Byrant D. Petersen

Experience

Bryant D. Petersen has primarily been engaged by attorneys and law firms to assist them and their clients with financial and accounting-oriented issues, ranging from complex damage analyses to business valuation.

His engagements include performing business appraisals or valuations, investigative accounting assignments, and economic loss quantification cases. Mr. Petersen has also been engaged to provide professional expertise to individuals, businesses, insurance companies, financial institutions, and not-for-profit organizations.

The following is a summary of Mr. Petersen’s business valuation, investigative accounting, economic loss calculation, personal injury, and general litigation experience.

Business Valuation

Mr. Petersen has conducted business valuations in both collaborative and contested settings, determining the value of closely held companies across a broad range of industries. His valuation work supports numerous purposes, including buy-sell agreements, ESOPs, divorce proceedings, shareholder disputes, bankruptcy litigation, regulatory compliance, gift and estate tax planning, and other business and legal matters. He is skilled in handling complex valuation issues such as separating enterprise from personal goodwill, allocating goodwill value, and assessing the worth of horizontally and vertically integrated businesses. Below is a brief overview of the types of entities he has helped value:

• Numerous family limited partnerships and holding companies for gift and estate tax planning
• Car dealerships, including both new and used car dealerships
• Businesses engaged in providing sub-prime financing and other non-traditional financing options for car dealerships
• Businesses engaged in providing financing options for retail furniture stores
• Business entities that own retail furniture stores
• A full service equipment sales and rental company, primarily renting and selling heavy construction and mining equipment such as compactors, excavators, cranes, wheel loaders, and lighter construction equipment such as lasers, compaction wheels, trench boxes, and cables
• A healthcare staffing agency specializing in nurse staffing, contract nurse, temporary nurse, and traveling nurse services
• A medical billing agency
• Business entities that own retail grocery stores
• A business, including subsidiary and affiliated entities, that operates in the oil and gas industry, primarily involved in acquiring, retrofitting, operating, and selling oil and gas projects
• A business that provides oilfield services to gas and oil well operators
• A vertically integrated grouping of three New York family-owned businesses that were involved in catching and brokering seafood, both domestically and internationally, in countries such as the UK, Russia and China
• Many different types of medical practices, including those of anesthesiologists, chiropractors, neurosurgeons, ophthalmologists, orthopedic surgeons, plastic and reconstructive surgeons, transplant surgeons, veterinarians, and podiatrists
• Many different holding entities, including real estate holding companies, business asset holding companies, family limited partnerships, and investment holding companies
• Many different businesses engaged in construction-related services, including electrical contractors; engineering services businesses; a specialty transportation engineering and planning firm; telecom construction services; drywall and plaster services; landscaping; carpeting and flooring; and design services
• Law practices and firms, ranging from sole practitioner, locally focused entities to multi-practitioner, national practice entities
• A commercial wholesale bakery that specializes in bagels, tortillas, and pita bread
• A business that operated as a distributor of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, and provided sales, marketing, and delivery services to the retail trade
• A group of facilities that run licensed treatment programs for adolescents with behavioral, emotional, and substance abuse issues through the use of wilderness settings as a clinically focused intervention to teach students accountability, communication skills, and healthy emotional and behavioral habits
• An educational film company involved in a shareholder dispute
• Various professional services firms, including a CPA practice and an engineering/architectural firm for divorce settlement purposes
• A ski resort

Forensic Accounting

Nearly all of Mr. Petersen’s engagements have involved an element of investigative accounting. His work has included applying forensic accounting techniques to analyze financial trends, uncover inconsistencies, and investigate allegations of fraud. The following highlights some of the diverse matters in which he has applied his forensic accounting expertise:

• Performed investigative accounting work related to the tracing of funds in offshore Ponzi and investment scams.
• Reconstructed accounting records lost or destroyed as a result of theft, flood, fire, and other situations causing lost documents or data.
• Determined total remuneration for individuals who receive income and benefits from a variety of sources. These analyses are typically for marital dissolution matters and regularly involve sole proprietors, entrepreneurs, owners, and executives of privately held enterprises, and beneficiaries of trusts.
• Investigated and identified assets of estates and businesses for use in probate, marital dissolution, and corporate matters. Mr. Petersen regularly conducts these analyses for purposes of preparing a schedule detailing a marital estate for determining an equitable division.
• Supervised and performed investigative accounting work for criminal fraud trials and claims.
• Supervised and performed investigative accounting services on the assets of marital estates in divorce cases.
• Traced and identified amounts contributed to and for the benefit of businesses as well as the returns and amounts paid to or for the benefit of investors in a business for purposes of establishing the total contributions to a start-up business.
• Performed investigative accounting work related to accountant malpractice litigation.
• Investigated alleged embezzlement of funds from a dental practice.
• Traced and determined the accuracy of all amounts allocated and paid to a member of a medical practice related to claims of underpayments made in post termination litigation.
• Investigated and determined total remuneration of a financial advisor employed at an investment bank.
• Performed investigation to determine assets and income of individuals and businesses for purposes of judgment collection proceedings.
• Traced and detailed uses and separate character of premarital funds and assets, including tracing of incentive stock options through vesting, re-capitalization, public offering, and merger.
• Performed a forensic audit to verify the accuracy of the amounts charged to a club related to an agreement between the club and a professional sports franchise.
• Performed rent audit to verify accuracy of rent amount based on percentage of revenues related to a ground lease agreement.
• Traced and reconstructed payment history relating to the sale of a business and subsequent payment default.
• Performed forensic accounting to reconstruct banking records and trace cash flows to identify the total amounts received from and sent to various individuals and entities for a criminal matter involving a U.S. Army contract with a munitions dealership based in Miami Beach, Florida, for a contract to supply the Afghanistan Security Forces with various types of military munitions including nearly 500 million rounds of AK-47 ammunition.
• Performed forensic accounting investigation of certain claims relative to an estate, verified the net assets of the estate, identified distributions of and expenses of the estate, and computed the amount of the distributions that need to be made to wind up the estate.
• Performed forensic accounting investigations for fraudulent conveyance and preference actions.
• Performed forensic accounting investigation of the use of funds invested in a business by a passive investor, including the tracing of siphoned funds through personal accounts of the individuals, and identification of misstatements in financial statements provided by the company as compared to business results demonstrated from the forensic reconstruction.
• Engaged by the Securities and Exchange Commission to provide a forensic accounting investigation of an alleged Ponzi scheme and provided findings in an expert report for use in a court of law for a matter involving claims of fraud in the offer and sale of securities, fraud in connection with the purchase and sale of securities, and offer and sale of unregistered securities.

