HF Execs Charged With Contempt In Raid

A pair of hedge fund executives who allegedly raided a safe deposit box in defiance of a court order have been held in contempt, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced. Glenn Sherman and Robert Wildeman, principals of Chicago-based Northshore Asset Management, along with fellow Northshore principal Kevin Kelley, were accused last year of diverting investor funds from a recently acquired hedge fund, Ardent Research Partners, for personal use. A federal judge froze the firm’s and fund’s assets in February and March 2005, but, according to the SEC, Wildeman, at Sherman’s behest, emptied a Northshore safe deposit box twice that March. In addition to holding the two in contempt, U.S. District Judge Richard Owen of the Southern District of New York fined both men $2,500 and awarded the court-appointed receiver attorney’ fees and related costs, in light of Sherman and Wildeman’s “unremorseful behavior and many contrived excuses.”

In a separate action, the SEC said Evan Misshula, the founder of defunct hedge fund Sane Capital Partners, has accepted a ban from the investment industry. Misshula was accused of transferring Sane funds to his own account and covering up the impropriety with fictitious reports to investors. Misshula and Sane have already been hit with civil judgments totaling nearly $800,000, equal to Sane’s peak asset level. So far, The Wall Street Journal reports, Misshula has repaid $25,000.