Kent E Barrett, CPA, CFF, CFE, CLU, ChFC, FLMI

Kent E. Barrett, CPA, CFF, CFE, CFF, CLU, ChFC is a Senior Managing Director for Veris Consulting, Inc.  Kent joined Veris in 2003 after several years as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for a number of major insurance and investment companies and directing the internal audit function for American General Financial Group, a financial services conglomerate of  insurance, consumer finance and  investment companies with $110 billion in assets.

Since joining Veris, Kent has led numerous major litigation engagements, including a dozen assisting both plaintiffs and defendants in cases involving allegations that financial statements failed to be prepared in accordance with U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (U.S. GAAP), Statutory Accounting Principles (SAP), or International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).   His litigation work frequently involves insurance and other financial service organizations with disputes related to revenue recognition, insurance and loan loss reserve adequacy, inadequate disclosures, internal control failures, quality of sub-prime  first  and  second  lien  mortgage  and  student  loans,  sub-prime  loan  securitizations,  and adequacy of collateral and financial guarantees.

Kent also consults regularly on complex technical accounting issues and is particularly adept at constructing sophisticated financial models, identifying and communicating key underlying facts and trends, reviewing actuarial studies, performing reinsurance analysis and evaluation of auditor responsibilities and compliance with generally accepted auditing standards (GAAS).

Kent has testified in deposition and at trial and has presented as an expert before arbitrators and the Securities and Exchange Commission.  Kent also led Veris' services to a major Swiss-based insurer in a nearly one-billion-dollar dispute regarding highly-complex international reinsurance and  loss  reserve issues.

Earlier in his career, Kent spent nearly nine years with Ernst & Young (formerly Ernst & Whinney) providing auditing and consulting services to more than two dozen life, health and property/casualty insurance companies as well as banks, stock funds and a variety of other organizations.

Kent was the number one graduate in his Masters of Accountancy Program at Brigham Young University where he also received a B.S. in accounting. He received the Elijah Watt Sells Certificate for performance with high distinction on the CPA exam and is also Certified in Financial Forensics (CFF), a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), a Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU) and a Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC).

Following are some representative litigation engagements:

         Presented before the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on behalf of an insurance company  CFO,  who  was  a  target  of  an  investigation  of  the  company  and  certain  senior executives for allegedly failing to timely record and disclose certain financial statement liabilities. Also consulted with the lawyers representing the other defendants.

         Worked on behalf of the SEC in three cases involving allegations of financial statement failures, including one that resulted in one of the largest settlements and most sweeping actions against auditors (a Big-Four firm).

         Supported the defense of the auditors of a bankrupt specialty finance company that originated and sold subprime first and second residential mortgages by issuing notes payable and subordinated debentures to investors.

      Testified in a case involving alleged lack of due diligence by one of the nation's largest title insurance companies in transactions involving churning of real estate investments.

      Testified in U.S. Tax Court in a case regarding the definition of “insurance” for tax purposes related to certain specialty coverage for equipment and real estate.

         Led litigation services to the Bankruptcy Trustee of a major publicly- traded financial services franchisor in connection with hundreds of lawsuits seeking to recover funds paid to third parties while the entities were insolvent. The work has involved identifying and quantifying errors in the filed financial statements and extracting, analyzing, interpreting and presenting enormous volumes of detailed financial data.