Church fined by SEC

[Okrahomer]

47 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I am from Wyoming too (northern Wyoming, by Yellowstone, so I don’t have a lot of experience with the southern part of the state), and I’ve been pulled over a few times since my driving career started, along with different members of my family. The majority of time you won’t get a ticket unless you’re really breaking the law. But it’s the small towns you have to watch out for. They need the revenue, and plus they have a full-time cop with pretty much nothing to do except sit on the road all day long.

Just goes to show that enforcement of speeding is not the same everywhere, and some agencies see it as a bigger infraction than others. 😊

Yes.  Funny that...

[Calm]

18 minutes ago, ttribe said:

From my experience assisting clients with SEC matters early in my career, I wouldn't be surprised if a draft of this document went back and forth several times between the Church's attorneys and the SEC.

Assuming this is a typical process, do you have any idea what was different or went wrong in the cases mentioned in my post where the SEC got slammed for misrepresenting facts?
 

 

[bluebell]

17 minutes ago, Okrahomer said:

Named after my great, great grandpa.

Love it. My dad grew up there and my grandparents lived there until my grandma died. It’s not what it was in its heyday but still a nice town. 

[ttribe]

10 hours ago, Calm said:

https://www.wiggin.com/publication/sec-loses-insider-trading-case-court-distressed-by-counsels-conduct/
 

Here is the press release issued by the SEC for one of the cases above

https://www.sec.gov/news/press/2003-171.htm

More detail info in links at bottom
An additional thought…

The Church has agreed to settlement before when the judge was requiring them to share information they didn’t want to. Could this be a case they agreed to settle because they didn’t want to put in the public record how they handled assets, how much all they had, etc?

Looks like those cases actually went to a filing of a complaint by the SEC and were likely adversarial from the beginning. Unless I missed something, I don't see that those ended in settlement at the end of the investigation.

[bluebell]

2 minutes ago, ttribe said:

Looks like those cases actually went to a filing of a complaint by the SEC and were likely adversarial from the beginning. Unless I missed something, I don't see that those ended in settlement at the end of the investigation.

If a settlement was offered, but the company refuse to accept it, would there be a record of that that would be made public?

 

[MiserereNobis]

Ya’ll need your own private bank. The Vatican bank is a model of upstanding fiscal responsibility…

Perhaps underlying this issue, for supporters and critics, is the issue of infallibility? The Vatican bank has had some pretty shady things go on, but for me that doesn’t really relate to the truth claims of Catholicism. Ok, I meant to write more, but I’m off to a work meeting now. 

[ttribe]

4 minutes ago, bluebell said:

If a settlement was offered, but the company refuse to accept it, would there be a record of that that would be made public?

 

Probably not. In my experience, settlement negotiations are off limits if the case goes to trial, so I'm guessing the same is true for the public.

[Saint Bonaventure]

7 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

Ya’ll need your own private bank. The Vatican bank is a model of upstanding fiscal responsibility…

Perhaps underlying this issue, for supporters and critics, is the issue of infallibility? The Vatican bank has had some pretty shady things go on, but for me that doesn’t really relate to the truth claims of Catholicism. Ok, I meant to write more, but I’m off to a work meeting now. 

There's a building in Chelsea, that if these Ensign Peak folks had just purchased it....😃

[california boy]

I wonder if the Church thinks its deceptive plan was worth it.  Now the whole world knows about it.  My. dad used to always say

"Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive". There are consequences for not being honest.

Just some of the articles written about this

 

[Peacefully]

2 hours ago, Okrahomer said:

I was born in Wyoming, and this is all probably true; however, last year as I was driving on I-80 in South Central Wyoming, my mind was focused on getting home (to Oklahoma) as quickly as possible to see my ailing 90+ year-old parents.  My speed inched up without my even noticing it...when what to my wondering eyes should appear...?

Yep.  A cheerful man with red and blue lights flashing.  I apologized immediately to the HP officer.  He asked me where I was headed, and I told him "home to Oklahoma to see my parents."  He looked at me, he looked at my license and he glanced at my registration information.  He handed it all back, and said:  "Try to keep it under the speed limit.  And remember, the closer you get to Laramie, the more likely it is that you'll run into snow and ice -- so please be careful.  I don't want to have to come and pull you out of the barrow pit...or worse." 

