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| The indictment of a New York billionaire for allegedly operating the largest ever insider trading scheme involving a hedge fund last week, is a signal that regulators are taking a more aggressive tack in hunting down illegal activity on Wall Street, former SEC officials say. Photo: New SEC Sheriff in Town Robert Khuzami, Director of Enforcement at the SEC, speaks at a press conference where he announced... Expand Robert Khuzami, Director of Enforcement at the SEC, speaks at a press conference where he announced charges against hedge fund managers, Fortune 500 executives, and a management consulting director for participating in insider trading schemes, at the U.S. Attorney's office in this Oct. 2009 file photo in New York City. The defendants in the pearl jewelry case include Raj Rajaratnam, inset, the managing director of Galleon Management, LLC, and a portfolio manager for Galleon Technology Offshore, Ltd. The indictment of the New York billionaire for allegedly operating the largest ever insider trading scheme involving a hedge fund last week, is a signal that regulators are taking a more aggressive tack in hunting down illegal activity on Wall Street, according to former SEC officials. Collapse (Getty Images/AP Photo) Raj Rajaratnam, head of the Galleon Group hedge fund, along with five others stand accused by prosecutors and the SEC of earning more than $25 million in profits by using illegally obtained information to make trades of stock in companies, including Google Inc., Clearwire Corp., and Hilton Hotels Corp., court documents show. The Sri Lanka-born Rajaratnam, who established Galleon in 1997, is free on $100 million bail and his travel is restricted to within 110 miles of New York City. Federal prosecutors leveled a number of charges against Rajaratnam, including securities fraud and conspiracy to commit securities fraud. Jim Walden, an attorney for biwa pearl Rajaratnam, said his client is innocent, the Associated Press reported. Related Indicted N.Y. Financier Gave Big to Hillary and Terror Charity Swindled Madoff Investors Sue U.S. Gov't for Ignoring 'Smoking Guns' in Ponzi Scheme More from Brian Ross and the Investigative Team The tactics used to build this case – including the use of undercover informants and wire taps show the SEC, still reeling from its failure to detect massive fraud in the Bernard Madoff and Allen Stanford scandals, is going to new lengths to uncover criminal activity on Wall Street. "This is consistent with the overall more aggressive posture that the SEC is taking," said Michael MacPhail a former SEC branch chief who is akoya pearl now a partner at Denver-based Holme Roberts & Owen. "It looks like they had an informant that was helping the government to gather evidence against these people. And for the SEC to be quoting conversations and things like that... that could be a departure from the way the SEC used to do business." This case marks the first time court-authorized wiretaps were used in a hedge fund case. Experts say the tactics used in this investigation may be a harbinger of things to come under the watch of new SEC enforcement chief Robert Khuzami, a former federal prosecutor who took over the post in February. "As somebody who's involved in the securities business, we've been waiting a while now for this to happen. I tell clients who've done anything wrong... the SEC is going to be really difficult and really tough, and they're going to take no prisoners," said one former SEC attorney, who now represents clients in enforcement cases. | ||
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| Genetic screening of embryos, sperm and eggs has been tied to the worst aspects of eugenics, but a new case study in one of the nation's leading medical journals shows some benefits may come from genetic analysis of donors. Share Selective sperm banks could get you a pearl jewelry baby who looks like a famous person. The study documents the case of a then-23-year-old sperm donor whose donations in 1990 and 1991 led to the birth of 22 known children. Recently, however, it has also been discovered through gene testing that he has hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), a genetic heart condition that can lead to heart failure and sudden death, among other problems, and a problem some of his children now also have. "This is the first time a genetic disease has been documented this way," said Dr. Barry Maron, a cardiologist with the Minnesota Heart Institute Foundation. "It's supposed to make the point that this is an invisible risk. Could it happen again? Of course. That's the point of the whole exercise." While the FDA requires sperm donors to be screened for multiple conditions, these tests are aimed at preventing the transmission of infectious diseases such as AIDs, and largely do not address genetically transmitted diseases like the genetic heart biwa pearldefect that afflicted this sperm donor's offspring. Related Birth It Like Beckham? Celeb Look-Alike Sperm Embryo Mix-Up Yields Son; Heartbreak Ahead Build-a-Baby: Are We