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Washington (July 3, 2002) -- In the ongoing squabble between bankrupt cable giant Adelphia and its former auditor Deloitte & Touche, the audit firm said executives of Adelphia Communications Corp. tried to withhold information from auditors and the government, according to published reports.In a June 27 letter included in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Deloitte said that the company asked the audit firm to sign off on financial reports for creditors without supplying enough information to the auditor, Dow Jones reported.
Deloitte said Adelphia eventually agreed to provide the SEC with information it wanted to withhold and got an extension on its credit without the auditor's report.
The disagreements discussed by Deloitte took place after Adelphia appointed a special committee in March to investigate irregular accounting. Deloitte was dismissed by Adelphia on June 9. PricewaterhouseCoopers replaced the firm as Adelphia's independent accountants.
After Deloitte's dismissal, Adelphia offered a preliminary revision of previously reported results, cutting 2001 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization to $1.2 billion from $1.4 billion and decreasing reported revenue to $3.51 billion from $3.58 billion, Dow Jones said.
In the letter, Deloitte noted that six executives who might have been involved in inappropriate conduct were still employed by Adelphia when it was dismissed. Deloitte said it didn't believe it could rely on statements from those executives. Adelphia said the six executives were reassigned to other duties, according to the report.
Adelphia said in the filing that it disagreed with certain statements made by Deloitte and noted that it would respond to the charges in another SEC filing.
-- Electronic Accountant Newswire staff