I drove on, very grateful and much chastened.  I reached Oklahoma safe and sound and happy to greet both parents much improved.

My co-worker was driving back from Park City to Boulder on Monday and was stuck around Rawlins because of road closures. He had to find a place to sleep Monday night and didn’t make it back until Tuesday night. 

[bsjkki]

4 minutes ago, Peacefully said:

My co-worker was driving back from Park City to Boulder on Monday and was stuck around Rawlins because of road closures. He had to find a place to sleep Monday night and didn’t make it back until Tuesday night. 

Wyoming is treacherous on I80 when the wind and snow blow. 

[Teancum]

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

Once again, you are fabricating expectations out of thin air, applying them to the Church, and griping when it fails to hop to.

No I did not fabricate expectation.  The SEC imposed the expectations on EPA and the Church.  In another post you poke at me for my lack of legal training.  Well sure. I am not an attorney though I have worked with tax law for my entire career. I also have experience with a very serious SEC issue for a business I deal with.  Do you have SEC experience?  But yea I am not a litigator though I have experience guiding clients through litigation settlements from a tax and advisory role.

 

You seem to think the SEC is just making suppositions and  not using a fact based approach. This is simply not true at all.  And your clam of fabricating expectations is a disingenuous remark.  Had there not been a problem of to complying with the regulations the SEC would not have brought action  against EPA and the Church.  I am sure you know that based on your legal experience.

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

Once again, there is no meaningful indication that the Church improperly "hid" anything, that it engaged in any fraudulent behavior, and so on.  Instead, it sought and obtained, and then acted on, legal advice as to a course of action that the SEC has, decades later, asserted to be problematic.

Really?  Well we know the LLCs were set up to hide the existence of the assets.  The church did not want the public or its members to know about this.  Why is that?  What are they afraid of?  The Church is hyper concerned about keeping its financial activities secret.  Oddly many other churches go to great lengths to be transparent with their financial actions even though US law does not require it.  But not the self proclaimed Church of Jesus Christ.  Was it fraudulent?  I don't that I would go that far.  Was it improper?  Well they took steps to avoid required reporting did they not?  Is that honest? Maybe you should spent sometime reading up  on what your church and its leaders say about honesty as well as what is expected of its members.  The standards are pretty high.  Then answer whether it is honest.  Clearly they knew if they did not set up the numerous  LLCs they would have a reporting issue.  They set them up with legal council in order to avoid such reporting.  Just because it went on for decades and there was no SEC action is not relevant.

 

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

And it may well be that the SEC has exceeded the scope of the statute, and has charged the Church with violating a statute when the violation is instead related to a embellishment added to the statutory by the SEC (see here).  If so, then the legal advice the Church received may well have been accurate.

Now who is fabricating things.

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

+

Excellent.

But what is some self-appointed critic of your fine self comes along as says "Not good enough.  I want more.  In the interests of 'transparency' as I arbitrarily define it and apply to you, whom I dislike with a burning intensity"?

Would you take that demand seriously?

Dude your stretch here just does not work.  Nor does your over the top hyperbole for anyone who is rational and not so deep of a believer that they have to defend things at all cost.  But it may play well to some of your audience here.  I doubt it would fly in a courtroom.

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

I know.  That is my point.  And without any such reason or obligation, I don't expect you to.  And your nondisclosure is not fairly characterized as "hiding" your finances.

When I have assets that the SEC requires me to report you can be sure I will.  I won't take steps to hide things.

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

Now, if you could set aside your hostility against a religious minority long enough to apply these same general precepts to it, that would be awesome.

Oh brother.  More over  the top hyperbole.  As noted, when I am an organization granted NFP status and I have billions in a management fund you can be sure I won't set up 13 LLCs in order to skirt around my reporting requirements.  By the way I am not hostile.  And to bad your skin is so thin that you have to spin any criticism the Church in such a way.

 

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

Way too facile, this.

Yes your arguments are.

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

The Church is now years into its full compliance with what the SEC wants it to do. 

Yes a few years. Which likely would never had happened but for thee whistle blowers. You can be sure that the church would have tried to keep all this hidden from its members and the public. So don't pretend they were altruistic and volunteered this on their own.

