Peter Pocklington takes the Fifth
Brent Jang
05:21 EST Friday, Jun 26, 2009
It's a tale of Stanley Cup rings sold and unsold, bank accounts in the Bahamas, a closet full of women's shoes and designer purses, and 10 Andy Warhol prints of Mick Jagger.
The assets – coveted by creditors pursuing Peter Pocklington for more than $19-million (U.S.) – are at the centre of a lawsuit filed by a California bankruptcy trustee against the former owner of the Edmonton Oilers.
But now Mr. Pocklington is attempting to use his mounting legal troubles to try to keep those creditors, the largest of which is the government of Alberta, at bay a little longer. He's asserting his Fifth Amendment right under the U.S. Constitution to avoid questions about the assets in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, arguing that providing answers would taint his criminal trial scheduled for August.
The financier known as Peter Puck, who traded Canadian hockey superstar Wayne Gretzky from the Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings in 1988, was criminally charged in March for allegedly concealing assets in bankruptcy fraud. Mr. Pocklington has pleaded not guilty to a two-count felony indictment that accuses him of filing false bankruptcy declarations and making false oaths.
Robert Whitmore, the trustee overseeing Mr. Pocklington's personal bankruptcy proceedings, alleges that Mr. Pocklington understated his assets when he claimed they totalled just $2,900 (U.S.), compared with $19.7-million in personal liabilities. And it appears he wants to grill Mr. Pocklington on the location of some items the businessman once owned.
“The bankruptcy trustee seeks to question Mr. Pocklington regarding certain items of jewelry, namely championship rings he was given when his National Hockey League team, the Edmonton Oilers, were named [Stanley Cup] champions,” according to new filings in U.S. Bankruptcy Court from Mr. Pocklington's criminal lawyer, Brent Romney.
“Mr. Pocklington may have once owned these items of jewelry, but years ago he may have given these items of jewelry to his wife. If so, they would constitute her separate property and his omission of these items on his bankruptcy application would have been proper. … His compelled testimony in the bankruptcy proceedings ‘might tend to incriminate him' in his federal bankruptcy fraud criminal proceedings.”
Mr. Pocklington claims in court documents that he no longer knows where the rings are. In a filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Mr. Pocklington explained that he acted on behalf of his wife, Eva, when he contacted Marc Juteau of
www.classicauctions.net to sell sports memorabilia such as five Stanley Cup rings and one Gretzky jersey.
Mr. Pocklington said Mr. Juteau paid $50,000 as an advance for the sports memorabilia, and those funds were deposited in Dempsey Investment Corp., based in the Bahamas. Classic Auctions advertised and initially sold the five rings for nearly $273,000 in total last year, but Mr. Pocklington said it turns out that the memorabilia were “not sold as advertised” and he's unsure of their whereabouts.
Dempsey, coined after his mother's maiden name, is described by Mr. Pocklington as a family charitable trust. But Mr. Whitmore alleges in his role as bankruptcy trustee that Mr. Pocklington holds stakes in corporations such as Dempsey and had or has several undisclosed bank accounts, “including those located in the Bahamas.”
The trustee has asked U.S. Bankruptcy Court for permission to hire “special counsel” to trace offshore assets, seeking help from a California law firm that represents the creditors chasing Mr. Pocklington.
Last summer, about 250 items were confiscated during raids of the Pocklingtons' Indian Wells condo in the California desert, including Chanel women's shoes, Yves Saint Laurent evening gowns, Hermès designer purses and Louis Vuitton bags, as well as an eclectic collection of art, ranging from Inuit carvings to Buddha sculptures to the Warhol prints. Those are now in storage in Los Angeles, awaiting the outcome of the civil and criminal cases.
The legal issue is over whether such women's apparel should be deemed “community property” co-owned by Mr. Pocklington or if the items solely belong to Eva. He claims he transferred ownership of art, the Stanley Cup rings and a wide range of other assets to her in the late 1990s. The couple married in 1974.
“The U.S. Attorney insists that all personal property owned by either Mr. or Mrs. Pocklington is community property. The Pocklingtons, on the other hand, claim certain personal property is his personal property and certain personal property is her separate personal property,” Mr. Romney wrote in a court filing. “His testimony may ‘provide a link in the chain of evidence' needed to prosecute him in either federal or state court.”
Mr. Pocklington's criminal trial is scheduled to begin Aug. 11 in Riverside, Calif. He faces up to 10 years in prison.
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