The Securities and Exchange Commission announced Monday that it had accepted a guilty plea from former National Century Financial Enterprises executive Sherry Gibson, who admitted that the company improperly took funds from NCFE's securitization trusts and sent fraudulent reports to investors and auditors. She is the first to cop a plea to the SEC's newly filed criminal complaint against NCFE and it is unclear as of this point as to whether additional NCFE executives — such as CEO Lance Poulson — will also plead guilty.
Gibson, who admitted that she directed others to prepare financial reports containing false financial information dating back to 1995, was the firm's executive vice president of compliance from 1999 until the company filed for bankruptcy in November 2002. She also admitted she kept two separate actual and reported sets of books.
Gibson faces up to five years in prison without parole and a $250,000 fine as well as three years of post-release supervision. No date has been set for sentencing.
