Welcome To the WIN!!! St. Elias Mines HUB On AGORACOM

Keep in mind, the opinions on this site are for the most part speculation and are not necessarily the opinions of the company WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Free
Message: US sec busts Brewer

Mr. Brewer was SLI. Not only is he the husband of the CEO, he was also VP of Exploration for St. Elias. Do you not remember sparring with  me over the questionable BC claims transactions? Was he not charged in 2003 for insider trading involving the Cueva Blance property? By the way, SLI employee Dorian Leslie was the cartographer for the Emerald Isle property...it seems they run in packs.

Here is an interesting read:

 

Black Friday should have happened on Canadian soil.

For Paul Winkler, that is the only shadow over his pleasure at learning former media mogul Conrad Black was convicted of fraud in an American court.

On Friday, after 12 days of deliberations, a jury found Black guilty of three counts of mail fraud and one count of obstruction of justice.

"I'm pleased, obviously, that white-collar crime is being taken seriously and is being punished. I think it is a good conviction for Conrad," said the owner of Trajan Publishing in St. Catharines.

"But Canadian authorities should have been investigating him. We should have been looking into it. We should have got him."

Winkler, a Fonthill resident, followed Black's Chicago trial with a unique personal interest. He has the rare distinction of going head-to-head against Black's company, and his former partner, David Radler, in court - and winning.

In 2002, Winkler was awarded a year's salary and severance in a wrongful dismissal suit he brought against Hollinger, the company Black ran as chief executive. Former Hollinger president Radler was Black's right-hand man.

Winkler said he was fired in 1999 because he was opposed to a shell game Radler was playing with certain British Columbia newspapers, including one for which Winkler worked.

Winkler was the general manager of a group of small newspapers in B.C., including the Kelowna Capital News.

In 1999, Hollinger bought the newspaper group. It wasn't Winkler's first choice of employer - he had moved from Ontario to B.C. to avoid working for a Hollinger-owned paper - but he had little control over it.

The trouble, he said, was he was asked to do things that harmed his newspaper's business and benefited a rival, the Kelowna Daily Courier.

The Courier was owned by Horizon Publishing, a company controlled by Radler and Black.

Winkler raised his concerns about conflicts of interest and was ultimately fired, he said.

It would take three years for Winkler to get his day in court - actually an eight-day trial that included a full day with Radler on the witness stand - and another seven months to be awarded damages.

"Those were a few lean years for me," Winkler said. "I was unemployed for 20 months. My wife, who was a reporter at the paper, had also lost her job."

With the legal battles out of the way, Winkler contacted the B.C. securities commission to pass along what he knew about Hollinger and Horizon.

"I was told that though the newspapers in question were in B.C., Hollinger was headquartered in Ontario, so I had to contact the Ontario commission."

The Ontario commission responded within 48 hours with a letter, politely telling Winkler to get lost, he said.

"I was blown off," he said. "They said there was no evidence of any wrongdoing."

Winkler tried to go to the newspapers, contacting a former co-worker who was working for the Canadian Press.

No one would touch the story. Winkler said it is possible news outlets feared legal reprisals from Radler or Black if they ran with it.

And, he said, many probably thought his complaints were little more than sour grapes.

"The story was so preposterous that I am certain I looked like a bitter ex-Hollinger employee who was just out to get Radler and Black," he said. "I really became depressed over it."

Denied by securities commissions and dismissed by the press, Winkler figured it was the end of the road.

What he didn't know was U.S. authorities had begun their own unrelated investigation into Black's business dealings. And that investigation would resurrect Winkler's story in 2003.

"A reporter from the Chicago Tribune called my house," he said. "My wife answered the phone and at first thought it was a friend playing a joke.

"But it was real enough and after I had talked to the reporter for a few minutes on the phone, I heard him turn to his editor and say, 'I'm flying to Canada tonight.' "

The story ran on the front of the Tribune's Sunday edition. That led to Winkler contacting the American securities commission.

"I spent four hours talking to them," he said. "They were very serious about it. They wanted to know everything I knew."

Black's recent charges were not connected to the Kelowna papers.

But Winkler was pleased that someone in position to investigate took the time to listen.

"Canadian authorities should have investigated it," he said. "The Canadian news media should have covered it."

Share
New Message
Please login to post a reply