https://www.twincities.com/201...s-taxidermy-cabelas/



Grain elevator closes after exec allegedly stole $2 million for safaris, taxidermy, Cabela’s

By MIKKEL PATES | Forum News Service
September 14, 2018 at 1:07 pm



ASHBY, Minn. — A west-central grain elevator is going belly up, alleging that its general manager spent more than $2 million of its funds for hunting safaris, taxidermy and other expenditures.

The Ashby Farmers Cooperative Elevator Co. stopped taking deliveries on Sept. 10 and will officially close for business on Sept. 14, the company said in a letter to members on Sept. 12. The board’s initial investigation has revealed that Jerry Hennessey, the co-op’s general manager, signed checks that included $375,000 for safari hunting trips, more than $500,000 for taxidermy and more than $1 million for personal Cabela’s Club Visa card expenditures.

The unauthorized withdrawals have been reported to the Grant County Sheriff’s department, and a deputy has been assigned to conduct an investigation.

Added investigations may include the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the state of Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said Erik Ahlgren.

The board will hold an informational meeting for members and patrons on Tuesday, Sept. 18, at 7 p.m. at the co-op’s warehouse in Ashby, which is 20 miles southeast of Fergus Falls.

The co-op’s board will be “actively seeking new owners who will be able to re-open the elevator, but cannot provide a timeline as to if or when this may happen,” the letter said. The elevator was established in 1908 and generates $1.9 million in annual revenues and employs five people.

In the letter, the board said they learned they are missing a significant amount of the company’s grain inventory that was reported on the co-op’s financial statements. On Sept. 10 the board met and retained Ahlgren Law Office PLLC, a Fergus Falls-based law firm, as well as Eide Bailly, a forensic accounting firm, to conduct an investigation and to advise the board.

“The board does not expect to have funds to pay the co-op’s outstanding obligations in full,” Ahlgren said, in the release. “The co-op may have an insurable loss for theft. It may also be able to recover assets from other sources, but it is unlikely that the co-op will be able to pay any obligations before the end of the year.”

The Minnesota Grain and Feed Association in 2014 listed the elevator as having 151,000 bushels of grain storage, handling wheat, corn, oats and soybeans, and offering grain drying, feed, seed and animal health supplies.


“Please note that our investigation into this situation is continuing, but it is early in the investigation,” the letter said. “As our members, friends and neighbors, we intend to keep you updated on the facts.”

A website for Chris Bilkey’s Track and Trail Safaris of New Zealand, offering “personal, professional safaris” for tahr and red stag, lists Jerry and Becky Hennessey as having taken a trip in June 2011.

“We both said that it was better than anticipated, your place, hospitality, and hunting are second to none, and we really enjoyed our conversation and our education we learned from both of you on yourselves and your country,” said a review comment attributed to the couple.


Bilkey offers “fair chase, free range” hunting of tahr, a kind of large, wild goat, on privately-managed property. Tahr is native to Nepal and northern India. It has a feral range on the south island of New Zealand. The company also offers hunts for red deer, chamois, fallow deer and water buffalo.

Jerry Hennessey is listed in 2018 as involved in fundraisers for Safari Club International events in Minnesota. He is listed as a “member reference” for a hunt advertised for a muskox hunt in Greenland, offered as an auction item for Minnesota SCI’s 42nd Annual World Hunting in February 2017.

No big surprise that the fine name of SCI once again takes a dip in bullshit. $1,000,000 spent at Cabela’s?

quote:

Originally posted by jdollar:
No big surprise that the fine name of SCI once again takes a dip in bullshit. $1,000,000 spent at Cabela’s?

He needed his name in a record book!

Not the first time someone spent millions on hunting and left others with the bill.

Bummer! What some people will do without considering the outcome.

quote:

Originally posted by jdollar:
No big surprise that the fine name of SCI once again takes a dip in bullshit. $1,000,000 spent at Cabela’s?