Playing God? The current FDA regulations require the testing for genetic diseases like cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, and Tay-Sach's, but genetic heart problems are not included in the screening. "The FDA had not paid much attention to the transmission of genetic diseases," Maron said. "The emphasis has been on transmission of infectious diseases." The anonymous sperm donor's screening did not pick up his heart condition, and of his 24 children (two from his wife, the rest from donation), nine have the genetic mutation responsible for HCM. One has functional limitations, chest pain and fatigue because of this problem; another has palpitations; and one died of progressive heart failure at the age of 2, while awaiting a transplant. The case study appears in the newest issue of the akoya pearl Journal of the American Medical Association. In a related editorial in the journal, Judith Daar of Whittier Law School in Costa Mesa, Calif., and Dr. Robert Brzyski of the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio say the study shows the need for increased gene screening and counseling, although they note that this is not foolproof when it comes to the health of potential offspring. "Geneticists caution, however, that prospective parents should be counseled about the limitations of genetic testing and its relationship to long-term offspring health," they wrote. "Providing recipients a clean genetic bill of health about a chosen donor can lead to a false sense of confidence about the risk of illness their child might face. A significant proportion of some genetic conditions ... arise from [new] mutations." | ||
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| With the case of alleged bomb maker Najibullah Zazi fresh on the public's mind, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has called for a nationwide "awareness" program of sales of peroxide, a chemical widely used in over-the-counter hair dye formulas and swimming pool cleaning supplies but also sought after by terrorists to make homemade bombs. Photo: The Beauty Parlor Bomb Plan; Massive Terror Plot Alleged: Denver Man, Others Accused of Stockpiling Chemicals, Building Bombs According to court documents, accused al Qaeda bomb maker Najibullah Zazi "purchased unusually large quantities of hydrogen peroxide and acetone from pearl jewelry beauty supply stores in the Denver metropolitan area." (ABC News Photo Illustration) A recipe to make a homemade liquid bomb using concentrated peroxide, known as TATP, was found in Zazi's computer, law enforcement officials say. It was said to be the same recipe used by terrorists in the London transit bombings that killed 56 and wounded more than 700 commuters on July 7, 2005. CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE COVERAGE OF THE NEW YORK TERROR PLOT AND OTHER TERRORISM STORIES. Related California Man Blows Off Hands with Explosives The Beauty Parlor Bomb Plan; Massive Terror Plot Alleged More from Brian Ross and the Investigative Team Surveillance videos showed Zazi purchased dozens of biwa pearl bottles of low strength hydrogen peroxide used to dye hair at various Denver area beauty supply stores and then prosecutors say he went to a nearby hotel where he experimented with cooking the chemicals on a stovetop. "With these potentially dangerous chemicals so readily available to the public, we must do what needs to be done to ensure public safety," Schumer said. "Not only has there been a string of terrorist plots involving TATP, but the alleged New York City bombing plot of Najibullah Zazi has reminded us all of the serious nature of this threat. We must do everything we can to prevent a possible tragedy in the future." Earlier this month, a southern California man akoya pearl blew off several fingers while dealing with what authorities say was homemade TATP in the basement of his home. Benjamin Kuzelka, 23 was in the garage handling an unstable liquid when it exploded, officials said at the time. | ||
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| The president of Lithuania called for an official investigation Tuesday into an ABC News.com exclusive report in August that the CIA housed a secret prison for al Qaeda suspects in Lithuania for more than a year beginning in 2004. PHOTO A third European country has been identified to ABC News as providing the CIA with facilities for a secret prison for high-value al Qaeda suspects: Lithuania, the former Soviet state. Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus (L) talks to U.S. President George W. Bush after a joint press conference at Society House in Riga, Latvia in pearl jewelry this May 7, 2005 file photo. (Jim Bourg/Reuters) "If this is true," President Dalia Grybauskaite said, "Lithuania has to clean up, accept responsibility, apologize, and promise that it will never happen again." At a press conference with the Council of Europe Human Rights Commission, Grybauskaite announced the investigation after it was clear a previous attempt by the Lithuanian Parliament was insufficient, according to a Council of Europe official. In August, ABC News reported that the CIA built a secret prison in a residential section of Vilnius from September 2004 through November 2005. The CIA used the prison to detain and interrogate top level al Qaeda prisoners captured around the world after 9/11. Lithuania was the only unknown European country to house so called "black sites," after the identities of biwa pearl Poland and Romania were reported in late 2005 by the Washington Post and ABC News' Brian Ross. Read that report here. Related EXCLUSIVE: Sources Tell ABC News Top Al Qaeda Figures Held in Secret CIA Prisons List of 12 Operatives Held in CIA Prisons More from Brian Ross and the Investigative Team The CIA built or housed al Qaeda detainees in several countries around the world before President Obama ordered them closed shortly after assuming office earlier this year. Among the countries were Thailand, Afghanistan, Morocco, in addition to the three eastern European nations, according to more than a dozen former and current intelligence officials. The Lithuanian prison was the last "black" site opened in Europe, after the CIA's secret prison in Poland was closed down in late 2003. In September 2004, European and American flight records examined by ABC News reveal CIA-contracted flights directly from Afghanistan to Lithuania. On September 20th, 2004, a Boeing 707 with tail number N88ZL flew directly from Bagram Airbase to Vilnius. According to several former CIA officials, the flight carried an al Qaeda detainee, who was akoya pearl being moved from one CIA detention facility to another. Additionally, in July 2005, a CIA-chartered Gulfstream IV, tail number N63MU, flew direct from Kabul to Vilnius. Several former intelligence officials involved in the CIA's prison program confirmed the flight as a prisoner transfer to Lithuania. The Vilnius prison was closed, however, after news of other CIA prisons in Poland and Romania were reported in the press in November 2005. | ||
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| Convicted con man Bernard Madoff, who slept on luxury linens and dined at the finest restaurants, is now sleeping in the lower bunk of a two man cell in a federal prison, with a 21-year-old convicted drug dealer for a roommate and a child molester cooking his pizza, according to a new victims' lawsuit filed by the lone outsider to visit him behind bars. Share The KPMG man cited in a suit tells ABC News he had no relationship with Madoff. More Photos San Francisco attorney Joe Cotchett says the pearl jewelry former billionaire now spends time with former Colombo crime family boss Carmine Persico and convicted Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard, amid a gang of fellow inmates in prison for drug and sex crimes. Click here to go behind the scenes of Brian Ross' investigation into Bernie and Ruth Madoff. Madoff should feel comfortable among the former drug dealers given his long association with office messengers who provided him and his wife Ruth with large amounts of marijuana over the years, according to accounts by former employee in a new book by ABC's Brian Ross, "The Madoff Chronicles." As the former Madoff staffers told Ross, Bernie liked to let off steam. "Especially in the early days, a messenger known in the office as Little Rick would be dispatched to Harlem to bring back marijuana for Bernie and others in the office." Related PHOTOS: Inside Palm Beach: The biwa pearl Secret World of Bernie Madoff PHOTOS: Bernard Madoff's Luxuries More from Brian Ross and the Investigative Team "Little Rick ended up losing his job in 2003 when he couldn't kick his own problem with cocaine and drugs were discovered in his desk. He says he wasn't the only one with a problem at the Madoff firm. "There was white powder all over that office. It was like the freaking North Pole," Little Rick said. "Are you freaking kidding me?" And as the firm grew, as reported by Ross in the "Chronicles," Bernie liked wild times at office parties. "At one Christmas Party, Bernie rented out the entire floor of the disco New York, New York, and there were topless waitresses and waiters in just g-strings," said Little Rick. Click here to purchase "The Madoff Chronicles" from Amazon.com. The lawsuit also brings new accusations against KPMG, a prestigious "Big 4" accounting firm, responsible for so-called independent audits of a several of the largest of Madoff's U.S. "feeder funds," as well as Madoff's London office. The lawsuit alleges there is "substantial evidence that KPMG either knew or failed to disclose or failed to detect" the massive Ponzi scheme. And in particular, the suit questions the role of akoya pearl David Yim, a director in KPMG's London office, whose cell phone number was found in Madoff's personal address book and who was one of the auditors assigned to Madoff's London operation, according to the lawsuit. "Either Yim knew or was willfully blind to the blatant fraud occurring. Yim was in constant contact with Madoff and his phone number was in Madoff's directory of key contact information." | ||
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