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Ebbers asks court for new trial

Tuesday, April 19, 2005 | 9:47 a.m.

Bernard J. Ebbers, the former chief executive of WorldCom convicted last month of conspiracy, fraud and filing false financial reports, asked a judge in New York Monday to give him a new trial.

In a motion filed in Federal District Court in Manhattan, Ebbers requested "a new trial in the interest of justice." The request came after jurors convicted Ebbers of masterminding an $11 billion fraud that brought down WorldCom.

Ebbers is to be sentenced on June 13.

His lawyers argued that Judge Barbara S. Jones erroneously told jurors that they could convict Ebbers if they thought he consciously avoided evidence of fraud even though prosecutors had argued that he had "actual knowledge" of the matter.

They also said the government should have granted immunity to three former officers at WorldCom who they contend would have absolved Ebbers. The executives refused to testify without protection from prosecutors.

Their absence "prevented Ebbers from presenting critical exculpatory evidence to the jury," according to the motion for a new trial.

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