Elaine Wynn, the ex-wife of Wynn Resorts founder Steve Wynn, testified Wednesday about the allegations of sexual misconduct that led Steve Wynn to step down as chairman and chief executive officer last month.
At a Las Vegas hearing to decide what evidence of Steve Wynn’s alleged misconduct can be brought at a jury trial scheduled for next month, Elaine Wynn said she told Wynn Resorts General Counsel Kim Sinatra nine years ago about an alleged rape of an employee by Steve Wynn from four years earlier; she said that the attorney said it wasn’t a company matter and that it was handled personally.
In a statement issued after the hearing, Sinatra said Elaine Wynn never told her about the rape allegation. “I disagree vehemently with Elaine Wynn’s testimony,” Sinatra stated on Wednesday. “My recollection, which is clear, is that at no time did Elaine Wynn ever tell me that there was an allegation of rape against Steve Wynn. In the relevant conversation in which she promised to destroy Steve Wynn and said she didn’t care if that reduced the company’s stock price to zero in the process, Elaine Wynn made an oblique reference to a settlement, and nothing more.”
Elaine Wynn claims she lost her seat on Wynn Resorts’ board of directors in 2015 because she had raised questions about her ex-husband’s “reckless behavior.”
However, a lawyer for Wynn Resorts said the company fundamentally disputed that Elaine Wynn reported the 2005 incident as a corporate governance issue.
Elaine Wynn has argued that a private, multimillion-dollar settlement her ex-husband made with an employee in 2005, without telling the board of directors, was evidence of his irresponsible management.