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by Mike Caswell

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has filed stop order proceedings against 20 purported mining companies for including false information in their registration statements. The SEC claims the companies each failed to disclose that they were controlled by John Briner, a Vancouver lawyer. Mr. Briner was the subject of previous fraud charges from the SEC and in 2010 received a five-year ban from practising as a lawyer before the SEC.

The proceedings are contained in 20 separate administrative orders the SEC filed on Monday, Feb. 3. In each of the orders, the SEC claims that the companies filed registration statements (mostly in 2013) in which they falsely claimed that their management consisted of one person. (The person varied by company. One said its sole officer was a transit operator from Alberta, while another listed a business consultant from Ontario.) The companies did not mention Mr. Briner, who the SEC says was an undisclosed control person.

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