." Docken said it's likely that Walsh's wife, a former corporate secretary and director of Bre-X, will be forced to step into her husband's shoes. "She will certainly have a larger role to play, and I don't think she was relishing that, but she's certainly going to be cast more into the spotlight," he said. "She very obviously may have to step into the fray here." David Walsh remains one of the key figures in what began as one of the most sensational rags-to-riches stories in the history of Canadian mining and ended in scandal and tragedy. Bre-X was a tiny Calgary-based company that dazzled investors with its spectacular Busang gold play and a meteoric rise from penny-stock obscurity to $6 billion in market value. But it all evaporated in the spring of last year as shareholders learned the Busang deposit, said to contain 200 million ounces of gold, was a scam meticulously orchestrated by former Bre-X geologist Michael de Guzman. Walsh has already said in sworn statements that he had no prior knowledge of the scheme. As a result, it's unlikely his testimony would produce any revelations that other insiders or family members couldn't provide, said one source close to the U.S. case. "There's few things that he alone would know," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "You lose him as a witness, but you don't necessarily lose what he knows ...the lawsuit would continue with little or no delay." It was de Guzman's suicidal leap from a helicopter over the Indonesian jungle in March 1997 that first told investors that something was amiss. A private investigator later determined de Guzman and a handful of other Bre-X employees sprinkled gold dust bought from a Borneo tribesman into selected ore samples -- a practice called salting -- before the samples were tested. Since May, a barrage of shareholder lawsuits have been launched against Bre-X and its senior officials, the TSE, securities regulators and several brokerage firms which promoted the stock. The bulk of the suits have been rolled into two class actions, one in Ontario and one in Texas. Lawyers for shareholders in the U.S. and Canada are waiting for U.S. District Court Judge David Folsom to decide whether Canadian shareholders who bought their shares in Canada can join the American class action. Former Bre-X executive John Felderhof, de Guzman's boss, retreated to the Cayman Islands shortly after the engineering report on the Busang fraud was released. He has denied any knowledge of the salthing scheme. Docken said the tragedy will also likely prevent the family from applying to set aside a court order last week that froze their Bahamian assets. "They had applied to set it aside, and they have now put those plans on hold, so (the funds) will remain frozen." Lawyers suing on behalf of shareholders have described Walsh as part of a group of "insider defendants" who should be held liable. They claim that Walsh, as a Bre-X official, was responsible for perpetuating a "fraudulent scheme" that included tampering with core samples in Indonesia. Walsh's lawyers have argued that he knew nothing of the scam and his role was simply to find the cash necessary for Bre-X to discharge its financial responsibilities. Alan Lenczner, Walsh's Toronto lawyer, did not return phone calls Wednesday. BREAKING NEWS MARKET WATCH BIZ TICKERS MUTUAL FUNDS MONEY RATES BIZ SEARCH Bre-X lawsuits likely unaffected by ailing Walsh: lawyers Boeing closing Toronto plant Newbridge stock drops in heavy trading on TSE Martin dismisses critical report from Gundy CANOE home \| We welcome your feedback. Copyright c 1998, Canoe Limited Partnership. All rights reserved. Please click here for full copyright terms and restrictions.