Enron figure withdraws plea

Wednesday, April 7, 2004 | 9:07 a.m.

HOUSTON -- Former Enron Corp. assistant treasurer Lea Fastow today withdrew her guilty plea and will stand trial June 2, following a refusal by her sentencing judge to be bound by a January plea bargain with prosecutors that would have limited her prison term to 10 to 16 months.

Fastow, 42, had pleaded guilty to one count of filing a false income tax return. Her husband, Andrew, 42, Enron's former chief financial officer, pleaded guilty to orchestrating an accounting fraud that permitted him to earn $60 million from off- the-books partnerships used to hide company debt.

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