Posted on 08/22/2010 10:52:16 AM PDT by markomalley
CARSON CITY – Half a dozen former employees of a Las Vegas-based gaming company laid off last year say they are still owed about $500,000 in severance pay and other compensation even as the firm continues to receive financial support from high profile investors, including the brother of President Obama’s chief of staff.
One of the former TableMAX Gaming employees, Tyson Wrensch, said efforts to contact current company officials to resolve the compensation issue have not produced any results so far.
Wrensch said he personally is owed about $65,000 for salary and commissions prior to being let go by the firm in August of 2009. Collectively the group is owed an estimated $500,000.
“I keep getting the runaround and that’s not right,” Wrensch said. “A gaming company in Nevada should not be allowed to operate that way.”
TableMAX President and CEO Ron Altbach said today that the company is in the process of offering settlements to the group of former employees.
“We drew up some ideas yesterday,” he said. “We will be contacting each of the employees to come to a resolution. Nobody will be thrilled but I think they will all be satisfied. That’s where we are right now.”
Altbach would not disclose details of the offers, and several former employees say they will reserve judgment. But the former employees also say that the company and its investors have been nonresponsive for months.
“The company has ignored hard working middle class people who worked to make the company a success,” said former employee Sheri Hanks, who is working a temp job in Texas. “That severance pay would have really helped.”
Hanks said that if the offer involves stock in the company it won’t be satisfactory.
“I don’t want stock in a questionable company,” she said.
In response to Altbach’s comments, Wrensch said: “No one at the company has bothered to reach out to me once since I was laid off but it’s just the same story I’ve been hearing about having something soon. TableMAX owes us all our paychecks and we are through being patient.”
TableMAX makes an electronic table game that offers Progressive Blackjack or Caribbean Stud on a large video screen that up to five people can play at one time. Wrensch said the games he placed in several tribal casinos are still in use.
“TableMAX is continuing to make money and earn money off of machines I placed,” Wrensch said. “So there is some frustration in that I’ve been a nice guy but nothing seems to get done.”
One of the major investors in the company is Hollywood powerbroker Ari Emanuel, brother of Rahm Emanuel, who serves as chief of staff to President Barack Obama. An October 2008 Securities Exchange Commission filing identifies Ari Emanuel, who is the model for the fictional Ari Gold on the HBO series “Entourage” as one of the major stockholders in the company.
The filing also shows that TableMAX has a consulting agreement with Ari Emanuel in exchange for common stock.
The TableMAX games are not offered in Nevada casinos and the company does not have a Nevada gaming license. The company let the former employees go at different times during the second half of 2009 and now maintains only minimal staff.
Wrensch’s comments were supported by other former employees, including former Chief Financial Officer Paul Kimmel, who said he is owed about $89,000 for severance pay, accrued vacation and unreimbursed medical costs.
“The company has pretty much stiffed all of us,” he said.
Wrensch said he spoke with Ari Emanuel regarding his situation in July and was referred to the new management that had taken over the day-to-day operations of the firm in late 2009. Wrensch said his calls were never returned.
Ari Emanuel could not be reached for comment.
Altbach said a former company chief executive officer entered into agreements with the former employees that were overly generous by industry standards. The agreements have caused a lot of confusion for the new management. Investors and company officials are trying to get TableMAX back on track, he said.
“We don’t want to be dishonorable,” Altbach said.
Altbach has his own high profile connections as a songwriter and performing member of the Beach Boys dating back to the late 1970s.
The former employees say they are contemplating a lawsuit to recover what they are owed, although that decision will now await a review of the settlement offers. Nevada labor laws cover only unpaid salary and commissions, not severance or other details of individual employee contracts.
One former employee is already involved individually in litigation over his pay.
Wrensch said he has also filed paperwork with the state Labor Commissioner about his back pay and commissions and is awaiting a response.
The company, which is publicly listed, saw its shares worth about $1 in October 2009, but now the company is valued as a penny stock. The stock is not actively traded and was valued at six cents a share as of June 30.
Even so, Wrensch said the company has significant value in its patented intellectual property. Based on those patents, the company is involved in a patent infringement lawsuit with Shuffle Master, another electronic gaming manufacturing company. Filed in April 2009, the lawsuit alleges infringement of patents protecting proprietary electronic devices and system architecture used in TableMAX multiplayer games.
Wrensch and several other employees have found other jobs, although two of the former employees had to relocate out of state to do so. Others have not been as fortunate.
