Two competitive fishermen who say they still haven’t been paid their proper winnings by an Alabama-based tournament organization are now suing. The two are among a much larger group of fishermen who claims that American Bass Anglers is bouncing tournament checks and defrauding its members.
ABA’s president Morris Sheehan acknowledged the payment issue last week, as reported by OL Friday, and he chalked up the problem to a banking error. At that time, several anglers who had fished an ABA military tournament in the spring had made their complaints public, telling local reporters that their prize checks bounced.
Those complaints are still piling up, according to Joe Durham Jr., an attorney who is representing the two plaintiffs in their lawsuit against the ABA. A competitive bass fisherman himself, Durham has fished in multiple ABA tournaments, and he points to what he says is a history of fraud and deception by the organization. He alleges “there is way more to this” payment issue than just a few recent clerical errors.
Durham tells Outdoor Life he’s heard from more than 40 anglers who say they’ve received checks — sometimes multiple checks — from the ABA that bounced, or who haven’t been reimbursed by the ABA for the return fees they were charged as a result. Durham says some of these individuals are still waiting to get paid for tournaments they placed in months ago. Although he stopped short of accusing the ABA of embezzling funds, one of the plaintiffs he’s representing made a comment on Facebook Tuesday accusing someone at the organization of “[sticking] their hand too deep in the cookie jar.”
The ABA’s website was recently updated to note that all events will “now feature all cash payouts.” And Sheehan issued another formal statement Monday expressing his concerns and assuring anglers that “corrective actions have already been implemented.” (Sheehan has yet to respond to multiple requests for comment from Outdoor Life.) Durham remains skeptical.
“A gentleman called me today who just yesterday [June 4, had] a check [bounce] from the ABA,” he says. “This was from a recent tournament on Lake Lainier.”
As a member of the local tournament community, Durham says he’s heard other allegations regarding the ABA and fraud in the past. He says the organization had been on his radar for more than a year when he heard in early May about the checks that bounced after the military tournament. The possibility of veterans and active-duty members getting swindled by a for-profit corporation is what really drew the public’s ire, and it’s what led two of those veterans, Chad Ardis and Rick Bradley, to sue the organization this week. Ardis (along with his teammate Bud Bowman) finished in first place in the military tournament but says he has still not gotten his share of the $1,900 in winnings.
“These are military gentlemen, and they’re both a bit older. And one of them said to me that he wants to prevent this from happening to a young, active-duty soldier in the future,” Durham says. “These guys might get two weeks of leave in a year, and they take one of their weeks to go practice and fish in a tournament. They finish high enough to get money, and then they don’t get paid? And they still haven’t been paid.”
The two complaints, which accuse the ABA of fraud and breach of contract, were filed Tuesday in Truth County, Georgia. Durham says the tournament organization was served that same day; it now has until July 3 to respond. But with all the additional complaints he’s received from other affected anglers, Durham says more court filings will soon follow, and that his firm is actively considering a much larger class-action lawsuit.
Layers of Complaints and a Pattern of Fraud
“We’re talking well over $100,000,” Durham says, referring to the dozens of complaints he’s heard from anglers who are still owed money by the ABA. “There is one client of mine who had a check for roughly $12,000 bounce after a tournament in February, and they sent him a follow-up check that bounced as well. Okay, so they told him, ‘Hey, we’re going to wire you the money.’ And as of today, he still hasn’t been paid.”
Then in March the ABA held one of its flagship tournaments, the Ray Scott Championship, on Lake Eufala. Durham says that to his knowledge, every check but one bounced. Then came the Military Team Bass Tournament, which was held on Georgia’s West Point Lake from April 20 to May 2.
“And the same thing happened,” Durham says. “Every single check bounced.”
In light of all the previous complaints, Durham says the financial fallout from the military tournament is part of a pattern of fraud and deception by the ABA. He doubts that a simple banking issue has dragged on this long. He also claims to have texts and emails in his possession that show a variety of conflicting excuses given to owed anglers by Sheehan and others.
“The important thing here, now, is that ABA is not paying back but about 50 percent of the entry fees they collect. So there really is no excuse,” says Durham, who notes that the organization is a for-profit fishing club that collects dues from its members. “In the military tournament, they paid back 40 percent of the entry fees they collected … Where’s the money?”
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The only way to answer this question, Durham says, is for the court to put ABA “into receiver,” where an independent lawyer would investigate and take control of the organization’s finances. He says this is one of the requests he plans to file in the courts in the coming weeks as he and his clients explore the possibility of a class-action lawsuit — and as more anglers potentially come forward with complaints of their own.
“We can even fast forward to the National Championship that was just held on Lake Murray,” Durham says, referring to the tournament there from May 3 to May 9. “None of those competitors have been paid yet. The guy that won was supposed to win a boat. They have not provided his boat, even though he’s contacted the ABA … And I have concerns whether he is going to get his boat.”
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