U.S. SEC loses retrial in Florida bank case

Bluegreen Vacations Holding

08/05/2017 20:39

By Jonathan Stempel 
    May 8 (Reuters) - A federal jury on Monday cleared a Florida 
bank and its former chief executive of U.S. Securities and 
Exchange Commission charges that they downplayed real estate 
lending risks prior to the global financial crisis. 
    Jurors in Miami found BBX Capital Corp  BBX.N , a Florida 
company once known as BankAtlantic Bancorp, and former Chief 
Executive Alan Levan not liable on all counts in the civil case, 
including improper accounting, court records showed. 
    The SEC had accused BankAtlantic and Levan of making 
misleading statements in a July 2007 conference call to hide 
deterioration in the bank's commercial real estate portfolio. 
    Its lawsuit, filed in January 2012, arose from loans that 
BankAtlantic had made on large tracts of land intended for the 
construction of single-family homes and condominiums. 
    Florida was among the U.S. states hardest hit by the 
nation's housing crisis. 
    Both defendants had denied wrongdoing. 
    Levan, in a statement provided by BBX, accused the SEC of 
bringing the case so it "could say it did something to somebody 
other than watch the banking system collapse under its nose." 
    An SEC spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for 
comment. 
    A different jury had in December 2014 found both defendants 
liable, and they were later fined a combined $5.85 million by 
U.S. District Judge Darrin Gayles. 
    But the federal appeals court in Atlanta threw out the 
verdict and fines last September, citing errors by the judge. 
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N1C50Q9 
    Gayles presided over the retrial, which began six weeks ago. 
Jurors began deliberating on Friday. 
    BankAtlantic was renamed BBX after selling its main banking 
assets in 2012 to North Carolina's BB&T Corp  BBT.N . 
    The case is SEC v BankAtlantic Bancorp Inc et al, U.S. 
District Court, Southern District of Florida, No. 12-60082.     
 
 (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Tom 
Brown) 
 ((jon.stempel@thomsonreuters.com; +1 646 223 6317; Reuters 
Messaging: jon.stempel.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net)) 
 
Keywords: SEC BANKATLANTIC/