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A former investment officer with the Iowa Public Employees’ Retirement System alleges he was wrongly fired after reporting the state’s pension system was routinely overstating its performance, concealing certain expenses and understating its investment risk.

Rich Wiggins is suing the State of Iowa in Polk County District Court, claiming wrongful discharge and violations of the state’s False Claims Act.

According to the lawsuit, Wiggins was hired by the State of Iowa in June 2022 as the investment risk and operations officer for the Iowa Public Employees’ Retirement System. In that role, Wiggins replaced Sriram Lakshminarayanan, who moved into the role of IPERS’ chief investment officer.

According to the lawsuit, Wiggins was the head of risk and strategy for Saudi Aramco, the second largest company in the world, before joining IPERS.

Wiggins’ duties as IPERS’ investment risk officer included risk management and monitoring the performance of IPERS’ $40 billion investment portfolio. One of his other duties, according to the lawsuit, was to monitor the conduct of Lakshminarayanan — although Lakshminarayanan had the authority to terminate the employment of Wiggins without cause.

In his lawsuit, Wiggins states that he was “tasked with ensuring that IPERS did not become the next Pennsylvania State Employees Retirement System.” In 2021, Pennsylvania’s largest pension fund was at the...

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