Judge rules for Wynn on documents issue

Amid more sparring over the corporate divorce of Wynn Resorts Ltd. and former largest shareholder Kazuo Okada, a judge found on Thursday that the company had "in large part" turned over certain documents as previously ordered.

Okada attorney Charles McCrea Jr. contended that Wynn had largely evaded a court order to produce papers from 2000 to 2002, relating to how money was alleged to have been spent to sway Macau gaming regulators in pursuit of a license and how Wynn spent the $120 million invested by Okada's Aruze USA.

According to McCrea, Wynn came up with only 304 pages, almost half of it "filler" from a standard public filing.

"We continue to believe the Wynn Resorts has not provided the required information because it may have something to hide related to how it obtained gaming licenses and approvals in Macau," said Okada, in a statement released on Monday. "We are concerned that Wynn Resorts' actions in Macau may have been unethical or even illegal and may have put Wynn Resorts shareholders in significant jeopardy."

However, Clark County District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez denied Okada's bid for more paper, with the caveat that more disclosures may be needed depending on what future searches turn up or to flesh out general entries on spending ledgers.

An investigation commissioned by other members of the Wynn board of directors last year found that Okada had crossed ethical and even legal boundaries in trying to sway Philippine officials to let him build a casino resort in the Manila area.

Against that background, said Wynn attorney James Pisanelli, "Mr. Okada and his legal team are chasing their tails looking for documents that don't exist."

Because Wynn had not lavished cash and gifts on Macau officials during this time, except for spending $1,700 on lunch and dinner for a Macau delegation that visited San Francisco on an unspecified date, he had nothing to show. "Mr. Okada can't believe this company operates within the bounds of the law," Pisanelli said.

Nevertheless, he said, Wynn attorneys had spent about 700 hours "digging through boxes in dusty storage rooms" to meet the court's order of Oct.12.

Okada, still a director but isolated as the only board member not on the executive committee created in February, has sought to build his own case that the company, particularly CEO Steve Wynn, also acted corruptly in Asia.

Besides the early days of the company and its predecessor, he has focused on a $135 million corporate donation last year to the University of Macau.

Contact reporter Tim O'Reiley at
toreiley@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5290.