 

12 hours ago, smac97 said:

 

And that does not include the various arbitrary and hostile and endless demands for "more" from self-appointed faultfinders who are long predisposed to dislike and speak against and assume the worst about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

As long as folks like you persist in fabricating stupid and arbitrary and ad hoc requirements and expectations about the Church, and then grouse when those requirements and expectations are not met, I will continue to hold up a mirror to reflect your contrived and hackneyed banalities right back at ya.

Thanks,

-Smac

Yea whatever.  See above.

[Analytics]

 

11 hours ago, Calm said:

https://www.wiggin.com/publication/sec-loses-insider-trading-case-court-distressed-by-counsels-conduct/
 

Here is the press release issued by the SEC for one of the cases above

https://www.sec.gov/news/press/2003-171.htm

More detail info in links at bottom

This reminds me of a snippet of a People's Court episode I saw in a waiting room a little while ago. Somebody was suing his ex-wife for something or another, and Judge Judy got confused about why he had given away so much in the divorce settlement, and he said, "After my attorney bill got to $15,000 I ran out of money and couldn't fight it anymore, so I just settled."

My point is that this is not the dynamics of typical disputes with the SEC. The SEC is in the business of challenging the integrity and the money of people and organizations that are usually on the spectrum between very rich and obscenely rich. The targets of their investigations can hire the very best lawyers and politicians. This means that the SEC absolutely must hold itself to the absolute highest standards of ethics and accuracy, because unlike that poor guy on the People's Court, the people in controversies with the SEC have very strong means to fight back. 

Do they always meet those standards? No, as proven by the article you found from 2006 about one of the occasional cases when an SEC attorney screwed up. But those situations are rare: when the SEC decides to prosecute, 98% settle. If it makes it to trial, the SEC wins between 70% and 90% of the time, depending upon venue.

11 hours ago, Calm said:

An additional thought…

The Church has agreed to settlement before when the judge was requiring them to share information they didn’t want to. Could this be a case they agreed to settle because they didn’t want to put in the public record how they handled assets, how much all they had, etc?

That's possible and entirely consistent with the Church being "as transparent as they know how to be." But the facts here are pretty cut-and-dry. Did the scheme of having fake "Business Managers" file materially false reports with the SEC comply with the law? If they complied, why did the Church apologize and change its practices? If they did not comply, why bother fighting it?

Edited February 23, 2023 by Analytics

[Teancum]

21 hours ago, bluebell said:

I’d have to read that quote in context. Because obviously the church has hidden stuff. There are a ton of things that most members will never know about the inner workings of the church, that the church goes out of its way not to publish.

It’s been known for years that the church keeps its investments and financials hidden from members. We’ve discussed it on here multiple times over the two decades that I’ve been here anyway.

It’s common knowledge that some stuff is carefully guarded and kept from the knowledge of most members. And it would’ve been common knowledge to most people who heard elder Ballard say that when he said it.

Given that, I have to think “what was the context of the statement, where the listeners would be aware of the many things that church leadership doesn’t tell us, and yet still consider elder Ballard’s statement to be truthful?”

Because there are are contexts where I would agree that that statement is not honest, but I need more information.

Do you have a link for the talk? I’ve tried looking it up and all I can find is that quote on critical and anti-sites with no explanation of where it came from.

It is telling that members and defenders of the church need to parse such things from their leaders when said members and defenders are held to a higher standard of honesty to get their temple recommend. It must be exhausting.

[bluebell]

36 minutes ago, Peacefully said:

My co-worker was driving back from Park City to Boulder on Monday and was stuck around Rawlins because of road closures. He had to find a place to sleep Monday night and didn’t make it back until Tuesday night. 

Rawlins is the worst place to be stuck. I feel so bad for him. There’s a reason that’s where they put the state prison. 

[Teancum]

21 hours ago, bluebell said:

OK, so the church agreed to an order which states it violated securities laws, while also claiming it does not agree that it is guilty of violating securities laws.

Is that a more accurate way of putting it?

Because it still seems contradictory to me, and one reason why these kinds of topics are such a mess to discuss.

This is common in such proceedings. The SEC offers a compromise.  Essentially it says if you pay us this amount we will let you off the hook for higher penalties and we will let you use language that is softer and leaves your image intact. If you say no to this we will play hardball.

[bluebell]

7 minutes ago, Teancum said:

It is telling that members and defenders of the church need to parse such things from their leaders when said members and defenders are held to a higher standard of honesty to get their temple recommend. It must be exhausting.

Yes, I am guilty of wanting to read things in context and accepting weaknesses in my leaders, just like I accept weaknesses in myself and they accept weaknesses in me.

Truly diabolical. Very exhausting.  So telling.

😁

 

[bluebell]

5 minutes ago, Teancum said:

This is common in such proceedings. The SEC offers a compromise.  Essentially it says if you pay us this amount we will let you off the hook for higher penalties and we will let you use language that is softer and leaves your image intact. If you say no to this we will play hardball.

Where can I find this referenced?

[ttribe]

Just now, bluebell said:

Where can I find this referenced?

I posted about it here:

 

[Teancum]

21 hours ago, ttribe said:

You didn't answer my question. You attacked me personally and tried to discredit me because you think I'm hostile toward the Church. That appears to be more bad faith argumentation on your part. Very sorry to see you resort to that kind of rhetoric. In the meantime, I hope at least someone has found some of my posts helpful on this issue.

He has to attack personally and use his persecution complex hyperbole.  It is really all he has.  He knows he would lose his argument in comparing an individual disclosing its finances to that of the church in a court of law

[ttribe]

Just now, Teancum said:

He has to attack personally and use his persecution complex hyperbole.  It is really all he has.  He knows he would lose his argument in comparing an individual disclosing its finances to that of the church in a court of law

I don't know. It just comes off as a very unreasonable comparison.

[smac97]

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

And yet the "facts" laid out by the SEC after the Church fully cooperated have not been disputed by anyone. In other words, they are undisputed facts.

The Church has neither admitted nor denied any of the allegations in the SEC Order, and the SEC has not established the allegations via adjudication.  You are studiously refusing to address this.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

Quote

Throughout the multi-year investigation, the Church had its days (read years), in court.

Consider this a formal CFR.  You have asserted that the Church has been "in court" in this matter.  I ask that you either substantiate this claim or withdraw it.

Let's be clear what we are talking about.

Yes.  Let's.  You are fabricating stuff out of thin air.

This issue has not been adjudicated.  It has not been "in court" by any measure of the word.  There has been no Article III judge assigned, nor a magistrate, nor an ALJ.  No hearings.  No motion practice.  No trial.  No Due Process.  No weighing of evidence by an impartial factfinder.  You are studiously refusing to address this.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

We are talking about whether the undisputed facts in the SEC Order are really true or not.ne

No.  We are talking about allegations which have been neither admitted by the Church nor proven "in court" by the SEC.  You are fabricating stuff out of thin air.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

The literally undisputed facts.

Repeating a falsehood will not make it less of a falsehood.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

I think they are true,

Obviously.  And you are entitled to whatever opinion you like.  What you cannot do, however, is fabricate.  You cannot claim that legal allegations which have neither been admitted by the charged party nor proven via the adjudicative process have been established as "fact."  You also cannot claim that the SEC acted as "prosecutor, judge and jury" (wow, that was a real eye-opening whopper).  

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

and you think they are mere unsubstantiated allegations

It's not a matter of what I think.  It is, instead, a matter of what the documents and the law says.

The allegations have neither been admitted by the Church nor established via an adjudicative process.  Your assertion/implication to the contrary is a rank falsehood.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

that can't be considered factual

As a matter of law?  No, they cannot.  "Factual" means "concerned with what is actually the case rather than interpretations of or reactions to it."

The SEC asserted allegations as to various matters involving the Church and EPA.  The Church expressly neither admitted nor denied the allegations.  The SEC and the Church then settled the matter.

The allegations, therefore, remain as such:

Quote

allegation

 

An allegation is defined as a claim of fact not yet proven to be true. In a lawsuit, a party puts forth their allegations in a complaint, indictment or affirmative defense, and then uses evidence at trial to attempt to prove their truth. 

Again, you are studiously refusing to address this.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

because the dispute was settled without a trial. Your whole point here is a red herring.

