Attorney Says Posner Not to Blame for Firm’s Woes

Business problems associated with Victor Posner’s Evans Products Corp., which owes creditors $680 million, were not caused by the Miami Beach financier, a bankruptcy courtroom packed with attorneys and creditors was told Friday.

“This is not a Victor Posner case,” said Robert Mark, an attorney for Evans, adding that there had been a tendency to focus more on Posner than on the financial woes of the company itself.

The daylong hearing on a Chapter 11 reorganization plan for Evans Products, one of Posner’s many holdings, was held three days before he was to go on trial on unrelated federal tax-evasion charges.

The bankruptcy hearing and tax-evasion trial are the latest in a string of financial difficulties for Posner, who made more than $12 million in salary, stocks and bonuses last year and was ranked as the highest paid executive in the country by several national magazines.

Evans Products, a lumber and building supplies company in Portland, Ore., filed for reorganization in March, 1985.

Led by Bank of America, Evans’ lenders have submitted a reorganization plan under which Posner would get nothing under the reorganization.

A second plan developed by Posner would give him an opportunity to exchange his old stock for proposed new issues in the company.

Mark told Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas C. Britton that the company had assets of $300 million to $350 million and, under Posner’s reorganization plan, would be able to pay off shareholders at least 100% on the dollar.

Britton asked attorneys for additional documents and said he would not rule on the reorganization plan before June 27.

Posner, 67, was not present for the proceedings. He was expected in federal court Monday to stand trial on tax-evasion charges.