PHOENIX (AP) — The former chief executive of a Scottsdale-based company has been criminally charged with orchestrating a scheme meant to inflate the firm's stock price and defraud investors, auditors and regulators.
The Arizona Republic reports (http://bit.ly/IWgqBz ) that Bradley David Edson, CEO of NutraCea from December 2005 to March 2009, has been indicted on federal fraud charges.
The company makes forms of stabilized rice bran, which is the outer layer of the brown-rice kernel.
Prosecutors say Edson orchestrated sham agreements and transactions that allowed NutraCea to artificially boost the company's sales and net profit by $750,000 in 2006 and $3.6 million in 2007.
Edson resigned after federal regulators launched an investigation of NutraCea transactions in 2006 and 2007.
There was no answer at Edson's home when The Associated Press called there Tuesday.