I've pushed you into unseriousness.

If Party A files a Complaint against Party B, and if Parties A and B then settle the matter, the only items in view are allegations.  There are no "undisputed facts" because the facts have neither been admitted, nor established via "evidence at trial," nor deemed admitted by a default, or any other mechanism.

There is no lawyer in the United States who would agree with your position, namely, that the untested, unproven allegations in a legal dispute settled prior to trial, with no factual findings made by an impartial factfinder (and no Due Process, no weighing of evidence, etc.), and with no admissions by the charged party, and where the settlement is explicitly based on on this lack of admission, can be characterized as "undisputed facts."

Again, you are studiously refusing to address this.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

When I said the Church "had its day it court" I was metaphorically speaking about the settlement negotiations and the opportunity the Church was given to read and comment on a draft version of the Order.

Utter crapola.  You were responding to my comments which were explicitly talking about actual adjudicative processes.   Here:

Quote

Quote

Is it unusual then that the SEC refers to the allegations as facts?

No.  A plaintiff filing a complaint will include in it a "Statement of Facts," yet everybody in the process knows that these are facts as alleged by one party in the dispute, that they are intended to be established as "facts" in the future, through the adjudicative process. 

Nothing "metaphorical" here.

You responded:

Quote

Quote

No.  A plaintiff filing a complaint will include in it a "Statement of Facts," yet everybody in the process knows that these are facts as alleged by one party in the dispute, that they are intended to be established as "facts" in the future, through the adjudicative process. 

You are making yourself look quite provincial and for the sake of your own credibility, you really ought to stop. An SEC investigation and subsequent order is a completely different animal than the court proceedings you deal with in Utah County.

Here is what happened. The SEC reached out to the Church and said it was concerned with some things and was opening an investigation. The Church responded in the same way all large, sophisticated organizations do: it said that it always endeavors to comply with the law and will cooperate with the investigation completely to clarify any misunderstandings and rectify anything that it had done wrong. Subsequently there was a long and detailed investigation in which the Church and its attorneys participated. The SEC kept the Church informed about what it was finding out and the conclusions it was coming to. The Church had endless opportunities to respond, and actively participated in the investigation. The SEC sincerely wanted the Church's side of the story so that it could get the facts right, and it did get the Church's side of the story. Throughout the multi-year investigation, the Church had its days (read years), in court.

At the end of this long, detailed process where the SEC was in fact the prosecutor, judge, and jury, it came to the conclusions about the facts, and stated those facts in the order. By paying the fine and choosing not to fight this, the Church is implicitly agreeing that the facts are in fact the facts. It's somewhere between a guilty plea and a no-contest plea. The SEC order isn't a plaintiff making an allegation--it is the judge ruling on what actually happened, and the defendant deciding to take its lumps, accept the verdict, and not appeal. 

You are dissembling by claiming that you were only speaking "metaphorically."  You explicitly stated that the SEC had functioned as "the prosecutor, judge, and jury."  You said this was "fact."

The SEC has ALJs for administrative proceedings.  Here, however, no administrative proceeding was ever commenced.  Nor was this matter ever filed in an Article III court.

An investigation is not "court."  The SEC never acted as "judge and jury."  There was no trial.  No Due Process.  No weighing of evidence.  Instead, the SEC and the Church settled the matter, with the allegations never having been admitted by the Church nor adjudicated by an impartial factfinder.

You are just making stuff up as you go along.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

If there would have been a factual misrepresentation in the Order, 

Oi.  Your lack of training and experience in the law is really impeding this discussion.

Given that we are speaking in a legal context, the point here is not really appropriately framed as being a question of "fact" versus "misrepresentation," but rather a question of "allegation" (that is, a claim of fact not yet proven to be true) versus "fact" (a claim that has been "proven to be true").  

