Norm Coleman concedes. Photo: Chris Steller, MnIndy

All of the allegations contained in a pair of lawsuits detailing a purported scheme to funnel $100,000 to then-U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman are false, according to the findings of a Special Litigation Committee appointed by the company at the center of the legal dispute.

The lawsuits allege that Nasser Kazeminy and his allies were responsible for gross fiscal mismanagement of Deep Marine Technology, a Houston-based underwater services firm. Among the alleged waste: an attempt by Kazeminy to provide funds to Coleman through a Minneapolis insurance firm where the former senator’s wife was employed.

The lawsuits were filed in the final days before voters went to the polls in the hotly contested U.S. Senate race between Coleman and Al Franken, which was finally settled on Tuesday with Coleman conceding the race to Franken after a lengthy recount and legal appeal which went to the Minnesota Supreme Court.

Bruce Gilman, chairman and CEO of Deep Marine Technology and parent firm Deep Marine Holdings, declines to discuss the specific allegation involving Coleman.

“All I can tell you is that all the allegations were found to be without merit,” he said. “I will not single out every one of the allegations in there because there are many, many allegations.”

The Special Litigation Committee was appointed to look into the charges shortly after the lawsuits were filed. The committee interviewed 24 people and scrutinized thousands of pages of documents during the eight-month investigation, according to Deep Marine Technology.

The initial lawsuit was filed in Harris County District Court in Texas, and is currently pending. A separate lawsuit involving the company, filed in Delaware, contained almost the exact same allegation regarding a Coleman-Kazeminy payoff scheme. That case has since been dismissed, however, according to Deep Marine Technology.

Norm and Laurie Coleman at a 2008 campaign event (Photo by Paul Demko/Minnesota Independent)

Gilman says that the company will now seek to also have the Texas case thrown out. “We will move to dismiss the action in the Texas litigation as quickly as possible,” he said. “We were obviously waiting for this to be concluded.”

The announcement of the investigation’s findings comes just a day after Coleman conceded the protracted U.S. Senate contest to Franken. But Gilman insists that the timing is entirely coincidental.

“Frankly I’d never heard of Norm Coleman until this lawsuit,” he says. “Believe me we were trying to get this done as quickly as possible, because these things are expensive. But if you have an independent group doing this you can’t tell them what to do.”

Casey Wallace, the attorney representing McKim, argues that the investigation wasn’t independent, but rather was controlled by the company’s board of directors.

“We believe that the conclusions of the Special Litigation Committee are wrong, that the investigation was skewed to have a certain outcome,” he said. “The special litigation committee is the board; the board is the special litigation committee. We don’t believe it’s independent or serves any purpose.”

Wallace says the outcome of the investigation will have no affect on his client’s legal strategy. “We plan to go forward,” he said.

Coleman has said that all of the allegations are false and that the lawsuits are politically motivated. Kazeminy has also denied any wrongdoing in the matter.

Related: Texas firm “stonewalling” suit that names Coleman, lawyer says

A lawsuit alleging that Norm Coleman’s longtime associate Nasser Kazeminy attempted to funnel $75,000 to the senator should proceed without delay, says attorney Casey Wallace.

Last week, lawyers representing Deep Marine Holdings, a Houston-based company of which Kazeminy is a primary stockholder, sought a stay that would delay proceedings in the case for at least two months. They argued that an internal investigation set up by the company should be completed before any more court proceedings are held.

But Wallace, the attorney representing plaintiff Paul McKim, the founder and chief executive officer of Deep Marine Holdings, insists there’s no need for a delay.

“These are simple allegations,” he said on the phone from Houston. “This is not an Enron-ish type case. They’ve had plenty of time to do their investigation.”

A pair of lawsuits making nearly identical allegations about Kazeminy’s efforts to funnel money to Coleman were filed in Texas and Delaware courts just prior to the November election. The accusation is just one detail in a messy corporate dispute involving Deep Marine Holdings that has McKim at loggerheads with his former business partners.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has subsequently launched a probe into Coleman’s ties to Kazeminy.

Coleman has denied the allegations made in the suits, dismissing them as a last-second political smear. But as the U.S. Senate contest continues to drag on more than two months after election day, the cases have begun moving, albeit slowly, through the courts.

While McKim’s attorney believes the case should proceed without delay, he doesn’t see any political calculations behind the effort to postpone the lawsuit.

“Absolutely not,” Wallace said. “If there were I’d be happy to tell you yes. I absolutely do not believe that to be the case.”

A decision on whether to postpone the Texas lawsuit could come as soon as Monday, when a hearing is scheduled on the matter.

The case in Delaware, meanwhile, is also creeping forward. Arguments on a motion to dismiss the case are due by the end of next month.