TORONTO - One of the leading figures in the Livent Entertainment financial scandal, Myron Gottlieb, has reached a tentative settlement agreement with Ontario financial regulators — subject to approval by the Ontario Securities Commission.
Details of the agreement negotiated by the OSC's enforcement branch and Gottlieb remain confidential and weren't released Friday.
An OSC panel will make its decision after being presented with details of the settlement on Tuesday afternoon in Toronto.
The settlement agreement follows the revival of the OSC's pursuit against Gottlieb and Garth Drabinsky — the cofounders of Livent — as well as Gordon Eckstein, who was a former vice-president of the now-defunct theatrical company.
The provincial regulator announced in February 2013 that it would rexamine whether they contravened the Ontario Securities Act and the "public interest'' when they manipulated the books at the theatre production company.
The OSC originally filed allegations against the trio in 2001 but suspended its administrative actions indefinitely due to criminal proceedings.
In 2007, Eckstein pleaded guilty to fraud and was given a conditional sentence for his role in the book-cooking scheme. Two years later, Drabinsky and Gottlieb were convicted of two counts of fraud.
The court ruled that the partners orchestrated a scheme involving the falsification of Livent's financial statements to lower its expenses and make the company look like it was meeting high earnings projections.
Drabinsky, a former Order of Canada recipient, was sentenced to five years in prison and Gottlieb got four years. The longtime friends and business partners were both released on parole in 2012.
Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version misspelled Gottlieb.