No..just $1m on the card presumably to rack up huge points (who know what kind of BS he spent the $1m on...likely illegally)

$500k taxidermy!!! That's a LOT of taxidermy work!!! I can't even imagine

Makes Paul Manafort's $19,000 ostrich jacket sound like small potatoes.

Just another parson placed in a position well above his level of honesty or skill.
This sort of thing is all too common.

But, where was the board of directors while this was going on? The stockholders have more than one problem to address.

376 steyr - I politely disagree sir.

This person FULLY considered the implication. He KNEW he was stealing from others. He did it deliberately, repeatedly and did not care one bit.

Quite similar to the guilty please (in the political arena) we have been seeing lately.

quote:

Originally posted by 376 steyr:
Bummer! What some people will do without considering the outcome.

At least he didn't piss the money away on stupid stuff.

quote:

Originally posted by Opus1:
At least he didn't piss the money away on stupid stuff.

It was not his money, so how he used it is immaterial!

Moral compass???

quote:

Originally posted by Opus1:
At least he didn't piss the money away on stupid stuff.

I was just in Australia hunting. These people happened to be in camp at the same time. Very strange.

Hey Larry:
They hire you for accounting?

Hell of a deal. Beware of new friends, right?

George

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
I was just in Australia hunting. These people happened to be in camp at the same time. Very strange.

I guess that would have been their last hunting trip for the foreseeable future (and beyond hopefully).

quote:

Originally posted by BushPeter:

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
I was just in Australia hunting. These people happened to be in camp at the same time. Very strange.

I guess that would have been their last hunting trip for the foreseeable future (and beyond hopefully).

I imagine he will be hunting for a lawyer.

I am hoping my good friend the outfitter got paid. The sad thing is that this guy got the biggest buff taken all year.

These kinds of frauds almost always get caught. The perps start small and can't stop... this one looks to be a huge loss for the Coop owners. Hope they hang him from the highest rafter. A thief is a thief.

quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:


Moral compass???

quote:

Originally posted by Opus1:
At least he didn't piss the money away on stupid stuff.

Naki, that was a joke, not a validation.

quote:

Originally posted by bwanamrm:
These kinds of frauds almost always get caught. The perps start small and can't stop... this one looks to be a huge loss for the Coop owners. Hope they hang him from the highest rafter. A thief is a thief.

Given the description of what he took relative to their gross income, it is hard to believe it took this long. I agree, they almost always get caught.

Poor controls, reporting and governance.

A small co-op like that should be easy to administer. Financial forecasts and cash flow planning would have picked up variances of $5k a month and cumulative variances over a period of 3, 6 12 months.

If he was paying Cabellas since 2008 on credit card, that is criminal. Do they not have statutory accountants or auditors who file annual returns for tax & audit?

Hard to imagine that oversight was so poor. I suspect that he must have had a friendly board member who was either an accomplice or a total idiot.

They most certainly had to file tax returns. These can be filed off of unaudited data. The vast majority of companies do just that.

There is no requirement in this country to have financials audited unless it is a regulated industry such as banks, insurance companies, etc.

Can remember a guy here in town writing off 200,000/year on a million dollar business for entertainment. Busted.

Who files them?

Unaudited, yes I understand. But unscritinised? Unchecked? Unanalysed? Without checking cashflow and bank reconciliations & credit card reconciliations? $1 million on Credit Card at Cabelas!

If it was done by an accountant or an external professional, I would take him to court for negligence! What was the in-house accountant doing?

I remember in 1986, in India when I joined an agri business firm as area manager. A junior accountant found a delivery authorisation with his signature. But he knew he never signed it and it was a forgery. He immediately reported it. The dominos fell - 10 stories high. Lead to criminal indictment of a General Manager, Branch manager, sales & accounts supervisors and more.

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
They most certainly had to file tax returns. These can be filed off of unaudited data. The vast majority of companies do just that.