Kimmel said there have been some recent rumors that TableMAX might try to resolve the compensation issue only by offering former employees equity in the company.
But Kimmel, who is still in Las Vegas, though not employed, said that he needs the money owed to him, not equity of questionable value.
“I’m certainly disappointed,” he said. “I think they should make a reasonable attempt to settle with the former employees, with at least a healthy percentage being cash.”
Wrensch said: “It is disappointing that companies like this exist.”
So I guess this should come as no surprise to anybody
Evil family.
Ping.
Yea,just about what you should expect from an Emanuel.
Another CONfirmation of the linked cons from CHicago...Detroit, Philly, Nola, Las Vegas.....They all support each other....Where is RICO when you need it?
An October 2008 Securities Exchange Commission filing identifies Ari Emanuel, who is the model for the fictional Ari Gold on the HBO series “Entourage” as one of the major stockholders in the company.
The filing also shows that TableMAX has a consulting agreement with Ari Emanuel in exchange for common stock.
~~~~Another power hungry Chicago thug .. apparently runs in the family.
"Even as Mr. Wiatt opted out, Mr. Emanuel’s temper flared in negotiations with NBC over the drama “Medium,” which was created by one of his clients, Glenn Gordon Caron.
The spat, which broke out when the network balked at financial terms, concluded with “Medium” moving to CBS and Mr. Emanuel threatening Marc Graboff, co-chairman of NBC Entertainment, with personal ruin, according to three people with knowledge of the incident. Mr. Graboff declined to comment; an Emanuel colleague insisted the threats were not personal.
“Nobody wants to be on the wrong side of Ari Emanuel, especially now that his brother is running the White House,” said one television executive, who asked for anonymity to preserve harmony with him."
~~
Let's see if Politico, WashPost, NYTimes or any other lamestream covers this slot machine deal. Right ..
The Emmanuel Family: Pure Evil Total Sociopaths.
Rahm: nothing more needs to be added.
The vile Doctor brother, a Death Panel Czar in the Obama Regime.
And now a thieving Las Vegas dirtbag multi-millionaire, stealing from the little guys (well, like his brothers, actually)
Go to the EOC.
You get to go home and keep your mouth shut, and you don’t get the “Chicago” treatment. That would probably leave you satisfied, but not thrilled.
Sounds like the company has been taken over by patent trolls.
Honorable means management forgoes their own salary and severance until the worker bees are paid off.
How can Nevada law even permit this situation?
Americans should be worried that Rahm Emanuel, who came out of the world of dirty Chicago politics, is President Obama’s right hand man in the White House. Emanuel is ”no exception to the Chicago way,” said Glenn Beck. “He was known as the bag man in the Clinton White House. Emanuel was on Goldman Sachs' payroll while working for Clinton.[...] Now, in the Obama administration, his strong-arm tactics are helping make all of Obama’s dreams come true. It is scary but true.”
Democratic pollster and Fox News contributor Pat Caddell shed some light on some of Emanuel’s past shady financial dealings.
After Emanuel left the Clinton White House, Clinton appointed him to the board of Freddie Mac, the public-private hybrid secondary mortgage market (which caused the economic meltdown); Rahm also worked in the Chicago office of Wasserstein Perella, a major Wall Street financial firm. “He then made $16 million in less than two years,” Caddell said.
This is in addition to the $250,000 Emanuel ripped off at financially troubled Freddie Mac, which was plagued by scandals involving campaign contributions and accounting irregularities while he was on its board. ”He was there when they were cooking the books,” Caddell said.
SOURCE (Excerpt) Read more at newsrealblog.com
======================================
REFERENCE After Mr. Emanuel was named Obama's Chief of Staff, the Obama White House denied a Chicago Tribune reporter's Freedom of Information Act request for information on his Freddie Mac activities: “The Obama administration rejected a Tribune request under the Freedom of Information Act to review Freddie Mac board minutes and correspondence during Emanuel’s time as a director.
The documents, obtained for his investigation, were “commercial information” exempt from disclosure, according to a lawyer for the Federal Housing Finance Agency.” However, at the time of the request Freddie Mac was no longer a “commercial” enterprise, having been taken over by the government in September 2008.
According to ABC News, the Justice Department is in possession of these records, yet no indictments have been forthcoming: “Freddie Mac records have been subpoenaed by the Justice Department as part of its investigation of the suspect accounting procedures” they reported in November 2008.
mmm mmm mmm
What to do? What to do?
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