Boston Broker-Dealer’s Got Some Real Actors Here

Not exactly the Great White Way, but it's a start! And mimicking accents isn't illegal here.

Casting directors of Massachusetts: A new and totally untapped talent market is sitting right under your nose at One Beacon Street, in the offices of Realty Capital Securities. There, the many fine actors and actresses have been honing their chops, (allegedly) impersonating shareholders to vote in favor of its affiliate American Realty Capital’s takeover by Apollo Global Management. And while that marriage ultimately failed to make it to the altar, these clever character actors did their part. Unfortunately for them, that probably means they won’t have a job soon, as faking proxy votes is just the kind of thing that the Eliot Spitzer of the Back Bay, Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth Bill Galvin, tends to frown upon. But that’s good news for any production on Tremont Street looking for a master mimic.

On at least two occasions, RCS employees called the proxy solicitation firm pretending to be shareholders who wanted to place a vote, going so far as to mimic the accents of the shareholders, according to Galvin.

It was not clear from the complaint what accents they used.

Boston firm faked accents to make fraudulent proxy votes, Galvin charges [Boston Business Journal]
Massachusetts Regulator Says Real Estate Affiliate Faked Proxy Votes [DealBook]
Apollo’s Deal for Control of Schorsch Real-Estate Empire Falls Apart [WSJ]