The founders of Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey have filed a sweeping civil lawsuit in Bedford County Chancery Court against the company’s former chief financial officer, alleging years of fraud, forgery, and misconduct that they say caused them severe personal and financial harm. In the complaint, Fawn Weaver, Keith Weaver, and Grant Sidney Inc. accuse former CFO Michael Senzaki and his company, ZMS Strategies Inc., of abusing his position of trust to divert funds, conceal liabilities, and improperly transfer or encumber Weaver’s personal equity interests without her knowledge or consent.
According to the filing, Senzaki was entrusted with exclusive control over Uncle Nearest’s financial systems during a critical growth phase and is accused of manipulating those systems to conceal millions of dollars in vendor liabilities while presenting an artificially healthy financial picture. The complaint alleges that after executive approval meetings, Senzaki altered invoices inside the company’s payment software, redirecting funds to entities he controlled while making legitimate vendor invoices appear fully paid. Plaintiffs say the scheme remained hidden for years and only came to light after Senzaki’s departure in late 2024.
The lawsuit further alleges that Senzaki forged stock transfer certificates and used falsified documents to hypothecate Weaver’s earned and vested equity – described in the complaint as her primary form of compensation, valued in the tens of millions of dollars. The plaintiffs say Weaver took little to no cash salary while building the brand and never sold equity for personal benefit. Any equity sales, they say, were made for the benefit of the company and loaned back in full. The complaint alleges those equity interests were later leveraged without authorization for Senzaki’s personal benefit…