The 10 years that have passed since Livent collapsed into bankruptcy amid allegations of widespread accounting fraud have done little to cool the hurt and anger of the first prosecution witness in the criminal fraud trial of company founders Garth Drabinsky and Myron Gottlieb. Peter Kofman, an engineer who did ...

A loud crash rang out in the courtroom during one of the many objections lawyers for Garth Drabinsky and Myron Gottlieb made during prosecutor's opening examination of Livent's former senior vice president of finance, Gordon Eckstein. The noise came as Eddie Greenspan — who is acting on behalf of Drabinsky ...

During the cross examination of Peter Kofman yesterday, lawyers for both Garth Drabinsky and Myron Gottlieb spent a considerable amount of time asking the former Livent engineer if he was aware of the term "papering the house." The term refers to the practice of theatre — or any other live ...

Myron Gottlieb was not the architect of the frauds that ultimately destroyed Livent as prosecutors allege, but rather was instrumental in bringing a fraudulent ticket purchasing scheme to an end, a Toronto court heard today. Gottlieb was upset when Peter Kofman — an engineer who worked on Livent's theatre projects ...

Kofman found himself ensnared in Livent's so-called bogus billing schemes again in 1997 when the theatre company allegedly charged thousands of dollars of theatre tickets to Kofman's American Express credit card without his knowledge. Kofman testified that he found out about the charges when he tried to use his credit ...

Going along with the schemes was the only way the engineer could get paid for his legitimate Livent work, the engineer testified. Livent was routinely late in paying its bills, sometimes taking up to a year to pay the fees Kofman had wracked up for his work helping to construct ...

Kofman began working with Drabinsky and Gottlieb when he joined Cineplex Odeon as an engineer working on the company's redevelopment of movie theatres in Canada and abroad. When Drabinsky and Gottlieb were forced out of that company, Kofman followed them and began working on their rehabilitation of the Pantages theatre ...