Houston, Jan 08: Former Enron Corp. finance chief Andrew Fastow is negotiating a plea bargain that could send the high-powered executive to prison for his role in the accounting scandal that brought down the energy company, sources close to the case said. Authorities also were drawing up criminal charges against Enron's former chief accountant, Richard A. Causey, who was expected to surrender today, sources with knowledge of the matter told the associated press yesterday, speaking on condition of anonymity. The exact nature of the complaint was not immediately clear.
If attorneys and judges agree on the proposed plea deal with Fastow, the former executive could appear in court to change his innocent plea to guilty as early as today, the sources said.
Fastow would be the highest-ranking executive to plead guilty in the criminal investigation of Enron. The company's collapse in 2001 was the first in a series of scandals that rattled corporate America and caused the stock market to plunge.
Fastow allegedly masterminded a complex web of schemes that hid Enron's debt, inflated profits and allowed him to skim millions of dollars for himself, his family and selected friends and colleagues.
Fastow's wife, Lea, a former assistant treasurer at Enron, also is negotiating a plea deal along with her husband, the sources said.
Plea deals often involve agreements to testify against others, but there was no immediate indication whether that was happening in this case. Bureau Report