Wynn Resorts Executives Tried to Hide Misconduct Allegations Against Steve Wynn, Regulators Say while wynn will be betting on
Sunday, April 21, 2019
| Track Code | Track Name | Entry | Scratch | 1st Post ET | 1st Post Local | Time Zone | Stakes Race(s) | Stakes Grade | T.V. Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GG | GOLDEN GATE FIELDS | 48 | 24 | 3:45 PM | 12:45 PM | PDT | |||
| LS | LONE STAR PARK | 72 | 0 | 3:35 PM | 2:35 PM | CDT | |||
| SA | SANTA ANITA PARK | 72 | 24 | 3:30 PM | 12:30 PM | PDT | |||
| SUN | SUNLAND PARK | 168 | 0 | 2:30 PM | 12:30 PM | MDT | |||
| WO | WOODBINE | 72 | 48 |
Regulators began three days of hearings on Tuesday; Wynn casino and resort near Boston set to open in June
Wynn Resorts’ Encore Boston Harbor in Massachusetts. PHOTO: BRIAN SNYDER/REUTERS
BOSTON— Wynn Resorts Ltd. WYNN 1.93% executives ran a longstanding, sophisticated coverup to protect founder Steve Wynn from allegations by employees that he had engaged in sexual misconduct against them, according to an investigation by Massachusetts regulators.
Investigators also revealed Mr. Wynn, once one of the world’s most powerful casino magnates and a prominent Republican fundraiser, has entered into six settlement agreements since publication of an article in The Wall Street Journal that sparked their probe.
The report detailing the investigation’s findings was released Tuesday alongside the start of a three-day regulatory hearing to determine whether Wynn Resorts will be permitted to run a $2.6 billion casino resort called Encore Boston Harbor scheduled to open in June.
The Journal published an investigation in January 2018 about a series of sexual-misconduct allegations against Mr. Wynn. Those included that he in 2005 paid a $7.5 million settlement to a woman who had accused him of forcing her to have sex with him while she was working as a manicurist at the casino company.
Mr. Wynn, who stepped down from Wynn Resorts and the Republican National Committee following the Journal’s report, has previously said that the idea that he ever assaulted a woman was preposterous. His attorney didn’t respond to requests for comment Tuesday. Mr. Wynn, who declined to be interviewed by Massachusetts investigators, issued a statement to them included in the report saying that he had never had a nonconsensual relationship.
Following the hearings in Boston, Massachusetts regulators said they would deliberate in private over whether the company should be allowed to keep its license and issue a written decision at a later date. A revocation would damage the company and force it to sell the property, but analysts don’t expect that outcome.
Shares of Wynn Resorts closed 4.4% higher at $135.03 following the report’s release.
Massachusetts investigators recommended that commissioners consider during the hearings any knowledge that current Chief Executive Matt Maddox and board members Patricia Mulroy and Clark Randt had in 2016 about the circumstances surrounding the 2005 settlement. Major Wynn shareholder Elaine Wynn—Mr. Wynn’s former wife—had alluded to the settlement in unrelated court filings at that time.
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Investigators also recommended commissioners consider what Ms. Wynn herself knew about the 2005 settlement while serving as a company director. Regulators could decide that these individuals aren’t suitable to hold licenses. A representative for Ms. Wynn declined to comment.
In an opening statement to a large crowd gathered inside Boston’s main convention center, Mr. Maddox said that while he and others were in denial after the first Journal story ran, he changed his mind as a host of investigators began looking into the allegations. “I began to realize that there were many victims—and those victims felt powerless. For that I am deeply remorseful.”
The company, in a statement, said that anyone who received information about the allegations and then didn’t investigate or report them is no longer there. It said it has implemented enhanced sexual-harassment training for all employees, among other policy changes, in transforming itself into a more transparent company.
Karen Wells, who led Massachusetts’ investigation, ran through a litany of allegations and settlements in an hour-long presentation, focusing on the response from current and former company executives to each. While many problematic executives have since left the company, Ms. Wells said that does “not erase the fact that the corporate failures revealed in this investigation were significant. They were repetitive.”
Mr. Wynn was one of the architects of modern Las Vegas. His resignation last year shook the industry. Since then, however, Wynn Resorts has continued to successfully operate casinos in Las Vegas and Macau and prepared for the opening of its planned new casino in Massachusetts.
Investigators said that Mr. Wynn didn’t cooperate with them and that fear of litigation by him may have deterred some alleged victims and witnesses from cooperating. Moreover, although Wynn Resorts waived its confidentiality rights to various settlement agreements, Mr. Wynn refused to waive his, meaning that the parties to those agreements could have faced damages if they went public with their stories, according to the report.
Still, regulators said they interviewed more than 100 people for the investigation. Twelve of the current and former employees of Mr. Wynn who were interviewed said they were victims of sexual misconduct by him.
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Angela Saxton, a former spa attendant at The Mirage in Las Vegas, said an executive warned her against complaining about an alleged sexual assault by Steve Wynn. Photo: Bridget Bennett for The Wall Street Journal (Originally published March 27, 2018)
Regulators revealed the extent to which Mr. Wynn and his advisers went to conceal the $7.5 million settlement. The agreement required the accuser to sign a letter retracting her claims that Mr. Wynn had raped and impregnated her, alongside a nondisclosure provision prohibiting her from discussing the matter. A lawyer for Wynn created a limited liability company to disburse the payments. It bought certificates of deposits from a bank on which one of Mr. Wynn’s other lawyers served as a board member, the report said, citing another lawyer involved in the arrangement.
Though multiple senior executives were aware of the rape allegation in 2005, “no reports were made to the Company’s board of directors, nor to its audit or compliance committees, nor to regulators,” the report found.
In a previously unreported instance, Wynn Las Vegas reached a $700,000 settlement in 2008 with a terminated cocktail department staffer who had worked for Mr. Wynn and alleged a relationship with him, the report revealed.
And just three months before Massachusetts awarded Wynn a license to operate in the state in 2014, a cocktail server at Wynn Las Vegas, who had been recently terminated, alleged to Wynn’s outside counsel that Mr. Wynn had raped her. While at least three senior executives in addition to Mr. Wynn had knowledge of the allegation, the company didn’t investigate or document the events, regulators revealed in the report.
Wynn Resorts said in a letter to Massachusetts regulators on Tuesday that it wouldn’t contest the main sections of the report that detail allegations, though it also wouldn’t stipulate some of the summary statements in the introduction and conclusion.
Mr. Wynn stepped down from his post as Republican National Committee finance chairman the day after the first Journal article ran. He resigned, with no severance, from his positions as chairman and chief executive of Wynn Resorts in February 2018 and the following month sold his entire 12% stake in the company for $2.1 billion.
—Jon Kamp contributed to this article.
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