Evaluation of Economic Damages and Related Assessment of Economic Causation

Mr. Petersen has extensive experience in calculating economic losses, or economic damages, across a broad range of case types. His work includes preparing and evaluating analyses related to business interruptions, dissolutions, destructions, and various commercial disputes. He has authored both consulting and expert reports used for legal strategy, settlement negotiations, and trial testimony. Below is a summary of the diverse types of matters in which Mr. Petersen has analyzed and computed economic damages:

• Claims of breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, lost business opportunity, failure to comply with contractual obligation, civil conspiracy, intentional interference with economic relations, and intentional misrepresentations or fraudulent concealment, related to a business that operated several cellular telephone retail locations in Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, and Utah
• Claims of breach of contract, breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, breach of nondisclosure and noncompetition agreements, common law unfair competition, and statutory unfair competition, related to a business that provided a video and audio device marketed primarily to the airline industry, specifically for in-flight entertainment
• Breach of contract claims related to a contract between a multispecialty medical clinic and a doctor specializing in hematology and oncology
• Patent infringement claims related to businesses manufacturing irrigation and watering products
• Breach of contract claims between a medical practice and a university related to providing team physician services and medical facilities under an intercollegiate athletic services contract
• Claims of misappropriation of trade secrets, breach of fiduciary duty, intentional interference with prospective economic relations, and civil conspiracy, in a lawsuit between a company and its former employee and the company formed by that employee
• Failure to finalize terms for a software sale and subsequent sale of said software to a competitor, involving businesses in the video gambling equipment industry
• Personal injury, wrongful death, and wrongful termination cases
• Intellectual property cases
• Losses associated with construction contracts

Critique and Review of Other Financial Experts

Mr. Petersen is frequently engaged to review reports prepared by other financial experts. His involvement in these matters ranges from offering consulting support to legal counsel to preparing formal rebuttal reports and providing expert testimony. The following is a selection of matters in which he has contributed his expertise:

• Evaluated the damages calculation in a matter in which a developer claimed a governmental entity interfered with its operations and made statements defaming the developer, causing financial damages including lost sales, delays, and increased costs.
• Assisted counsel with critique of a valuation of a car dealership and related companies.
• Assisted counsel with analysis of stock option and restricted stock valuations.
• Evaluated and prepared rebuttal analyses of damage calculation in a matter involving breach of contract claims relating to a business involved in distributing laser-based teeth whitening equipment.
• Prepared an expert rebuttal analysis evaluating the economic damage claims in matters involving wrongful termination claims, personal injury claims, and wrongful death claims, including identifying and demonstrating the impact of flawed and speculative uses of generic data sources and vocational analyses.
• Evaluated and prepared rebuttal analyses evaluating economic damage claims in a matter involving real estate development, management, and option agreements, involving real estate with estimated value of over several hundred million dollars.
• Analyzed and prepared rebuttal analyses critiquing economic damage claims in a matter involving a loss of a distributorship and related down-line organization in a multi-level marketing business.
• Evaluated and prepared rebuttal analyses evaluating economic damage claims in a matter involving claims of fraud, breach of contract, mistake, and breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, relating to the sale of a business.
• Prepared expert rebuttal analysis critiquing an analysis of gross income and expenses presented for use in determining alimony and support.
• Prepared expert rebuttal analysis evaluating and critiquing economic damage opinions related to a claimed breach of contract involving a financing agreement for a business line of credit.
• Assisted counsel in evaluating economic damage claims in a matter involving claims of breach of contract and violation of covenant of good faith and fair dealing, intentional interference with contractual and prospective economic relations, business defamation, business disparagement, injurious falsehood, and breach of fiduciary duty relating a dispute between an independent business telecommunications company and a former employee and the new employer.
• Prepared expert rebuttal critique of economic damages calculated in a matter involving claims of breach of contract, negligence, and breach of warranty related to a business located in Hayward, California, engaged in the processing and selling of live and frozen fish products for human consumption.
• Provided expert rebuttal analyses of economic damages related to license agreements and royalty amounts for an intellectual property license, specifically evaluating economic causation issues as well as apportionment of value for technology licenses.

Educational Qualifications

• Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from Utah State University
• Master of Business Administration degree, with an emphasis in Finance, from Utah State University

Professional Certifications

• Accredited Senior Appraiser (ASA) by the American Society of Appraisers
• Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners

Types of Matters

Mr. Petersen has delivered professional services across a broad spectrum of cases and purposes. This diversity reflects the versatile application of core principles in forensic accounting, valuation, and economic damages. The following is a general overview of the types of matters he has addressed throughout his career: