Former NBA star Kevin Garnett is suing a former accountant and his firm, claiming that they helped a financial advisor steal $77 million from him.
Garnett, once the NBA’s highest-paid player, accuses Louisville, Ky.-based accountant Michael Wertheim and Welenken CPAs for allegedly helping financial advisor Charles A. Banks IV defraud him, according to a suit filed on Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the district of Minnesota.
Banks, an Atlanta-based wealth manager, pleaded guilty in 2017 to wire fraud for fraudulently inducing another NBA player, Tim Duncan, to invest in a business venture that led to $24 million in losses. Banks was ordered to pay $7.5 million in disgorgement and sentenced to four years in federal prison in that case.
Garnett’s suit accuses Wertheim of knowing that Banks was also siphoning money out of his accounts over the course of several years, but looking the other way. The suit alleges that Banks used Hammer Holdings, a firm that he partnered in with Garnett, to steal from the athlete, and that Wertheim took cues from Banks without contacting Garnett.
Banks ordered Hammer Holdings to make investments ostensibly as part of a 50-50 partnership between himself and Garnett, but the suit alleges that Banks contributed $2.5 million to Garnett’s $57 million, and that Banks took millions of dollars of the funds for his own use.
Banks and Wertheim allegedly implied to Garnett that he was financially struggling and placed him on a strict budget, even as Banks took over $2 million from Garnett’s accounts for himself. The suit alleges that the theft of money from Garnett’s accounts ended shortly after Banks was sentenced.
According to a Thursday report by the Associated Press, Wertheim and Welenken CPAs have denied wrongdoing and will move to dismiss the suit “at an early stage.”