Wednesday's Newsday coverage of the trial of Standardbred breeder and owner David Brooks included testimony from a former executive of Brooks's DHB Industries who said the company regularly rigged its financial records to ensure high profits.
The Newsday story by reporter Robert Kessler quoted Rhonda Graves, the former chief operations manager of Point Blank Industries, a DHB subsidiary, as follows: "I was told [they] needed a specific gross profit. . . . I just threw in numbers. Some of them were accurate . . . others I created."
The U.S. government's case against Brooks is underway in federal court in Central Islip, NY, on Long Island.
The Newsday story also stated that Graves was testifying under a grant of immunity from the government and is now a graduate student at Stony Brook University. She said her instructions came from the company's then-chief operating officer, Sandra Hatfield, who is also on trial with Brooks.