There is no requirement in this country to have financials audited unless it is a regulated industry such as banks, insurance companies, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by crane:
Can remember a guy here in town writing off 200,000/year on a million dollar business for entertainment. Busted.

My accountant says "Reasonable and Customary" and required to run the business. I suppose many in the outdoor industry violate that rule...

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
They most certainly had to file tax returns. These can be filed off of unaudited data. The vast majority of companies do just that.

There is no requirement in this country to have financials audited unless it is a regulated industry such as banks, insurance companies, etc.

I don't audit our financials but certainly have controls in place to make sure things are not amiss...the bank balance in our accounting software has to balance with the bank. After that, expenses and draws are easy to trace.

I am not an accountant by training. But my experience as a Management Trainee at 24 years has held me in good stead. No computers in those days. I got a small cannon calculator as a birthday present from my dad.

We were taught to check the numbers and paper trail. Check the field / shop floor.

Once I saw a truck leaving a site and decided to check the paperwork. I found none. I started asking a few discrete questions among the workers and they said that these shipments were going out for a few weeks - waste removal.

I found that the supervisor had been selling off waste without recording it and pocketing the cash.

Monthly controls are simple - make sure software account balance matches actual bank records. Every transaction should tally. Larger businesses will need to do this weekly.

Do the same for credit cards. Treat a credit card as a bank account in the software. Separate the private expenses from business expenses. If company policy covers this, it is impossible for the manager to use credit cards to pay $1 million to Cabellas!

quote:

Originally posted by AnotherAZWriter:

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
They most certainly had to file tax returns. These can be filed off of unaudited data. The vast majority of companies do just that.

There is no requirement in this country to have financials audited unless it is a regulated industry such as banks, insurance companies, etc.

I don't audit our financials but certainly have controls in place to make sure things are not amiss...the bank balance in our accounting software has to balance with the bank. After that, expenses and draws are easy to trace.

http://www.startribune.com/big...shby-minn/501713721/



Big game, small town and a $5 million mystery in tiny Ashby, Minn.

Grain co-op's manager and money have disappeared.
By John Reinan Star Tribune DECEMBER 1, 2018 — 8:03PM


Ashby, Minn. – Jerry Hennessey was a jet-setter with a high-powered rifle.

He was on a first-name basis with the world’s most renowned big-game guides, paying $50,000 or more for exotic hunting safaris in Africa, New Zealand and Alaska. He spent more than half a million dollars to have his trophies mounted and built a barn-sized addition to display them at his home outside this town of 440 residents some 165 miles northwest of the Twin Cities.

Chatty and personable, the 56-year-old was well known and liked in this community where, for nearly 30 years, he managed the Ashby Farmers Co-Operative Elevator Co.

But court documents allege that his high living was a sham, financed by a massive swindle that forced the elevator company to temporarily close on the eve of the busy fall harvest. In a civil case filed in Grant County District Court, the co-op has charged Hennessey with stealing more than $4.9 million over the past 15 years and spending the money on hunting, taxidermy, land purchases and personal expenses for himself and his wife, Rebecca, who is also charged in the case.



Hennessey skipped town in early September, just as a bank loan to the elevator came due with no grain in the bins to back it up. He’s been missing ever since, leaving state and federal investigators to sift through the tangled transactions that have left several hundred local farmers — the co-op’s owners — holding the bag.

In the nearly three months since he disappeared, Hennessey has been the talk of Ashby’s bustling Main Street, where locals gather for coffee and tater tot hot dish at the town cafe.



“It affected so many people in this area,” said Robert “Andy” Anderson, 91, a retired truck driver and lifelong resident. “I can’t understand a man that would do that to his family and friends.

“How can you stand and talk to a friend and stab him in the back at the same time?”

Janet Hamer, a clerk at Second Chance Thrift, said residents are amazed by the sheer size of the alleged theft.

