§ 1500. Keeping adequate and correct books and records of accounts; Minutes of proceedings; Form

Each corporation shall keep adequate and correct books and records of account and shall keep minutes of the proceedings of its shareholders, board, and committees of the board and shall keep at its principal executive office, or the office of its transfer agent or registrar, a record of its shareholders, giving the names and addresses of all shareholders and the number and class of shares held by each. Those minutes and other books and records shall be kept either in written form or in another form capable of being converted into a clearly legible tangible form or in any combination of the foregoing. When minutes and other books and records are kept in a form capable of being converted into clearly legible paper form, the clearly legible paper form into which those minutes and other books and records are converted shall be admissible in evidence, and accepted for all other purposes, to the same extent as an original paper record of the same information would have been, provided that the paper form accurately portrays the record.

§ 1507. False statements or entries; Tampering with entries; Liability

Any officers, directors, employees, or agents of a corporation who do any of the following are liable jointly and severally for all the damages resulting therefrom to the corporation or any person injured thereby who relied thereon upon or to both:

(a) Make, issue, deliver or publish any prospectus, report, circular, certificate, financial statement, balance sheet, public notice, or document respecting the corporation or its shares, assets, liabilities, capital, dividends, business, earnings, or accounts which is false in any material respect, knowing it to be false, or participate in the making, issuance, delivery or publication thereof with the knowledge that the same is false in a material respect.

(b) Make or cause to be made in the books, minutes, records, or accounts of a corporation any entry which is false in any material particular knowing such entry is false.

(c) Remove, erase, alter or cancel any entry in any books or records of the corporation, with intent to deceive.

§ 2254. False statements affecting the value of shares; Refusal to make book-entry or post notice required; Felony

Every director, officer, or agent of any corporation, domestic or foreign, is guilty of a felony

(a) who knowingly concurs in the making, publishing, or posting either generally or privately to the shareholders or other persons

(1) any written report, exhibit, statement of its affairs or pecuniary condition or a notice containing any material statement which is false, or

(2) any untrue or willfully or fraudulently exaggerated report, prospectus, account, statement of operations, values, business, profits, expenditures or prospects, or

(3) any other paper or document intend to produce or give, or have a tendency to produce or give, the shares of stock in such corporation a greater value or a less apparent or market value than they really possess, or

(b) who refuses to make any book entry or post any notice required by the law in the manner required by law.

§ 2255. Fraudulent receipt or possession of the property; Destruction, alteration or falsification of books, etc.; Omitting entries; Public offense; Penalty

(a) Every director, officer or agent of any corporation, domestic or foreign, who knowingly receives or acquires possession of any property of the corporation, otherwise than in payment of just demand, and, with intent to defraud, omits to make, or to cause or direct to be made, a full and true entry thereof in the books of accounts of the corporation is guilty of a public offense.

(b) Every director, officer, agent or shareholder of any corporation, domestic or foreign, who, with intent to defraud, destroys, alters, mutilates or falsifies any of the books, papers, writings or securities belonging to the corporation or makes or concurs in omitting to make any material entry in any book of accounts or other record or document kept by the corporation is guilty of a public offense.

(c) Each public offense specified in this section is punishable by imprisonment in state prison, or by imprisonment in a county jail for not exceeding one year, or a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars ($1,000), or by both such fine and imprisonment.

§ 2256. Exhibition of false, etc., an instrument to a public officer or board with the intent to deceive; Penalty

Every officer, agent or clerk of any corporation, domestic or foreign, or any person proposing to organize such a corporation or to increase the capital stock of any such corporation, who knowingly exhibits any false, forged, or altered book, paper, voucher, security or other instruments of evidence to any public officer or board authorized by law to examine the organization of such corporation or to investigate its affairs or to allow an increase of its capital, with intent to deceive such officer or board in respect thereto, is punishable by imprisonment in state prison, or by imprisonment in a county jail for not exceeding one year.

California Corporations Code (2008).

THE FOREGOING IS AN ACCURATE EXCERPT OF THE CALIFORNIA CORPORATIONS CODE AS OF THE DATE STATED. THE LAW MAY CHANGE. PLEASE CONTACT AN ATTORNEY FOR AN UPDATED STATEMENT OF THE LAW.


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