EXCLUSIVE
The administrators of a $2 billion SAG fund are being accused of covering up an embezzlement scheme that resulted in losses between $5 and $10 million, according to documents obtained by TheWrap.
Craig E. Simmons, an ex-employee of the Screen Actors Guild's Producers Pension and Health Plans (SAG-PPHP), on Wednesday filed a complaint with the U.S. Dept. of Labor seeking a civil and criminal investigation into charges of fraud and theft by his former employers.
In the documents, Simmons says 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.
Read the Dept. of Labor letter here
"As of this date, no action has been taken by the Trustees (of the plans) to either investigate or address the serious breach of duty," Simmons writes in his complaint. "As a result, I have informed the Trustees that, lacking any specific response or action, I will notify the DOL and other appropriate regulators so that a proper investigation can be commenced."
The plans’ leadership dismissed the allegations, calling Simmons' charges "completely without merit,” Robert Bush, co-counsel for SAG-PPHP, said in a statement to TheWrap.
“Bruce Dow... continues to have the full and unqualified support of the trustees,” he said.
Bush declined to specifically address the allegations of embezzlement.
Meanwhile Jeffrey Thomas, an attorney for Karimi, denied that his client was involved in any embezzlement.
"The allegations concerning Nader Karimi set forth in Mr. Simmons’ letters are denied," Thomas wrote to TheWrap. "There are to my knowledge no criminal charges of any kind pending against Mr. Karimi and no civil suit pending against him by anyone."
Read the letter to SAG-PPHP trustees
The plans control roughly $2.5 billion in assets for SAG members, but are administered independently of the union. The guild has approximately 90,000 members, many of whom rely on the fund for their health and pension benefits.
In a letter to trustees of the plans that he sent at the end of last month, Simmons writes that he was fired by Dow last winter because he would not help his boss mislead government agencies.
“I would not participate in the wrongdoing or improper and illegal behavior that I [sic] was being expected of me by my superior, Bruce Dow, as a demonstration of my ‘loyalty’ to him,” Simmons wrote.
Simmons says the financial misdeeds weren't limited to embezzlement. He accuses Dow of raiding the benefits plan to lavish money on family members and pay for his wife’s breast enhancement surgery.
Simmons, who is gay, claims Dow oversaw a frathouse-like work environment where sexual harassment and homophobia were commonplace.