“It’s really something,” she said. “I couldn’t see how such a tiny town could have such a big problem.”

Writing five-figure checks

Hennessey’s alleged scheme began to unravel when a “substantial” loan to the elevator came due on Sept. 1 from CoBank, a federal organization that provides financing for agricultural co-ops, said Erik Ahlgren, a Fergus Falls lawyer who represents the co-op.

When bank officials called the loan, the elevator didn’t have the money to pay. At the time, Hennessey told the co-op board members that he was refinancing the loan, Ahlgren said.

The board scheduled a meeting Sept. 10 to discuss the issue. Hennessey didn’t show up, and hasn’t been seen since.

In an affidavit filed with the court, Rebecca Hennessey said she hasn’t seen her husband since he vanished and believes he headed south to Des Moines. At some point, she said, her son called Hennessey’s cellphone and he answered, but then hung up immediately.

Rebecca Hennessey did not return phone calls last week seeking comment. In a court filing, she denied involvement in her husband’s alleged theft. She also has filed for divorce.

As police began their search for her husband, the co-op board surveyed the wreckage of the elevator’s finances. It turned out that Jerry Hennessey had been freely spending the co-op’s money since 2003, according to court documents. His actions were “brazen,” Ahlgren said.

Hennessey wrote hundreds of checks on the co-op’s account, according to the civil complaint, often putting them on the elevator’s books as purchases of corn, soybeans and feed. In reality, Ahlgren said, Hennessey was spending the money on hunting safaris, taxidermy, home improvements, hunting land and personal expenses for himself and his wife.

Hennessey spent more than $1.4 million of the co-op’s money over the years paying off his personal credit card debt, according to court documents.

He wrote many checks to Jay Link, a hunting guide based in Minong, Wis.; Sam Fejes, an Alaska master guide; Joe Jakab, who guides safaris in Europe and Greenland; and Chris Bilkey, a New Zealand hunting outfitter. Most of the checks were for five-figure sums, some for $70,000 or more.

Some Ashby residents had wondered how Hennessey, whose net income was about $85,000 a year, according to the divorce filing, could afford such expensive trips.

Ahlgren said Hennessey told people that he was doing well on grain trades he made for his own account.



Hennessey also allegedly spent more than $500,000 of the co-op’s money to have his big-game trophies mounted by Taxidermy Unlimited, an award-winning shop in Burnsville. Marv Gaston, who’s owned the business for 58 years, said he’s never seen anything like it.

“Normally, I can spot a phony-baloney guy a mile away,” Gaston said last week. “Him and his wife were such nice people. Everybody I’ve talked to can’t believe it, but it happened. It’s just absolutely amazing.”

Just before he disappeared, Hennessey and his wife had been on an extended hunting trip to Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Hennessey had shipped trophy hides from that trip to Gaston’s shop before he vanished. Now the hides are arriving — three crates of them so far, including elephant, water buffalo, Cape buffalo and impalas. Gaston doesn’t know what will become of them.

“They are high-scoring trophies,” he said. “It’s kind of been dumped in my hands. It costs me money every day just to keep the stuff on hand, and I won’t be mounting them.”

Nobody knows where Hennessey is, and there’s no telling if he’ll ever return. In a court filing, the co-op said it believes Hennessey may have used his hunting trips to set up overseas bank accounts.

“If Defendant Jerome Hennessey is living, it can be assumed that he has removed … property from the state to finance his daily living expenses,” the co-op said.

Meanwhile, Ashby residents are trying to figure out how anyone could get away with such a long-running scheme.

Russell Dewey, the co-op’s board chairman, was on a hunting trip to Montana last week and unavailable for comment. But others have their own explanations.

“The board members — they’re farmers,” said Dan Johnson, who owns the Hardware Hank store in Ashby. “They fertilize, they grow, they harvest. It’s like, ‘Jerry, you handle this.’ ”

Perhaps the simplest explanation came from Michelle Schaffran, manager of Second Chance Thrift.

