The former chief financial officer at notorious brokerage firm, Osler Inc., is now facing new quasi-criminal charges of unregistered trading and participating in an illegal distribution.
The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) announced today that Venard “Lenny” Gaudet of Toronto has been charged with unregistered trading and distributing securities without having filed a prospectus, in connection with allegations that Gaudet sold common shares of Intrinsic Minerals Ltd. to four investors in July 2012. The allegations have not been proven.
Gaudet’s first court appearance is scheduled for Dec. 12, at the Old City Hall, Ontario Court of Justice, in Toronto.
The OSC notes that it sanctioned Gaudet back in 1991 for his role in a $12 million fraud on Toronto-based brokerage firm, Osler, where he was the chief financial officer. At that time, the commission wrote that Gaudet and other top executives at the failed firm “should never again be allowed to participate in the capital markets…”
Now, the regulator alleges that Gaudet traded in spite of the order it issued in the Osler case, which permanently revoked his registration and banned him from relying on trading exemptions.
The latest charges stem from an investigation by the OSC’s Joint Serious Offences Team (JSOT), which is an enforcement partnership between the OSC, the RCMP Financial Crime program, and the OPP Anti-Rackets Branch.