The producer of “Safehaven,” an unreleased TV show, has been accused in a lawsuit of siphoning funds from the show’s budget to pay his personal expenses, including payments to keep his house out of foreclosure.
David Ozer, the president of Strong Studios, is alleged in the complaint to have fabricated invoices and created fake vendors in order to hide the theft.
The plaintiff, Kevin V. Duncan, is a producer and investor in the series. The pair earlier produced the Nicolas Cage horror film “Willy’s Wonderland.”
Ozer is a veteran entertainment executive, having previously worked at Sony, Starz and as president of IDW Entertainment.
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According to the complaint, Duncan and Ozer sought to produce “Safehaven” as a 10-episode supernatural series for Crackle, the free ad-supported streaming service. The show is based on a 2017 graphic novel by James Seale.
Duncan alleges that the show ran into financial difficulty as production was set to get underway in June 2022, forcing him to step in and provide gap financing to keep it on track.
The complaint alleges that — unbeknownst to Duncan — Ozer was withdrawing money from the production to “line his own pockets.” The suit cites numerous payments to alleged vendors who did no work on the show, and which, according to the plaintiffs, appear to be fraudulent.
Strong Studios is a subsidiary of Strong Global Entertainment, which went public on the New York Stock Exchange in May 2023.
The suit accuses Mark Roberson, the CEO of Strong Global Entertainment, and other officers of the parent company of having “signed off on the fake supporting documents… evidencing their knowledge and participation in covering up the misappropriation of funds.”
The production was aided by millions of dollars in Canadian tax credits, according to the complaint. The suit states that production was delayed by several weeks after a loan agreement fell through, causing the crew to be laid off. Ultimately, Duncan agreed come up with more than $350,000 in gap financing. A few months later, he kicked in another $500,000 to avoid a production shutdown.
The schedule originally called for 70 days of shooting, but had to be reduced to 65 days, according to the suit. That, in turn, cut the runtime of several of the episodes below 40 minutes, posing a risk that the show could not be distributed.
In May 2023, Screen Media Ventures — which had agreed to distribute the show with a minimum guarantee of $6.5 million — informed Ozer that it would not accept delivery, the suit states. The lender, Bank of Hope, then threatened to foreclose and to sell the show to any interested buyer in a “fire sale.”
Rather than allow that to happen, Duncan agreed to pay off the loan, which amounted to nearly $6.4 million.
The show had still not been completed, and Duncan alleges that Ozer sabotaged the post-production process by failing to pay vendors.
“Defendants’ complete lack of oversight and theft of funds from the ‘Safehaven’ production account negatively impacted crucial relationships with service providers for the Series, who were and are unwilling to do any additional work until they are paid,” the suit states.
Duncan later obtained bank records that showed tens of thousands of dollars in production money being sent to purported vendors. In one instance, records showed that $50,815 went to Deluxe Media, which was not a vendor on the show. The suit alleges that Ozer created a fake invoice, with a similar sounding domain name and fake contact information to conceal his theft.
Another $55,000 went to someone by the name of Daquan Williams, who also had nothing to do with the production, the suit states. The only person by that name whom the plaintiffs could identify is a prison inmate in Georgia.
According to the suit, Strong Studios was shuttered in January, once the plaintiffs alerted the company to the allegations.
Michael Freedman, the plaintiffs’ attorney, declined to comment beyond the complaint.
“As of this filing, Plaintiffs have not secured or been offered any agreement with any distributor to screen, distribute, or otherwise market the Series,” the suit states.
Reached by phone, Ozer said he had not yet seen the complaint.
