Crazy Eddie - Fraud

Fraud

Almost from the beginning, Crazy Eddie's management was engaged in various forms of fraud. The Antars deliberately falsified their books to reduce (or eliminate) their taxable income. They also paid employees off the books, and regularly skimmed thousands of dollars (in cash) earned at the stores. For every $5 Crazy Eddie reported as income, $1 was taken by the Antars. In 1979, the Antars began depositing much of this money (hundreds of thousands of dollars) in Israeli bank accounts. The Antar family skimmed an estimated $3 million to $4 million (US) per year at the height of their fraud. In one offshore bank account, the family deposited more than $6 million between 1980 and 1983.

By 1983, it was becoming more and more difficult to hide the millions of illicit dollars. The Antars decided that the way to cover up their growing fraud was to take the company public. In preparation, Eddie Antar initiated a scheme in 1979 to skim less each year. Since more income was actually being reported, this had the effect of showing drastically increasing profit margins. While the company's actual profits (taking into account skimmed profits) from 1980 to 1983 increased approximately 13%, reported profits rose nearly 171%.

Despite the misgivings of people closely associated with Crazy Eddie, the company held its initial public offering on September 13, 1984 (symbol: CRZY). Shares of the company sold initially for $8. By early 1986, Crazy Eddie stock was trading at more than $75 per share (split adjusted).

Eddie recruited his cousin, Sam E. Antar (known as Sammy), to assist the company with its fraud. Sammy earned a degree in accounting in 1980, and served his apprenticeship with Penn and Horowitz, Crazy Eddie's auditor. In 1986, he was named CFO of the company. Sammy was informed that there was a $3 million deficit from the previous year's inventory fraud that needed to be hidden. Additionally, he was instructed to find ways to show a 10% growth in sales.

One of Sammy's major schemes was a money laundering operation later known as the Panama Pump — money that the Antars had deposited in Israeli banks was transferred to bank accounts in Panama. These accounts, opened under false names, then drafted payments to Crazy Eddie. This money was largely used to inflate same-store sales figures for the company.

As a public company, Eddie, Sammy, and others engaged in increasing amounts of inventory fraud to increase reported profits and inflate the value of Crazy Eddie stock. For the fiscal year ended March 1, 1985, Crazy Eddie falsified inventories by $3 million. The next fiscal year, that amount increased to between $10 and $12 million.