About Us

Geoff Winkler is a Founding Member and CEO of American Fiduciary Services LLC. Mr. Winkler leads a team of legal and financial industry professionals who specialize in managing complex investigations, forensic accounting, fiduciary and insolvency services, and securities litigation support. He has extensive experience testifying as an expert witness and has served as CFO and COO in dozens of State and Federal District Court receiverships, corporate monitorships, and in other cases as a fiduciary and insolvency expert.

These roles included responsibility for: managing operations with up to thousands of employees; preparing, auditing, and/or restating financial statements per Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and SEC reporting requirements; instituting internal controls to prevent fraud and provide assurances in reporting; and turnaround and restructuring businesses. In addition, Mr. Winkler has initiated litigation against executive leadership, board of directors, and financial oversight committees for failure to execute the duties required by their fiduciary duty to the company, including failure to institute strong internal controls; provide oversight of financial reporting; and, ensure GAAP requirements are being met. Due to the varying nature of these assignments, Mr. Winkler works with a diverse team of experts that supplement his expertise based on the specific needs of a given case.

Mr. Winkler’s experience includes leadership in large and complex fraud investigations and forensic accounting efforts in numerous industries including manufacturing, financial services, healthcare, capital leases, consumer services and retail sales. One large private fraud investigation involved the misappropriation of funds from dozens of high-profile, high net worth individuals by their investment advisor. Among his numerous regulatory enforcement engagements, Mr. Winkler led a receivership team in an SEC action against a large operator of retirement care facilities in 38 states that was accused of defrauding over 12,000 investors and creditors for over $1.2 billion. The restructuring effort resulted in a sale to Blackstone Group, with most investors receiving interest in addition to their capital investments returned to them. These efforts resulted in winning the 2011 Turnaround Management Association Turnaround of the Year award.

Mr. Winkler has lectured and published articles on the topics of occupational fraud, anti-money laundering, business law, business ethics, elder financial exploitation, the role of financial oversight committees in preventing fraud, and analysis of new regulations.

Prior to forming AFS, Mr. Winkler was Managing Director with Alvarez & Marsal, the Director of Fraud & Forensic Investigations at Bates Group, a litigation consulting firm, and the Director of Case Management for Grassmueck Group, a fiduciary and insolvency services firm.

John B. Hall is a Founding Member and CFO of American Fiduciary Services, LLC in Portland, Oregon. He specializes in fiduciary, investigative and business operation engagements while concentrating on finance and accounting operations, analysis and reporting, fraud examination, forensic and other practical accounting, asset investigation and administration and claims process management.

Mr. Hall has over fifteen years of professional post-graduate experience, including roles such as Director of Disputes and Investigations, Controller, Financial Operations Manager, Sr. Financial Analyst, Business Consultant and Business Intelligence Analyst. He has worked on numerous fiduciary and investigations cases as a consultant, financial operations manager and as corporate controller. Working with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, as well as other governmental and private clients across numerous industries, Mr. Hall has provided vital support to federal equity receivers, bankruptcy trustees, corporate monitors and other fiduciaries in custodial and third-party capacities.

Prior to co-founding AFS, Mr. Hall served as Director of Disputes and Investigations for Alvarez and Marsal LLC, Fraud and Forensic Investigations Consultant for Bates Group LLC, Financial Operations Manager for Grassmueck Group, Controller for Allied Works, Senior Finance and Accounting Analyst for Fisher Investments and Business Intelligence Analyst for Audigy Group.

Mr. Hall earned a bachelor's degree and an MBA from Willamette University in Salem, Oregon. He is a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) and a Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor (CIRA). He is also an associate member of the National Association of Federal Equity Receivers (NAFER) and a member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) and the Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Advisors (AIRA). He also is a Certified Specialist in Asset Recovery (CSAR), although that underlying organization is now dissolved.