Administration November 8, 2004

Chapman Jurors Seek Verdict 'Advice'

August 11, 2004 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Federal court jurors turned to the judge hearing fraud charges against a former money manager for the state of Maryland retirement system for guidance about what to do if they couldn't reach a unanimous verdict on some of the 32 charges.
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The Associated Press reported that, in a note read byUS District Judge William Quarles, jurors said they were spending a lot of “precious time” on at least one of the counts against defendant Nathan Chapman Jr. and pleaded to Quarles: “”We need your advice regarding this matter.”

Quarles called the jury into court and told them they could reach a verdict on all counts, some counts or none. “It’s entirely up to you,” he said, before sending the jury back to deliberate. The jury was in its sixth day of deliberations in a case that began almost two months ago.

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Chapman, 46, was charged with mail fraud, wire fraud, securities fraud and other crimes in an indictment largely relating to his use of state retirement system funds to revive the stock price of his sagging company (See Chapman Fraud Trial Winds Down ).

The $29 billion retirement system, which is responsible for the pensions of more than 250,000 teachers, police officers, firefighters and other government workers, lost nearly $5 million in the transactions. Chapman managed more than $100 million in funds for the retirement system. He managed funds from 1996 until its trustees fired him in January 2002.

He also was accused of corrupting a pension trustee, Debra Humphries, one of the mistresses he allegedly showered thousands of dollars on, as well as gifts and a Hawaiian vacation (see Chapman’s Mistress Takes the Stand ).

Chapman served on the University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents for eight years, nearly four of them — from 1999 to 2002 — as chairman. He was a friend and political supporter of former Governor Parris Glendening who appointed Chapman to the board and pushed for his selection as chairman.

Administration November 7, 2004

EBRI: Plan Participation Among Families Is Up

July 23, 2003 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - More than four out of 10 families had a participant in an employment-based retirement plan in 2001, a level virtually unchanged from 1998's figures.
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The figures from 2001 might not indicate much of a shift in the previous three years, but going back to 1992, headway is being made on increasing participation levels.   Where in 2001, 41.6% of families were represented by participation in either a defined benefit or defined contribution plan, in 1992, this same figure was only 38.8%, according to a release of data on the Survey of Consumer Finances by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI).

In fact, the percentage of families participating only in a defined contribution plan rose to 57.7% in 2001, from 37.5% in 1992.   Conversely, only 19.5% of families had only a defined benefit plan in 2001.

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Additionally, the recent results showed 31.4% of families owned either an individual retirement account (IRA) or a Keogh plan, an increase from 28.4% in 1998 and 26.1% in 1992. Furthermore, more than half (58.6%) of families had a participant in a current or previous employer’s retirement plan or an IRA/Keogh, which is an increase from the 53.3% in 1992.

Contributions Levels

Looking at the defined contribution plan, plan balances are also on the rise – albeit the data only includes 2001’s figures, which missed a year of market declines in 2002.   Among all families with a defined contribution plan in 2001, the median plan balance was $18,000, an 81.8% increase from the 1992’s figures and a 10.2% rise since 1998. Similarly, among families with an IRA/Keogh plan, the median value of their plan was $27,000 in 2001, up 24% from 1998.

Outside of the employer-sponsored retirement plan, EBRI’s study also examined IRA holdings among families.   Not surprisingly, the most commonly owned IRA was the regular IRA, owned by 42.2% of family heads. This was followed by:

  • Rollover IRA held by 25.7%
  • Roth IRA owned by 16.4%.

However, when broken down by assets, family heads with rollover-IRAs-only moved to the top spot, accounting for 36.0% of the total assets, while the owners of regular-IRAs-only accounted for 31.3% of the assets.

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