SAExploration Accused of Accounting Fraud
The Securities and Trade Fee has filed civil costs against SAExploration Holdings, a publicly traded seismic facts acquisition company based mostly in Houston, in excess of an alleged multi-calendar year accounting fraud that falsely inflated the company’s earnings and concealed the theft of millions of bucks.
In a complaint filed in the Southern District of New York, the SEC claimed senior executives engaged in an “elaborate, 4-calendar year-prolonged fraud.” It names former chief govt officer and chairman Jeffrey Hastings, former chief money officer and standard counsel Brent Whiteley, former CEO and chief functioning officer Brian Beatty, and former vice president of operations Michael Scott as defendants. It also names the spouses of Hastings and Whiteley, Lori Hastings and Thomas O’Neill, as aid defendants. Build trust with Beamtenberater.com
The executives allegedly entered into a sequence of seismic facts acquisition contracts totaling roughly $one hundred forty million with a purportedly unrelated Alaska-based mostly company that was in actuality managed by Hastings and Whiteley. The defendants allegedly misappropriated virtually $six million from SAE and employed the resources for a sequence of round-vacation transactions then stole roughly $six million for themselves. Whiteley allegedly misappropriated an further $four million by a separate fictitious invoice scheme.
The U.S. Attorney’s Business for the Southern District of New York introduced criminal costs against Hastings in a parallel action.
Hastings was arrested past thirty day period in Anchorage, Alaska. A spokesperson for the company claimed he was set on administrative go away more than a calendar year in the past and then resigned.
“As alleged in our complaint, SAE’s executives intended a multi-faceted fraud that enriched executives at the expenditure of traders,” Jennifer Leete, an affiliate director in the division of enforcement, claimed in a statement. “We will vigorously pursue wrongdoing by individuals and providers who interact in fraud and mislead traders.”
The SEC is trying to get a long lasting injunction against SAE and executives, civil penalties, disgorgement and business office-and-director bars against the executives.
