Richard G. Hinckley, Mormon Seventy, Was A Director Of The Company "Nature's Sunshine Products", And They Have "Outlined Potential Violations Of Law."

Well, lets just say that Richard G. Hinckley, Mormon Seventy, for less than a year and non other than the son of the current Mormon Prophet, Seer and Revelator, Gordon B. Hinckley, might find himself in some hot water very soon. He may be getting a special visit from the feds, unless Daddy can bail him out, a la Mark Hofmann. Of course, we don't know if he has knowingly done anything wrong or not, but hey, like the old saying goes, where there's smoke, there's usually fire. As I stated in the title of this post, Richard G. Hinckley was a Director for Nature's Sunshine Products, Inc, which is based out of Provo, Utah.

Shortly after being called as a Seventy (you know, when Gordon B. Hinckley was so terrified of the very appearance of nepotism and recused himself from the process and told everyone not to blame his son for being called), Richard G. Hinckley sent a notice to the "Company", indicating his resignation from the Board of Directors effective as of June 30, 2005.

The "Company" said: The Company is treating the resignation as effective on July 15, 2005, the date of receipt of the notice. Richard G. Hinckley said, in the resignation, that he was "resigning so he can devote more time to other responsibilities, and his resignation is not in connection with any know disagreement with the Company on any matter relating to the Company's operations, policies or practices."

http://biz.yahoo.com/e/050718/natr8-k.html

The time, that he needed, for his other responsibilities, was of course to live the very difficult, agonizing life of a Seventy; you know, flying around the world on private jets with Daddy, is a real tough thing to do. Of course, shortly after being called to be a Seventy, and on his way to South Korea, with Daddy, on Huntsman's private jet, unbeknownst to the world of course; his elastic band snapped and popped him in they eye while he was exercising. We never have heard how he or his eye are doing by the way. I guess he must be okay.

Anyway, please allow me to post the article from the Deseret News, explaining the problems that Nature's Sunshine Products is in and then I will describe the trouble that Richard G. Hinckley may be in and why.
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Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Clouds shroud 'Sunshine' — Provo firm may face firings, stock delisting

By Jenifer K. Nii
Deseret Morning News

Provo-based nutritional supplement maker Nature's Sunshine Products Inc. retracted four years of financial statements Monday and warned that it faced possible delisting from the Nasdaq stock exchange, government investigations and termination of senior officers.

Its stock price sank more than 13 percent.

The company said in an 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that a preliminary report of its audit committee — which was first assembled to investigate certain foreign operations but later expanded to include its general financial statements — found "certain internal control weaknesses and outlined potential violations of law." It did not elaborate on what those weaknesses were, or the potential legal violations.

The committee's report included recommendations, "including with respect to the termination of certain employees and senior officers," the company said in the filing. It did not elaborate.

Representatives of Nature's Sunshine Products did not respond Monday to requests for further comment.

The audit committee's investigation is ongoing, the filing said. Meanwhile, Nature's Sunshine said it has contacted the "relevant authorities" with respect to potential wrongdoings. It did not say which agencies were contacted, or whether those agencies have or likely will launch independent investigations. But the company said it "intends to fully cooperate with such authorities concerning these matters, and to make a full report to these authorities, if appropriate."

Based on the audit committee's report, the company said its financial statements for 2005 (10-Q), 2004 (10-K) and forms 10-Q for 2002, 2003 and 2004 should not be relied upon. Nor, the company said, should investors rely on the management's report, included in its 2004 annual report, regarding internal control over financial reporting.

Nature's Sunshine Products already missed its filing deadline with the Nasdaq stock exchange for the financial quarter ended Sept. 30, 2005. The stock exchange gave it an extension until March 31 to file its complete 10-Q statement, but the company said Monday it now does not expect to meet that deadline, nor its 10-K for the fiscal year ended Dec. 31, 2005. As such, the company warned that its stock may be delisted; and, if that happened, its liquidity "would be severely impacted."

Shares of Nature's Sunshine Products closed down $2.16 at $14.33 Monday on Nasdaq. During the past 12 months, the company's stock price has traded in a range of $12.50 to $23.89.

E-mail: jnii@desnews.com
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So, here's the bottom line and why Richard G. Hinckley may be in trouble. As stated in the article, an audit committee was assembled to investigate certain foreign operations, but in that process, they found "certain internal control weaknesses and outlined potential violations of law."

Due to these "potential violations of law", "Nature's Sunshine Products Inc. retracted four years of financial statements Monday and warned that it faced possible delisting from the Nasdaq stock exchange, government investigations and termination of senior officers." Also, "the company said it 'intends to fully cooperate with such authorities concerning these matters, and to make a full report to these authorities, if appropriate.'"

Now, on February 15, 2005, Richard G. Hinckley did a little selling and made a pretty good sum of money in the process. Now, let's keep in mind that his profits may have been based on artificially high, inflated, fraudulent numbers, based on false information, that was being provided to the UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION, through their 10K's, over a possible 4 year period of time. He had better hope that he didn't know ANYTHING about the possibly incorrect 10K's.

That's certainly not a good thing and again, they obviously have to do the investigation, to see who was "fixing the numbers" if anybody and what exactly was going on. I hope for Richard G. Hinckley's sake, that he wasn't involved. Even if he was, we may never know it, but we'll assume he's innocent until proven guilty, after all, this is the United States of America and that's how it's supposed to be. Too bad the Mormon Church rarely applies that motto.

Anyway, so what strong evidence is there, linking Richard G. Hinckley to those possibly fraudulent 10K's? Well, how about his signature of approval. I haven't checked the other years yet, but one thing for sure, is that his signature was on the 10K, that was submitted in 2005.

Here is the link and just scroll down to page 41 and you will see Richard G. Hinckley's name, as one of the signatures, since he was one of the Directors. So, if the 10k's are fraudulent and he knew about it and then signed them......he's in serious deep trouble. That is a lot of ifs but it's not a good sign, I'll just say that.

I just felt that everyone should know this information and be made aware of the situation. The US. Government has been going after these guys pretty hard, with the whole Enron, MCI, and Martha Stewart stuff going on; so I'm sure that they will go after NATURE’S SUNSHINE PRODUCTS and anyone involved, if there was indeed fraud committed.

Hey, doesn't the Church preach, "avoid the very appearance of evil?" Does anyone think that the Church will come out or Richard G. Hinckley himself, to address these issues or clarify things? What's that saying about monkeys flying out of my %$#......or when hell freezes over?

Yeah, that's when that will happen!! Until then, I guess we sit tight and wait to see if the feds come knocking on Richard's door. Even if they do and he was involved, I'm sure that they can broker some back room deal, with the Billion dollar cult leader, Gordon B. Hinckley, to keep his Son, God's inspired, called by Jesus, nepotism free Seventy, out of trouble. I'm sure that they can at least keep it quiet. Then again, maybe not, who knows? Wouldn't it be refreshing, to see Richard G. Hinckley, go before the cameras and either declare his innocence or guilt?

I'm sure that they'll love seeing this post on my blog though, as it should make their day!! I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens, but don't hold your breath, waiting for Richard G. Hinckley to publicly address this "very appearance of evil and possible law breaking."

Samuel the Utahnite