Curriculum Vitae – Cone Consulting Group

A Resume Marked By Relevant Training and Experience….

Professional Services

Cone Consulting Group Ltd – December 2021-Present

2022 – 2023: Critiqued inadequate investigation of embezzlement charges against an employee of a truck stop resulting in dismissal of the charges.
2022: Assisted with a civil matter involving questionable activity by estate beneficiaries.
2021 – 2022: Performed the accounting for a $4 million estate.
2019 – 2022: Served as the trustee and accountant for a relative’s trust
2018 – 2019: Reconstructed accounting from bank activity and documents of a custom home builder alleged to misused customer funds, contributing to a favorable settlement for the builder.
2017 – 2021: Assisting with the investigation of a company that failed to file payroll tax returns for multiple years.
2013 – Present: Developing CCG Accounting forensic software system for analyzing bank, credit card and other financial activity with ability to import accounting data from QuickBooks, Quicken and other accounting software.

Morones Analytics – December 2019 to November 2021

2020 – 2021: Testified at trial regarding mis-representations in construction project cost reports submitted to owner.
2020: Assisted with a matter involving analysis of energy being generated by solar panels that involved importing, processing and analyzing millions of rows of data generated by the solar panels and incorporating local weather data.
2019 – 2020: Deposition testimony in a matter involving commingled personal and business expenses in QuickBooks.
2018 – 2021: Assisting with analysis of millions of inventory records involving a dispute between a vendor and internet retailer.

