Damn, this is too funny... Narwal and Marvin Winick are connected:
SEC fines Narwal-linked accountant Winick for forgery
2006-07-04 20:55 ET - Street Wire
by Mike Caswell
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has fined Marvin Winick, a banned Ontario accountant linked to Silver Star Energy Inc. shareholder Sak Narwal, for forgery. The SEC says Mr. Winick issued bogus audit opinions for three public companies, Tekron Inc., Greentech USA Inc. and Information Architects Corp., by forging the signatures of accounting firms in Colorado and Oklahoma.
Mr. Winick, without admitting any wrongdoing, has agreed to $135,062 in civil penalties to settle the allegations. (All figures are in U.S. dollars.)
As reported by The Vancouver Sun in March, Mr. Winick set up three shell companies, which are unrelated to the current SEC case, for Sak Narwal, the largest shareholder in Silver Star Energy. The RCMP raided Silver Star in 2004, suspecting a pump-and-dump, but no charges have been laid.
The SEC's complaint
In a settled civil complaint filed Friday, the SEC says Mr. Winick fraudulently issued audit opinions for Tekron, Greentech and Information Architects, all reporting issuers at the time. Mr. Winick, who was banned in 1992 by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Ontario for professional misconduct, was to prepare the companies' financial results and send them to an outside auditor.
Instead of hiring an independent auditor to overlook his work, the SEC says Mr. Winick forged the signature of an Oklahoma City auditing firm. He apparently presented the financial results as being in perfect order, and filed them with the SEC.
It seems the problem came to light when the Oklahoma firm found its name on filings it did not audit. The firm confronted Mr. Winick, who promised to remove the filings and apparently did. The SEC says he replaced them using more forged audits, this time bearing the name of a Colorado firm.
Like the Oklahoma auditor, the SEC says the Colorado auditor eventually discovered the forged opinions, and wrote a letter demanding its name come off the filings. Mr. Winick's employers, which knew about the Oklahoma problem by this time, fired Mr. Winick.
Along with the fine, Mr. Winick has agreed to a permanent director and officer ban.
The SEC has also filed suit against Luigi Brun, the chief executive officer of Tekron Inc., one of the companies for which Mr. Winick worked. The SEC says Mr. Brun knew about the forged audits.
In a separate administrative proceeding, the SEC has revoked the registration of three private Nevada companies that list Mr. Winick as president.
The Silver Star connection
With the director ban, Mr. Winick will have to resign from at least 13 public companies of which he is listed as a director or officer. Likely included in his resignations will be Easy Com Inc. and Multimod Investments Ltd., which Mr. Winick set up for Sak Narwal, the largest shareholder in RCMP target Silver Star Energy, according to The Sun's March 27 story.
The RCMP's Integrated Market Enforcement Team raided Silver Star's office in 2004. Search warrant documents alleged a pump-and-dump at the Vancouver company. No charges have been laid in that case.
A jailed relative of Sak Narwal, Roman Narwal, was also listed as a shareholder in Easy Com and Multimod in public filings. Roman Narwal is serving a 15-year sentence for drug-related extortion and kidnapping.
Although Mr. Winick did not return calls for an interview Tuesday, he told The Sun in March he did not know who Roman Narwal was and said Sak Narwal had resigned from the companies.
Mr. Winick is the target of a website calling itself Winick Watch. The site lauds itself as "dedicated to protecting the public from the possible financial risks of engaging in business relationships with Marvin Winick." In a cult-like manner, the site lists any news stories, SEC documents and lawsuits that include Mr. Winick.
Mr. Winick sued the website for slander in 2004, but Winick Watch claimed its information was factual and mostly came from public sources. Mr. Winick dropped the suit last February.
Reader Comments - Comments are open and unmoderated, although libelous remarks may be deleted. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Stockwatch. For information regarding Canadian libel law, please view the University of Ottawa's FAQ regarding Defamation and SLAPPs.
Was Jamie King the promoter behind this.He needs to feel the SEC heat.He is heat.
Posted by jamie King at 2006-07-05 06:24
"Was Jamie King the promoter behind this.He needs to feel the SEC heat.He is heat."
Unlike mine self, JK is bullet-proof. Safe as church.
Posted by DeadNick at 2006-07-05 08:46
He isn't bullet proof.A wave of heat is about to rain down on Vancouver.Personally Im very scared .
Posted by moiche at 2006-07-05 21:31 I wish! But nay, no rain - no heat for the slicksters who are able to guide their international allies through the swamps of the pinksheets and bullet-in board deals.
Simply too many jurisdictions that are not interested in wasting valuable resources on these guys. Remember - money sticks. Count on it.
If you are reading the Baines columns and drawing encouragement that FINALLY something will happen to thwart the bad guys - again nay.
Read his words ever so carefully, and you may realize that it is NOT the bulletin board and pinky shysters he is after - his sights are, in my most humble opinion, focused on a much slower moving target.
Posted by Sam_Ketchum at 2006-07-05 23:01
This is the normal course of doing business in Vancouver! So what's "the beef"?
Posted by bearcat at 2006-07-06 19:48
As the operators of the WinickWatch site we would like to clarify some information regarding us and these SEC actions.
The WinickWatch site is not just a collector of public information regarding Marvin Winick. As former victims of Mr. Winick we are dedicated to protecting others from him with the ultimate goal of seeing him put in jail.
In our case, we were introduced to Mr. Winick by Merrill Lynch Canada through their employee Jaime Vilas. We paid $85,000 to Merrill Lynch for their services. See Investment Dealers Association Settlement
Mr. Winick also hijacked our bank account at the Royal Bank of Canada. Documents setting up the business bank account had been altered. The RBC refused to go to the police in spite of our request that they do so. The police informed us that if there was fraud at the bank the bank would let them know.
The complaints to the SEC re: Information Architects, Greentech and Tekron were instigated by us after contacting the accounting firms involved, determining there were problems with these audits and contacting the SEC. We were particularly concerned about Information Architects as they claimed to do security checks for homeland security. Tekron on the other hand just seems to have been a classic pump and dump.
The investigators from the SEC contacted us about our complaints and we passed on more information to them. We also contacted the FBI with our concerns in November 2003.
The Colorado accountant you refer to is Michael Johnson, who himself was the target of SEC litigation (LITIGATION RELEASE NO. 18652).
The public announcement about Mr. Winick in the Globe and Mail occurred after we sent numerous requests to the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Ontario to warn the public about him.
This SEC litigation involving Mr. Winick is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to his activities. We are not a “Cult like site” as you state, but merely previous victims who decided to do what was right, even when large financial institutions decided that it would take the easier route to attack an average North American family with four children. We have taken a vested interest in the security of the United States and Canada and alerted the proper authorities to the activities of this individual, (we have numerous correspondence with different agencies over the past five year to verify such.) It is also interesting to note that we are contacted almost on a weekly basis by victims of Mr. Winick, and we have been lauded for performing a valuable public service. If you are defrauded by someone like Mr. Winick and refuse to inform and protect other potential victims, then you are part of the problem, not the solution. Mr. Winick previously has been able to take advantage of the fact that his victims felt helpless.
Posted by Winick Watch at 2006-07-09 17:46
Winick has defrauded our company and we are still suffering because of it. Winick also defrauded our president of 600,000 dollars and admits it. But the RCMP has done nothing.
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