As we mentioned briefly, Deloitte has been sued for $7.6 billion by the bankruptcy trustee of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker and Ocala Funding, LLC. If you've never heard of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker then check out Jr. Deputy Accountant who's been all over it since the Feds starting kicking down the doors. Long story short – TBW was a giant fraud perpetrated by its management, Colonial Bank owned a lot of TBW's mortgages, Colonial failed, Bank of America bought up a bunch of the mortgages, Fannie Mae says they're owed money, CHRIST, it's a mess. Anyhoo, Steven Thomas, who is known for suing the pants off Big 4 firms (and BDO!), is the lead attorney for the plaintiffs and it sounds like the age-old story of auditors BEING COMPLETE IDIOTS:
“Deloitte missed this fraud because it simply accepted management’s conflicting, incomplete and often last-minute explanations of highly-questionable transactions, even though those explanations made no sense and were flatly contradicted by documents in Deloitte’s possession,” one of the lawsuits says.
Of course Deloitte isn't amused by this, as Deloitte spokesman Jonathan Gandal's statement attests:
Gandal said the blame for the fraud and losses should rest squarely on Taylor Bean, Ocala Funding and Farkas. “The bizarre notion that his engines of theft are entitled to complain of injury from their own crimes and to sue the outside auditors they lied to defies common sense, not to mention the law,” Gandal said on behalf of Deloitte.
If this statement strikes you as a little confusing, then you're not alone. First off, when Mr. Gandal is referring to the "the law" he's probably referring to this. In less legalese, basically what Deloitte is saying is that Lee Farkas and his merry band of crooks are the ones responsible for this shitshow not the Green Dot and therefore, this whole thing is ludicrous. I mean, come on guys, what could a firm that just reported nearly $29 billion in revenue could possibly have done differently? Crooks are just far too smart far auditors. Just ask one.
