NewsMax.com Wires
Monday, May 3, 2004

A federal jury in Manhattan, deliberating on its second day, returned guilty verdicts on all three counts against Quattrone: obstructing a grand jury, obstructing federal regulators and witness tampering.

The verdict likely means the 48-year-old former banker will go to prison, perhaps for more than a year.

Quattrone was tried last fall on the same charges, but the judge declared a mistrial after jurors repeatedly said they were deadlocked.

Earlier Monday, U.S. District Judge Richard Owen answered a question the jury had asked in a note Friday as it began deliberating. Jurors asked whether they could consider the absence of other charges against Quattrone as circumstantial evidence in deciding the obstruction case.

"It is your task to decide only the three charges in this indictment," the judge said.

Quattrone, one of the top investment bankers of the dot-com boom, was charged for sending an e-mail Dec. 5, 2000, that urged colleagues at Credit Suisse First Boston to destroy documents.

A grand jury and federal regulators were investigating the bank's stock-allocation practices. The probe never resulted in criminal charges, and the bank later paid a $100 million civil settlement.

Quattrone was told two days before he sent the e-mail that a grand jury was investigating the bank. But he claims the note was a simple endorsement of company policy, which required regular destruction of documents.

Earlier, jurors heard a readback of Quattrone's testimony in which he claimed a CSFB lawyer told him in that conversation, on Dec. 3, 2000, that the investigation concerned high fees paid by hedge funds.

The jury also heard a readback of Quattrone's testimony about his involvement in a 1991 securities trial in Texas in which his employer at the time, Morgan Stanley, was a defendant.

Quattrone testified that Morgan Stanley was cleared of liability in part because it had been responsible about keeping documents.

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