Collision Victim Says Walmart Exec Hiding Assets

A Tulsa man who was hit by a car while walking in a Bentonville crosswalk alleged the driver is hiding assets to avoid paying him a $350,000 judgment.

Gary Watson filed a lawsuit last month against Siew “Sunny” Tai of Bentonville in her November bankruptcy reorganization case to prevent her from discharging her debts.

She listed nearly $600,000 in debts and $1.1 million in assets in her Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

The 2017 accident left Watson with a brain injury and broken bones. After the collision, Tai, who is a senior manager of replenishment at Walmart Stores Inc. of Bentonville and has a monthly gross income of $19,000, “embarked on a course of conduct to shield her assets from the claims of Watson,” according to the suit filed by his attorney, Stephen Gershner of the Davidson Law Firm of Little Rock.

At the time of the accident, Tai had liability insurance for $50,000, which wasn’t enough to cover Watson’s damages from the injury.

Tai formed a company called Sunny Rentals LLC a month after the accident and deeded property to the LLC “to insulate her assets from the claims of Watson,” the lawsuit said.

She also formed a living trust and deeded property to it.

The transfer of property into the LLC and the trust allegedly “was intended to prevent the lien of a judgment” stemming from Watson, the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit also alleged that Tai sold $70,000 worth of Walmart stock between March 29, 2018, and April 16, 2018, and put the proceeds into her checking account.

In April 2018, she withdrew more than $55,000 in cash from her bank account and delivered some of it to her mother, who held the money, the lawsuit said.

Tai reported that in the one-year period before she filed for bankruptcy she had $20,000 in gambling losses, according to her bankruptcy filing.

Tai’s bankruptcy attorney, Don Brady Jr. of Brady & Conner of Fayetteville, told Whispers last week that he will file an answer denying Watson’s allegations.

“If you look at the timing and events and everything, it’s pretty clear that that’s not what was going on,” he said.

Brady said he couldn’t get into the details of what happened but Tai “clearly” wasn’t shielding assets.

“And I don’t think at trial they’re going to be able to prove that,” Brady said.