Kosher slaughterhouse accountant: Iowa plant manager oversaw alleged fraud scheme

Accountant: Slaughterhouse manager oversaw scheme

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — A former accountant at a kosher slaughterhouse testified Thursday that a former plant manager on trial for financial fraud oversaw a vast scheme intended to defraud a lender bank.

Former Agriprocessors Inc., plant controller Yomtov “Toby” Bensasson said the Postville, Iowa, slaughterhouse operated largely on borrowed money, at one point forcing a top manager to cash in his life insurance policy to keep the plant operational.

The manager, Sholom Rubashkin, faces 91 fraud charges in the federal trial, including mail, wire and bank fraud. Prosecutors claim the company intentionally defrauded St. Louis-based First Bank on a revolving $35 million loan by faking invoices from meat dealers.

Bensasson said the audits of the lender, First Bank, were not as detailed as reviews he would have conducted.

“By my standard, no,” Bensasson said. “I wouldn’t have done them that way.”

Bensasson said Rubashkin believed federal agents had bugged the plant and his phone lines, and conducted all conversations “on the move.”

The plant was the site of a major immigration raid in May 2008, and 389 illegal immigrants were arrested.

Rubashkin faces another trial on 72 immigration charges when the current trial concludes.

Bensasson struck a deal with prosecutors in which he pleaded guilty to a charge of making false statements to a bank, and Rubashkin attorney Guy Cook questioned him on it.

“Good morning,” Cook said. “Sir, do you want to go to prison?”

“Nobody wants to go to prison,” Bensasson replied.

Cook pressed him further.

“You nevertheless have convicted yourself” of the conspiracy charge, Cook said.

“Yes,” Bensasson said.

Bensasson has testified that he and Rubashkin falsified the invoices.

Information from: The Des Moines Register, www.desmoinesregister.com