“In small towns,” she said, “people trust everybody.”

Sad that so many innocents will suffer at the hands of one criminal.

Imported an elephant? Interesting.

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
I was just in Australia hunting. These people happened to be in camp at the same time. Very strange.

Which camp
I was there at this time as well? Interesting

quote:

Russell Dewey, the co-op’s board chairman, was on a hunting trip to Montana last week and unavailable for comment.

At least hunting seem to be what you do down there.

He turned himself in it sppears.


http://www.startribune.com/fug...al-charge/501902201/

How do you spend $1million at Cabela's? How many Realtree camo shirts can one guy wear?

Well it least it went to a good cause ...

Cabela's used to have a booking agency. If that is still the case, then spending a million would not be difficult.

https://www.wctrib.com/news/cr...ers-hunting-trophies

LINK HAS PHOTOS.



Documents show first glimpse of alleged co-op embezzler’s hunting trophies, debt details

By Mikkel Pates / Forum News Service Today at 6:00 a.m.


ELBOW LAKE, Minn. — Recently filed court documents include photos of hunting trophies at the home of a former Minnesota farm elevator manager who is accused of using money from the co-op to pay for his big-game hunting trips.

Jerry Hennessey is facing federal charges related to the case while the business he managed, Ashby Farmers Co-op Elevator, pursues a civil case against the former manager.


The co-op alleges Hennessey and his wife deprived the co-op of nearly $5.5 million in assets from 2003 to Hennessey’s departure in September. Hennessey went on the lam on Sept. 10. After a federal IRS investigation, he was charged with mail fraud and turned himself in Dec. 4.

According to court documents, Hennessey paid at least $1.19 million to his personal credit card bills, including $219,414 in construction expenses for his personal properties, including his home near Dalton in west-central Minnesota.

Court documents say the unauthorized projects appear to have included an “addition of a huge heated shed complete with a full-service bar and home theater to house the animal trophies.” The documents include the first public photographs of some of the displays from hunting trips around the world, including a tiger and several African animals.

The documents say Hennessey from January 2013 to November 2017 misappropriated more than $416,245 to pay Taxidermy Unlimited, owned by Betty and Marv Gaston in Burnsville.

Nearly $1.4 million of the funds were for “personal hunting and recreational expenses,” the documents state. For the first time, the co-op also listed amounts Hennessey paid to vendors.

The largest include $312,150 to Jay Link of Link’s Wild Safaris, a Wisconsin-based business that provides international hunting trips; $277,875 to Dickey Mueller and Mabula Game Lodge in South Africa; and $177,500 to Chris Bilkey in New Zealand.

The list also includes $88,000 to Apple Creek Whitetails, Gillett, Wis.; $65,875 to Mulehead Ranch in South Dakota and businesses in Alaska and Texas.

Hennessey’s last trip was to Australia in August 2018, just prior to the financial irregularities being discovered at the co-op

For the construction of the building at the Hennessey property, the report details more than $200,000 of co-op money paid to contractors, “all of which were falsely coded as purchases of soybeans, wheat or corn.” The checks were on the account of “Ashby Farmers Elevator Co,” but the recipient would not have seen any notation for the purpose.

Hennessey’s attorney, Thomas Kelly of Minneapolis, did not return a phone message requesting an interview.

Attorneys for the elevator filed a motion Dec. 31 asking Grant County District Judge Amy Doll for a default judgment against its former manager Hennessey and his estranged wife, Rebecca.

I know for absolute fact that several exhibitors were served with lawsuits related to this matter at the SCI convention last week.

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:
I know for absolute fact that several exhibitors were served with lawsuits related to this matter at the SCI convention last week.

Would be interesting to see if the outfitters cashed checks and received wires from the entities (grain elevator) and not the individual.

That should have set of a warning signal.

Mike