Comments on: This Auditor Was Duped

By: Is Any Other Audit Firm Vulnerable Besides Ernst & Young? - Francine McKenna - Accounting Watchdog - Forbes

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 18:06:10 +0000

[...] pride in preliminary court proceedings – auditors often claim their firm and its partners were “duped” – than try to prove their innocence to a jury, in my [...]

By: re: The Auditors » Blog Archive » @Forbes: Bankruptcy Examiners and The GM IPO

Fri, 05 Nov 2010 13:59:43 +0000

[...] pride in preliminary court proceedings – auditors often claim the firm and its partners were “duped” – than try to prove their innocence to a [...]

By: re: The Auditors » Blog Archive » If I Told You I’d Have To Shoot You. Or Lose The Case. Neither Are Good.

Fri, 10 Sep 2010 16:09:36 +0000

[...] the restatements, backdating scandals, and assorted frauds of their clients. It has been asserted at times with success. It’s being used more and more and more and more. But it smacks of the “have your cake and [...]

By: re: The Auditors » Blog Archive » Compliance Week Day 2 - More Than Enough To Keep Me Busy

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:35:27 +0000

[...] from the McAfee case. I told them when I asked for the interview: I like winners. That makes three legal superstars on the west coast for Cooley [...]

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 18 May 2008 21:33:00 +0000

this defense is the best to any semi-complicated problem or one where some “expertise” is assumed to be needed and the best part is that accepting a little shame is usually enough proof for the accuser that you really were “duped”. i’ve used it successfully several times for electronic/internet issues and don’t believe it when i hear it from someone else for a second. even given that management holds an informational advantage over the auditors, they need to be skeptical enough to make sure they undertand what is going on

By: Independent Accountant

Independent Accountant — Fri, 16 May 2008 19:58:00 +0000

When I was a senior auditor with Big 87654, we would get firm memos whenever the firm got sued for malpractice about how the firm was duped by an evil client. We seniors would discuss these memos. 90-95% of the time we concluded the firm’s official position was nonsense, that no partner at Big 87654 could have been so stupid as to have been fooled by whatever the “scam” was.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:24:00 +0000

I don’t disagree with the comments that it’s a double-edged sword, but I think it’s more fair to say auditors do truly get duped by management at times and they won’t be able to immediately catch on. For example, if there are “side agreements” by the heads of companies that have no immediate impact to financial statements, you might not be able to catch it until much much later, if at all. Almost no auditor in the world will be able to catch such things.