Cone Consulting Group Ltd.¹ – July 1992 to Dec 2019

2019: Testified at trial regarding what Excel and computer file metadata represented.
2018: Assisted with a civil matter involving an allegation by the opposing expert that QuickBooks accounting records had been modified, and assisted counsel in formulating deposition questions to challenge the expert’s conclusion.
2018 – 2019: Assisted with the criminal defense of a man accused of stealing a camping fee receipts from a county park; Wrote a preliminary findings letter that was instrumental in having the case dismissed.
2018 – 2019: Assisted with the criminal defense of a loss-prevention officer accused of removing cash from retail self-serve checkout stations.
2017 – 2019: Assisted with criminal defense of an employee alleged to stolen funds from a construction company.
2016 – 2017: Assisted with the criminal defense of the treasurer of a youth athletic club accused of diverting funds for personal use; Assisted in evaluating discovery, interviewing defendant and participating in settlement discussions.
2016 – 2017: Assisted with the criminal defense of an auto-wrecker involving allegations of accepting stolen vehicles, developing a database to organize and review surveillance photos to identifying key characteristics of the photos and assist in evaluating the allegations.
2016 – 2017: Assisted with the criminal defense of a health care worker alleged by the employer having stolen funds from mentally handicapped individuals; Established through the review of documentation and text messages that other employees were making false accusations.
2016 – 2018: Assisted with the criminal defense of man alleged to have fraudulently obtained investor funds for a gold mining operation.
2016 – 2018: Reverse engineered a law firm’s commercial time accounting database and software to perform custom analyses; Developing an application for reviewing/analyzing time, expense and payment data.
2015 – 2016: Assisted an insurance company and its client, a painter, who was being sued to recover fire and business interruption paid by a company’s insurance carrier that alleged that the painter was responsible for the fire. Reviewed and evaluated claim and related discovery produced by the company’s insurance carrier and assisted with a negotiated settlement.
2015 – 2016: Assisted in the criminal defense of woman alleged to have financially abused an elder. Analyzing defendant’s and alleged victim’s investment and financial records in CCG Accounting forensic software.
2015: Assisted with the development of a construction cost claim exceeding $1 billion. Responsibilities included importing, understanding, analyzing and reporting on a JD Edwards job cost database of over 6 million records.
2014 – 2016: Assisted with the defense of a man accused of paying someone to murder his estranged wife; Reviewing credit card and bank data in CCG Accounting forensic software to assist counsel in evaluating reasonableness of allegations.
2014 – 2015: Assisted with civil matter where joint owners of businesses and properties were accusing each other of improper accounting of transactions and taking advantage of each other. Imported QuickBooks accounting data to CCG Accounting forensic software, analyzed accounting records, advised client and counsel, and modeled various ways to settle the matter. Participated in mediation sessions.
2014 – 2015: Assisted with the criminal defense of a woman accused of embezzlement, critiquing police report, and testifying at the sentencing hearing.
2014 – 2015: Assisted with criminal defense of the owner of a Social Security payment processing company alleged to have diverted client funds to personal use.
2014: Assisting with a lawsuit by a person convicted of embezzlement requesting a new sentencing hearing. Reviewed and compiled 10 years of corporate tax returns and evaluated statements made by victim at original sentencing hearing. Prepared an expert report and testified in a deposition regarding inconsistency of amounts reported on the tax returns with the victim’s statement at the original sentencing hearing; A new sentencing hearing was granted after appeals and testified at the hearing.
2014 – 2015: Assisted with the criminal defense of the CEO of a company accused of running a Ponzi scheme related to investments in numerous assisted-living properties and other commercial properties. Involved reviewing the accounting records of over 600 companies stored in a Sage MAS 90/ERP 100 accounting system as individual companies which included developing a process for exporting each company’s accounting records to a new database and then combining them into one common database, standardizing over 20,000 general ledger accounts, and importing the data to the CCG Accounting program for analysis of activity on a combined basis. Assisted with the preparation for cross-examination of the government’s accounting witness. Prepared for and testified at trial.
2014 – 2015: Assisted with the criminal defense of a person accused of embezzlement by extracting data from QuickBooks files, searching for specific transactions and identifying the dates they were created and edited.
2014 – 2015: Assisted in a criminal matter involving alleged theft of Oregon lottery funds at a bar.
2014: Assisted with criminal defense of client accused of assisting in a scheme to embezzle funds from a company’s client trust accounts, including compilation of bank account data in CCG Forensic Accounting software.
2014: Testified at trial regarding the deductibility of rent and other expenses when evaluating rental income.
2013 – 2014: Assisted food retailer with defense of class-action claims that employees did not receive meal periods required by law, involving analysis and combining of the Kronos timekeeping system and a predecessor DOS-based system involving over 30 million time-keeping records.
2013: Assisted with post-trial motion hearings and preparation for sentencing for an individual convicted of incorrectly computing profit-based fees for commodity option trading activity. Post-trial motions were initially denied but then reheard and granted, acquitting defendant, primarily due to the government not clearly defining the term “profits” and failing to establish a standard of behavior the defendant should have known of, and conformed to, but did not.
2012 – 2013: Assisted a Fortune 100 company with obtaining and compiling loan histories for sub-prime mortgages originated by a subsidiary that were then subsequently sold to special entities created by investment companies and then publicly sold as part of collateralized debt obligations (CDO); Monthly loan histories were published to the internet sites by the special entities. Downloaded and parsed published data, linking to loans originated by a subsidiary of the Fortune 100 analyzing loan data.
2012 – 2015: Assisted with the criminal defense of a CEO of a restaurant chain accused of embezzling approximately $1 million by analyzing approximately 40,000 transactions of the CEO from bank and credit card documents; analyzing the government’s listing of questionable transactions; analyzing the resturant’s bank and account records, drafting an expert report and assisting with settlement negotiations.
2011 – 2012: Assisted with parsing over 25,000 phone wiretap records to establish that defendant played a minor role in an oxicodone drug ring.
2011 – 2012: Assisted attorney with reviewing and understanding related home mortgage transactions.
2011 – 2012: Assisted with the criminal defense of welfare recipient accused of filing false applications. Case dismissed when state could not produce adequate documentation supporting their claim.
2011 – 2012: Assisted with the criminal defense of an individual alleged to have incorrectly assessed fees for commodity option trading activity. Found guilty at trial, but assigned to a new attorney for post trial motion hearings.
2011 – 2012: Assisted with the criminal defense of partner in a commercial debt collection company that failed to forward receipts from debtors to creditor/customers of the debt collection company.
