Ex-GE Bankers Get Prison Sentences For Rigging Muni Bonds
NEW YORK, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Three former bankers at a unit of General Electric Co were each sentenced on Thursday to several years in prison for conspiring to rig bids to invest municipal bond proceeds.
The men were convicted in May as part of a broad investigation by the U.S. Justice Department of the $3.7 trillion U.S. municipal bond market. The probe has focused on rooting out schemes to fix prices and rig bids on bond transactions, and has ensnared some of the world's largest banks.
The government had accused the three GE Capital bankers of conspiring with brokers, between 1999 and 2006, to submit artificially low bids for municipal finance contracts. They were found guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and to defraud the United States.
GE Capital is the financial services unit of Fairfield, Connecticut-based GE.
At Thursday's hearing, U.S. District Judge Harold Baer in Manhattan said "corruption and greed was certainly what this case was about."
Defendant Steven Goldberg was handed a four-year prison term, while Peter Grimm and Dominick Carollo were each sentenced to three years.
