It Was the Butler, in the Hamptons, with the Fax Machine

Posted by Keith Hahn, Jul 11, 2007, 1:34pm

wadsworth.jpg Turns out to be the winning Clue for the SEC, in a $66k insider-trading settlement with Graham Lefford, former butler to American Idol creator Robert Sillerman. Lefford was “managing” Sillerman’s house in Southampton, and doing some day trading on the side. Lefford decided to buy 5,000 shares of Sports Entertainment Enterprises (now CKX) coincidentally about 12 minutes after signatures were faxed to cement a $100 million deal to buy a stake in Elvis Presley’s estate.

Shares of the then penny stock shot up 9,000% in two days after the announcement, netting Lefford almost $49k from a $600 investment. Lefford agreed to relinquish his profits and pay a penalty plus a bit of interest (amounting to the $66k), all without having to admit any wrongdoing, the SEC’s preferred method of toothless “enforcement.”

Sillerman does make all his help sing “A Moment Like This” and sign a confidentiality agreement that prohibits using information obtained during work for personal benefit.

PS – When going to the CFO.com link, does anyone else get a “Youth Porn Rehabilitation” Google ad on the side of the page or is my computer trying to tell me something (by that I mean rehab for teens who look at porn, not people looking at teen porn...key difference)?

A Whodunnit in the Hamptons [CFO.com]

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Posted in: Insider Trading

Comments

Posted by Booya shakka, Jul 11, 2007 1:51PM

I think you mean Sillerman, not Silverman. They're not all names of precious metals with a "man" or a "stein" added to the end...

Posted by anon, Jul 11, 2007 1:54PM

So butlers have $600,000 bankrolls.

Posted by , Jul 11, 2007 1:54PM

Oh man, is that Tim Curry in Clue? great image there

Posted by KH, Jul 11, 2007 2:00PM

Dammit, you're right Booya, good call.

Keith

Posted by CPTiger, Jul 11, 2007 2:09PM

I think your computer is trying to tell you something!

Posted by , Jul 11, 2007 2:31PM

It's $600.00, 1:54, not $600K.

Posted by jt, Jul 11, 2007 3:18PM

Yup confirmed your computer/google is trying to tell you something Keith. Closest I got was ads for McAffee antivirus (which I guess a few times removed could be indication to rehabilitate from youth pron?)

Posted by Tim Carney, Jul 11, 2007 3:32PM

The SEC is "toothless?" It took $66 k from some dude. That's more than bankrobbers usually haul, and they often have guns, not to mention teeth.

Some gums.

Posted by obviously, Jul 11, 2007 4:43PM

they're toothless because they never require an admission of guilt.

Posted by GDM, Jul 11, 2007 5:01PM

All I got was martial arts, taser, and pepper spray ads. If our computers are telling us something, you're a pervert and I'm a wimp.

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