Biz As Usual For Utsick’s Euro Partners

Two of Jack Utsick’s European partners say they see no reason for the problems the Miami Beach-based entrepreneur is having with the American Securities and Exchange Commission to have any impact on their operations.

Utisck’s Worldwide Entertainment has a slice of the UK’s 3A and Willem Venema’s Dutch-based The Alternative, but neither company expects his well-publicized problems with the SEC to affect his interests in them.

“We feel for Jack and hope his problems are soon sorted out but, as far as we’re concerned, it’s business as usual,” 3A director Pete Wilson told Pollstar.

The SEC has charged Utsick, Worldwide Entertainment and two other partners with defrauding 3,300 investors out of $300 million, money that was supposed to be used to promote concerts.

The SEC found reasons to believe that instead of concerts, part of the investor funds went toward Utsick’s two multimillion-dollar condos in Miami and “a lavish lifestyle.”

Utsick’s lawyer issued a statement saying his client has not admitted or denied wrongdoing and a settlement has been reached with the SEC to sort out the financial mess and repay investors. But the federal securities regulators still sued for fraud in U.S. District Court in Miami April 17.

The commission says Worldwide Entertainment, along with another Utsick company called Entertainment Group Fund, and American Enterprises and Entertainment Funds – both controlled by Robert and Donna Yeager – committed the alleged fraud between 1998 and 2005.

Utsick’s company was placed in receivership in January after two investors filed a lawsuit against him. Now the SEC wants the court to place all four companies under receivership on behalf of investors and to authorize a full investigation into the companies’ accounts.

Utsick set up 3A with Wilson and former Triple A directors Dennis Arnold and Martyn Stanger in 2003, after the latter company tanked because of money it was owed by its partner in a disastrous Star Trek exhibition in London’s Hyde Park.

Triple A went down with losses of about £5 million, most of which was said to be money the company was owed by its U.S.-based Star Trek partner Special Entertainment Events. Utsick and the company’s former co-directors put 3A together and rescued some of the shows the bankrupt company still had on the books.

Wilson wouldn’t reveal Utsick’s full stake in the company but emphasized that it’s only a shareholding. He also said that he had no reason to believe Utsick may have to liquidate it to raise cash to pay his disgruntled American investors.

Venema also shrugged off his U.S. partner’s problems with the SEC and said, “I can’t see how any of this affects the shares he has in my company.”

Utsick invested in The Alternative a little more than a year ago, following the breakdown of WE Entertainment, an earlier Dutch partnership he had with Frank Van Hoorn.

Apart from the 3A and The Alternative deals, Utsick’s Worldwide Entertainment has boasted other international partners like Australian promoter Michael Chugg and Live Limited’s Colleen Ironside in Hong Kong.

Chugg confirmed that his project-to-project partnership with Utsick ended last year, and declined further comment.

– John Gammon