2011 – 2012: Assisted with the criminal defense of partner in a venture to purchase, fix up and resell houses who was alleged to have signed fraudulent mortgage applications.
2010: Assisted with the criminal defense of individual involved with a company accused of the theft of trade secrets involving a custom-designed software for managing customers, related customer data, and selling products to those customers. Responsibilities included assisting attorneys with technical issues related to developing computer programs and critique of victim damage claims.
2010 – 2012: Assisted with criminal defense of person accused of embezzlement.
2009 – 2011: Assisted with the criminal defense of an art gallery owner who confessed to running a ponzi scheme. Activities included reconstructing accounting records from bank statements and other accounting documents to identify victim and losses. Also assisted with the review and compilation of victim claims and supporting documents for several victims to refute government loss claims.
2009 – 2013: Developed and maintained an engagement analysis tool for a major law firm where time, matter and client records are extracted from the firm’s Elite ProLaw time database for selected matters for standardized analysis in Excel worksheets. The system also allows for combining similar matters together into a single Excel analysis. Further, the system captures critical performance measurements not present in Elite ProLaw.
2009 – 2013: Developed and maintained time reporting system for small law firm that integrates with QuickBooks time entry system, automating a previously largely manual system, improving tracking of time and automating entry of time records in QuickBooks.
2008 – 2011: Assisted with the criminal defense of door-to-door salesman accused of both defrauding banks and investors related to using other people’s credit cards and lines of credit to finance activity, and failing to file tax returns. Responsibilities included assisting three different sets of attorneys representing defendant, reviewing documents, preparing analyses from available documents, discovery and trial strategy assistance, numerous analyses and reports, and attending portions of trial related to accounting/financial issues.
2008 – 2010: Testified in Federal District Court as an accounting and computer database expert in a criminal matter involving allegations of filing false tax returns and not reporting overseas money transfers. Activities included identifying applicable QuickBooks files from a collection of deleted files, establishing the exact creation date of a key accounting entry in QuickBooks; review and critique accounting and financial reporting activities of a U.S. branch of a foreign entity; review and critique the working papers of the CPA who prepared the U.S. branch non-profit tax returns; assist attornies with understanding QuickBooks data, accounting data and concepts, developing case and trial strategy and drafting expert testimony.
2007 – 2008: Assisted upscale clothing chain with transition to a new accounting system. The former vendor was to remain ignorant of the transition until after it was completed. Responsibilities included analyzing and reverse-engineering existing SQL Server database to assist with maintenance, if necessary, and assist with migrating data to new accounting system.
2007 – 2008: Wrote ‘Accounting and Auditing 101 for Lawyers’ and ‘Working with Accounting Data’ chapters for an E-Discovery book (not published) but available on at www.ConeGroup.com/Other/Documents. Co-led two one day seminars on forensic accounting. Also developed and maintained a module to integrate client management system and QuickBooks customer data.
2007 – 2010: Represented a Berkshire-Hathaway re-insurance subsidiary in defending against claims arising from the bankruptcy of a group of insurance companies being re-insured. Investigated bankrupt insurance companies’ insurance policy and claim records, cross-referencing them to proof of claim records, and assisting with estimating potential losses in claim portfolio.
2006 – 2013: Took over responsibility for continuing development, maintenance and support of a commercially available product used for assessing chiropractic patients. Tasks have included assessing and understanding original Microsoft VB6 program application and integrating new modules and reports developed using Microsoft Visual Studio.
2005 – 2006: Developed a document and email tracking system for a Berkshire-Hathaway insurance subsidiary that was being investigated as to certain transactions.
2003 – 2005: Represented a national consortium of medical insurance companies in defending themselves against allegations from service providers. Assisted in standardizing insurance company claim data and preparing analyses of the claim data.
2002 – 2008: Represented a national law firm in defending its actions in representing Enron partnerships whose creation and use was part of other Enron litigation. The law firm was released as part of a summary judgment motion but still needed to produce and track privilege on approximately 700,000 pages. Developed a document management and attorney-client privilege database system to view, manage and control production of documents in this matter.
2000 – 2005: Represented a Berkshire-Hathaway insurance subsidiary in a dispute with the IRS which denied a deduction for a portion of the interest expense on bonds issued by the company. Reconstructed into electronic form the paper and microfiche financial records of the subsidiary and developed software programs to trace cash flows related to securities and operations under various scenarios. Assisted with deposition preparation, and then trial preparation.
1995 – 2000: Represented Merrill Lynch in the Orange County bankruptcy litigation involving a $1.6 billion loss from liquidating the county’s investment portfolio in December 1994. Developed a database system to track documents and testimony. Reconstructed database of County investments for 1983 to 1995. Performed analyses of investment data. Reconstructed the County General Ledger for 1991-1995 and developed cash flow analyses. Developed damage calculation models. Assisted with the discovery and processing of electronic data and documents. Assisted with deposition preparation. Then represented others sued by Orange County as part of the bankruptcy, including PaineWebber and Standard & Poors.
1995 – 2000: Represented Merrill Lynch in the Orange County bankruptcy litigation involving a $1.6 billion loss from liquidating the county’s investment portfolio in December 1994. Developed a database system to track documents and testimony. Reconstructed database of County investments for 1983 to 1995. Performed analyses of investment data. Reconstructed the County General Ledger for 1991-1995 and developed cash flow analyses. Developed damage calculation models. Assisted with the discovery and processing of electronic data and documents. Assisted with deposition preparation. Then represented others sued by Orange County as part of the bankruptcy, including PaineWebber and Standard & Poors.
1992 – 1995: Represented Bass, PLC in litigation relating to the purchase of Holiday Inn from Promus. Reconstructed database of quality control records and franchise information for Holiday Inn. Performed related analyses, including assistance with a statistical study correlating hotel quality levels and franchise fee generation.
1991 – 1993: Assisted a bank in defense of litigation brought after the government took over a failed savings & loan and found fraud in an auto dealer’s loan portfolio that had been sold to the S&L. Reconstructed loan records and identified instances of fraud. Found that that the instances of fraud accelerated after the sale of the loan portfolio to the S&L. This significantly reduced the damages paid by the bank.
1992 – 1999: Developed and maintained professional liability claim tracking and policy tracking systems.
Other litigation and consulting matters.

