Ex-WorldCom exec sentenced to five months in prison

Friday, Aug. 5, 2005 | 9:40 a.m.

NEW YORK -- Former WorldCom accounting executive Betty Vinson was sentenced today to five months in prison and five months of house arrest for taking part in the telecommunications company's record $11 billion accounting fraud.

Vinson, 49, pleaded guilty to fraud in October 2002 and helped the government build its case against former WorldCom CEO Bernard Ebbers, who was sentenced last month to 25 years in prison.

Vinson is one of five WorldCom executives facing sentencing over the next two weeks for their roles in the fraud, which plunged WorldCom into bankruptcy in 2002. It has since emerged under the name MCI Inc.

A second accounting executive, Troy Normand, was to be sentenced later Friday by the same judge, Barbara Jones of U.S. District Court in Manhattan.

At Ebbers' trial, Vinson, the company's former director of management reporting, said she was told to make improper accounting entries because Ebbers did not want to disappoint Wall Street.

"I felt like if I didn't make the entries, I wouldn't be working there," Vinson testified. She said she even drafted a resignation letter in 2000 but stayed with the company.

Her lawyer had argued for a sentence of probation, saying Vinson was pressured by superiors at WorldCom.