Administrators of the $2 billion fund are accused of covering up an embezzlement scheme that resulted in losses between $5 and $10 million. On Wednesday, March 7, investigators visited SAG's offices to collect documentation about the alleged fraud and cover-up.
"Federal investigators last week and this week arrived at SAG P&H Plan offices in Southern California and in Massachusetts and carried out several dozen boxes of paperwork to unmarked cars waiting outside," Finke reported on Thursday. "And a few weeks earlier a man identifying himself as an investigator came into the offices at 4 p.m. with a copy machine on [a] big dolly and spent 4 to 5 hours Xeroxing documents."
New England SAG member James McIsaac, of Massachusetts, wrote on Facebook on Thursday, "My local pres just confirmed the FBI picked up some papers at the P&HP office."
Deadline reports that the investigation is a direct result of letters and testimony from whistleblower Craig Simmons, an ex-employee of the Screen Actors Guild's Producers Pension and Health Plans (SAG-PPHP) who accused his former employer of fraud, theft, and wrongful termination. He has not spoken publicly about the federal probes.
Simmons filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Labor in September, requesting a civil and criminal investigation into what he called "numerous" violations of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). In the documents, he claimed that he was told by the plan's CEO Bruce Dow not to discuss an alleged embezzlement scheme by former chief information officer Nader Karimi, and to lie to authorities about other questionable financial activity. Simmons reportedly testified under oath during three sessions in Los Angeles last fall with the FBI, IRS, Securities & Exchange Commission, Department Of Justice, and Department Of Labor.
Read Simmons' letter to the Department of Labor here, as well as his earlier letter to the trustees of the SAG-PPHP board.