There has not been any "proving" of any allegations.  No conversion of a allegation, a "claim of fact," to a "proven fact."  There has been no admission by the Church (the SEC was, in fact, explicitly based on this).  There has been no suit filed by the SEC in an Article III court.  There has been no administrative proceeding commenced before an Administrative Law Judge.  There has been no Due Process.  There has been no submission of evidence to, and assessment of by, an impartial factfinder.  No judgment entered.  Instead, the matter was settled without any of these things having taken place.  The allegations, then, remain unproven.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

the Church's lawyers would have said something to the effect, "We're confident that we can reach a fair settlement here that will be acceptable to both parties. And we can both agree that it would be embarrassing for the SEC to publish as 'facts' things that aren't really true, so before we put this behind us and pay the fine, let's work together to make sure your report is accurate."

Utter malarky.

From the Order: 

Quote

In anticipation of the institution of these proceedings, Respondents have submitted Offers of Settlement (the “Offers”) which the Commission has determined to accept. Solely for the purpose of these proceedings and any other proceedings brought by or on behalf of the Commission, or to which the Commission is a party, and without admitting or denying the findings herein, except as to the Commission’s jurisdiction over them and the subject matter of these proceedings, which are admitted, Respondents consent to the entry of this Order...
...
The findings herein are made pursuant to Respondents’ Offers of Settlement and are not binding on any other person or entity in this or any other proceeding. 

You are studiously refusing to address this.

The "findings" were "made pursuant to the Respondents' Offers of Settlement."  The Offers were, in turn, explicitly made "without {the Church} admitting or denying the findings."

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

In that situation, the Feds would have carefully listened to any concerns the Church had about misstated facts.

Again, you are just making this stuff up as you go along.  You are guessing.  Speculating.  Nothing more.

What you think "the Feds would have" done is irrelevant given what they did do, which was to settle the matter without having pursued a civil action before an Article III judge or an administrative proceeding before an Administrative Law Church.  And the settlement was explicitly based on the Church not having admitted to any of the findings in the SEC Order.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Presuming the Church didn't want any "misstatements" in the public record on what really happened, the objectives of the Church and the SEC were totally aligned here.

Again, your lack of training and experience in the law is really impeding this discussion.

The SEC Order in this matter is nothing new.  Actually, these "no-admit-no-deny" settlements are fairly controversial because the SEC can assess a fine without any admission of wrongdoing.  That said, sometimes the SEC does require such an admission, and that did not happen here.  The merits of such settlements are still up in the air.  Meanwhile, however, the Church (more specifically, its lawyers) had to deal with the process as it is, not how some think it ought to be.  Here, that process culminated in a settlement with no admission by the Church, and no adjudication by an impartial factfinder (an Article III judge or an Administrative Law Judge).

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

And given the cut-and-dry nature of the "alleged" facts of this case, it's hard to imagine how misstatements could have made it into the final report after it was fact-checked a dozen times by the SEC and by the Church that was cooperating with them.

Again, your lack of training and experience in the law is really impeding this discussion.

Again, you are not paying attention to the actual text of the SEC Order.  Here it is again:

Quote

In anticipation of the institution of these proceedings, Respondents have submitted Offers of Settlement (the “Offers”) which the Commission has determined to accept. Solely for the purpose of these proceedings and any other proceedings brought by or on behalf of the Commission, or to which the Commission is a party, and without admitting or denying the findings herein, except as to the Commission’s jurisdiction over them and the subject matter of these proceedings, which are admitted, Respondents consent to the entry of this Order...
...
The findings herein are made pursuant to Respondents’ Offers of Settlement and are not binding on any other person or entity in this or any other proceeding. 

The "findings" were "made pursuant to the Respondents' Offers of Settlement."  The Offers were, in turn, explicitly made "without {the Church} admitting or denying the findings."  The matter was settled without any adjudication by an impartial factfinder.  Absent admission to the allegations/findings by the Church or an adjudication of the allegations by an impartial factfinder, the SEC's statement of what happened remains untested, unproven, unsubstantiated.  There are no established "facts" here, just "allegations."

As a practical matter, I think substantial portions of the SEC Order would, if adjudicated, be borne out to be true.  However, I also suspect that any number of allegations by the SEC would turn out to be incorrect, or misstated, or exaggerated, etc.  Again, from the "Comments" section of Sam Brunson's article:

Quote

I can’t emphasize this enough, the SEC’s enforcement arm is likely to take the most aggressive reading of any particular statute or regulation while others may take a significantly different view. Over the years, the SEC has been defeated in a number of enforcement actions when its interpretations have been challenged in court. The SEC’s interpretations of statutes and regulations are not law.

