http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=578&e=6&u=/nm/20040109/bs_nm/enron_fastows_dcEnron's Lea Fastow to Decide on Plea Deal
Fri Jan 9, 5:02 AM ET
By Matt Daily
HOUSTON (Reuters) - Former Enron assistant treasurer Lea Fastow is set to decide on Friday whether to accept a plea package with prosecutors that could clear the way for her husband, former Enron financial mastermind Andrew Fastow, to settle dozens of charges.
A plea agreement with Andrew Fastow, the company's former chief financial officer, would give prosecutors their biggest conviction to date in the upper echelon of senior management at Enron, which filed for bankruptcy in 2001 amid charges of accounting fraud and bogus energy trading. <snip>
Lea Fastow and her lawyers must decide whether to accept a deal that calls for her to plead guilty to one count of tax evasion.
But U.S. District Judge David Hittner said on Thursday he would take two months to determine the sentence in the case rather than accept a five-month prison sentence proposed.
Hittner has given Lea Fastow and prosecutors until midday Friday to accept the plea deal and officially present it to the court.
The length of the prison sentence remained the main stumbling block as the couple did not want overlapping prison terms because of their young children. <snip>