4
investors, except that petitioner himself was a member of every
venture; he was the only common member.
Petitioner kept no journals, ledgers, or other formal books
of account for the joint ventures. To the extent there was any
contemporaneous accounting for investors' funds collected by
petitioner, it consisted merely of notes on check stubs.
Although no member of any of the joint ventures authorized
petitioner to transfer funds from one joint venture to another
joint venture, petitioner consistently did so, as the need for
funds to meet the obligations of one joint venture would arise,
and funds available to petitioner would be in another joint
venture. Petitioner accordingly did extensive commingling of
funds between the various joint ventures, of which he was the
only common member. He did such commingling on his own
authority. Some funds were also abstracted from joint venture
moneys received by petitioner and were used for his personal
purposes. This commingling of funds, and their application to
other accounts and in some cases to petitioner's personal
purposes, was done without any knowledge or authorization by the
other investors in the various joint accounts, either orally or
in writing. All such transfers were done by petitioner on his
own authority.
As a result of commingling and appropriations in the many
joint ventures in which petitioner was engaged, together with
certain sales, failures, and foreclosures that occurred, lengthy
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next
Last modified: May 25, 2011