KNOX — The contentious race between Knox’s incumbent supervisor, Vasilios Lefkaditis, running on the Republican line, and Democratic challenger, Amy Pokorny, took a new turn this week with accusations leveled against Lefkaditis about his past work as a stockbroker.

In a letter to the Enterprise editor, Eric Kuck, a former councilman who often disagreed with Lefkaditis when he was on the board, wrote about Lefkaditis’s “indiscretions” and cited BrokerCheck, urging readers to check the website “to see lawsuits that customers brought against him for misrepresentation and misuse of their investments.”

“Arbitrations are part of doing business as a broker,” responded Lefkaditis. “In my heyday, I handled a quarter-of-a-billion dollars in assets. To have three complaints is a stellar track record. I have nothing to hide.”

The BrokerCheck service is provided by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc., known as FINRA. A self-regulatory organization, it is a private corporation, not a government agency. The website is designed to let investors evaluate stockbrokers. The site catalogs 640,000 active stockbrokers from about 4,000 firms.

About 13 percent of the stockbrokers included in FINRA have one or more reportable events, according to Michelle Ong, senior director of media external communications for the company. The highest or worst offense is fraud, which means the broker stole money. The heaviest sanction is that a broker is barred from FINRA.

Of the cases that are arbitrated, Ong said, “Almost 80 percent of the cases settle.”

BrokerCheck lists the seven brokerage firms for which Lefkaditis worked, from 1994 through 2008, as well as the exams he passed, starting in 1994 with the Series 7 that allowed him to become a “General Securities Representative.”

BrokerCheck lists three “customer disputes” for Lefkaditis. Two are from 1998 in which the customer alleged misrepresentation and unauthorized trading. The damage amount requested in June is listed at $175,000 and the settlement amount is $37,000. The damage amount listed in August is $90,000 and the settlement amount is $20,000.

“I categorically deny all allegations and will vigorously defend against this claim,” is the listed broker comment, from Lefkaditis.

“That’s boilerplate language on both sides,” said Lefkaditis this week. “There are only a handful of things you can complain against a broker.”

Of the BrokerCheck listing for a $20,000 settlement, Lefkaditis said, “That was settled by the underwriter, which I had nothing to do with.”

The third “customer dispute” was from 1997 for “misrepresentation” and sought compensatory damages of $59,695 and punitive damages of $400,000. The settlement amount was $25,000.

Total damages awarded were $25,000, the broker comment says, and $20,000 was paid by Kensington Wells Inc., the brokerage firm. “$4999.00 of which I paid in an effort to keep legal fees to a minimum and without any admission of guilt on any or all parties involved,” wrote Lefkaditis as his “broker comment.”

Lefkaditis told The Enterprise this week that, among the “thousands of stocks I’ve recommended over my career” — “I was on Wall Street for 17 years, give or take,” he said — he recommended stocks for two companies that were “10 years too early,” meaning their technology was ahead of the marketplace.

One was VideoLan Technologies Inc., known as VLNT, which was doing videoconferencing worldwide in the mid-1990s, similar to today’s FaceTime, he said, and the other was Xybernaut, which made small, mobile personal computers, meant to be worn and to provide functions similar to today’s smartphones.

The Washington Post reported that, from the time Xybernaut was founded in 1990 until 2005, it sold only 10,000 mobile computers while building up $162 million in losses and issuing 200 million shares of stock.

Describing what went wrong, Lefkaditis said, “If a company wants to go public, the underwriters put together investment banking packages and put it out to the brokerage firms. It turned out, the investment bankers lied. I was merely an agent.”

He said of the role of a stockbroker, “If it’s fraudulent, it’s almost impossible to know … That’s why I left the business. I wanted to protect myself and my investors. I switched to real estate and lending; those are tangible, real assets.” He added later, “You can kick bricks and mortar; you can’t kick equities.”

Lefkaditis went on, “I got lied to. You’re relying on investment bankers and public files When it turns out they lied, they sued everybody,” he said of the people who had bought stocks. “The investment bankers and underwriters were sued for a lot more.”

Lefkaditis recalled being “a 20-something kid” and being called by the brokerage’s lawyer about going to Utah for arbitration.

“They’ll crucify you,” Lefkaditis recalled the lawyer telling him.

“I did nothing wrong,” Lefkaditis says he responded. “I got hot,” he said, and insisted on defending himself.

The lawyer said it would cost $100,000 and it was smarter to settle. After Lefkaditis calmed down, he said, he agreed.

“It was a helluva learning experience,” he said. “It helped make me what I am today.”

He went on, “That’s why I’m as good at being a supervisor as I am.”

One of the lessons he said he learned was “to separate money from emotions, and to separate emotions from money.” He said, “People cling onto their investments or money like it’s life or death.”

Lefkaditis went on, “I believe the residents of Knox see right through these baseless personal attacks. In fact, they’re shameful. If someone wants to say how great their candidate is — fine. Tell us about your candidate’s vision, your candidate’s track record, your candidate’s belief. But don’t personally attack her opponent.”

Referring to the last election, where Lefkaditis, running on the Conservative line, ousted long-time Democratic incumbent Michael Hammond, Lefkaditis said, “In 2015, Mr. Hammond and I took the high road. Neither of us attacked the other and I respected him for that.”