Tucker Alan, Inc./Navigant Consulting, Inc. – 2002 to 2004

In July 2002 joined Tucker Alan, Inc. as a manager. In February 2004 Tucker Alan, Inc. was sold to Navigant Consulting. Responsibilities were similar to those when independent.

AppDev – 1999 to 2002

Instructor for week-long public seminars and customized in-house training seminars for Access 97, Access 2000 and SQL Server on behalf of AppDev. AppDev is a nationally recognized training company located in Minneapolis, Minnesota that sponsors training seminars. They used independent consultants to teach the training seminars.

Hemming Morse, Inc. – 1987 to 1992

1991-1992: Represented Union Bank in a case involving automobile financing fraud. Reconstructed database of automobile loans and payment histories. Developed related analyses of loans and identified fraudulent loans and fraudulent loan activity. Developed damage analyses.
1991: Represented the FSLIC in an action against a Savings & Loan’s directors and officers in connection with mortgage trading activity and certain real estate development projects. Reconstructed the General Ledger for a five year period and prepared analyses of mortgage trading losses and real estate development projects.
1988-1991: Represented Price Waterhouse and various broker-dealers in an action by the City of San Jose related to the loss of approximately $70 million upon the liquidation of investments in early 1984. Reconstructed the investment database from paper records, developed various analyses, developed damage calculations and prepared trial exhibits.
Other litigation and consulting matters.
1988-1992: Litigation Consulting Manager.
1987-1988: Audit Manager.

Price Waterhouse (now PriceWaterhouseCoopers)

1983-1987: Audit Senior through Audit Manager in Sacramento, California office.

Ernst and Whinney (now Ernst & Young)

1977-1983: Audit Staff through Audit Supervisor in San Jose, California office.

Siliconix

1976-1977: Cost accountant in Santa Clara, California office.

Professional Groups and Credentials

Oregon Computer Consultants Association, member of the Board, Treasurer and presenter.
Portland Area .Net Users Group.
Microsoft Office and developer conferences since 1992.
Access and SQL Server Training courses as participant and instructor.
Form member and speaker for the Portland Access Users Group.
Various continuing education programs.
Certified Public Accountant – Oregon license 1992 (active) – California license 1980 (inactive)
Oregon Society of Certified Public Accountants
California State Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo – Bachelor of Science in Business Administration – 1976 honors graduate.

¹Cone Consulting Group, Ltd. was formed January 1, 1998. Previously, Mr. Cone conducted business as Jeffrey A. Cone, CPA.