The SEC is not an impartial factfinder.  It did not, as you falsely assert, act as "prosecutor, judge and jury."

You are focusing your neophyte expectations about what you think would have happened to the exclusion of what actually happened.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

That process happened.

You are making this up.  You are fabricating out of thin air.

An investigation "happened," yes.  And then the parties reached a settlement, with no admissions and no factfinding or trial or judgment.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

By making minimal assumptions about the competency of the Church's attorneys and the good-faith of the SEC, it has implications about how confident we can be that the undisputed facts really are true.

There are no "undisputed facts."  There are no "facts," just "allegations."

Look, I have no qualms with you reading the SEC and reaching conclusions of your own.  My point is that you cannot say that the SEC's unsubstantiated, untested, unproven allegations have been adjudicated as "fact" by an impartial factfinder (an Article III court or an Administrative Law Judge).  I am emphasizing this because I have spent years watching anti-Mormons embellish, exaggerate, distort, mischaracterize, and otherwise mislead both themselves and others as to issues pertaining to the Church of Jesus Christ.  I suspect that folks like you are salivating at the prospect of being able to say something like "The Mormon Church was found guilty of violating securities laws," or "The Feds have demonstrated that the Mormon Church violated securities laws."  I fully expect this to happen.  I fully expect to see it on this very board.  When and if this happens, this thread will be available for ample review of what can and cannot be accurately stated about this episode.

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited February 23, 2023 by smac97

[Thinking]

5 minutes ago, smac97 said:

The Church has neither admitted nor denied any of the allegations in the SEC Order, and the SEC has not established the allegations via adjudication.

This issue has not been adjudicated.  It has not been "in court" by any measure of the word.  There has been no Article III judge assigned, nor a magistrate, nor an ALJ.  No hearings.  No motion practice.  No trial.  No Due Process.  No weighing of evidence by an impartial factfinder.  You are studiously refusing to address this.

We are talking about allegations which have been neither admitted by the Church nor proven "in court" by the SEC.

The allegations have neither been admitted by the Church nor established via an adjudicative process.

Does the SEC ever need to go to court when it makes allegations?

[smac97]

33 minutes ago, bluebell said:

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This is common in such proceedings. The SEC offers a compromise.  Essentially it says if you pay us this amount we will let you off the hook for higher penalties and we will let you use language that is softer and leaves your image intact. If you say no to this we will play hardball.

Where can I find this referenced?

I provided links to a few resources here. See also these comments:

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I’m a securities lawyer, though haven’t ever dealt with Forms 13F specifically. A few points on this:
...

What most people do not appreciate is that the securities laws and rules are a very complex web of statute, regulation, practice, and enforcement where interpretation in many instances is unclear or highly ambiguous. Even those who intend to comply fully with the securities laws and regulations can find themselves in trouble without meaning to.

In addition, and I can’t emphasize this enough, the SEC’s enforcement arm is likely to take the most aggressive reading of any particular statute or regulation while others may take a significantly different view. Over the years, the SEC has been defeated in a number of enforcement actions when its interpretations have been challenged in court. The SEC’s interpretations of statutes and regulations are not law.

However, a party under investigation may choose to settle, even believing that they have the better argument, because the consequences of fighting the SEC can be catastrophic, both in terms of time and money lost, impact to reputation (even if you win), and the fact that litigation can be a huge gamble with devastating penalties if you end up with the wrong judge or jury. I’m not saying that is the case here – I don’t know – but without having more information, I am saying it is plausible.

I’m a securities lawyer and I think defendants in securities law trials are at an even worse disadvantage in securities law cases than they would be in other cases. The securities statutes and regulations in many cases are vague and difficult even for securities lawyers to parse and fully appreciate and understand, let alone someone who doesn’t have expertise in the subject. A defendant in a securities law matter would have very justifiable concerns that the defendant would not receive a fair trial.

Thanks,

-Smac

[smac97]

Just now, Thinking said:

Does the SEC ever need to go to court when it makes allegations?

Rarely.  Last night I read an article indicating that about 2% of SEC charges go to trial, with the rest being dropped or settled.

Thanks,

-Smac