MIAMI — The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida has entered a consent judgment between the federal government, the former chief financial officer of IOTC Financial Services LLC and Global Oil Financial Servcies LLC to resolve charges of mismanaging employees' pension plan contributions.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA), Financial Services and Global Oil Financial's former chief financial officer Kevin Kirkeide violated Title I of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) while serving as a fiduciary trustee, agent or representative of the companies' employee benefit plan.
Kirkeide and Global Oil owner Harry Sargeant withheld money from worker's paychecks without the funds going into the employee plans and failed to forward monies in the required time frame, the EBSA said. Kirkeide also did not submit the employer contributions portions into the plans and co-mingled the employee contributions and company assets, according to the EBSA.
"Consent judgments such as this one identify bad actors, compel them to make benefit plans financially whole, and prevent them from doing further damage," said EBSA deputy regional director in Atlanta Lawrence Thompson in a statement. "The U.S. Department of Labor will continue to pursue all legal recourse to ensure employees keep the benefits they have rightfully earned."
The settlement enjoins Kirkeide from acting as a trustee, agent or fiduciary of any employee plan and Kirkeide and Sargeant have paid more than $500,000 in restitution, the EBSA said.