Ex-C Suisse Trader's Wife Loses Out, Goldman Goes To Court

Bloomberg reports that Elizabeth Butler doesn’t have a legal interest in the assets in the accounts, described in court filings as being jointly used despite being in Eric Butler’s name, U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein ruled in an order filed October 31st. Weinstein agreed with a U.S. magistrate judge’s recommendation that her efforts to seek an injunction barring the government from taking all the assets be denied. The money in question totals $736,060, according to court records.

Eric Butler was convicted by a federal jury in Brooklyn in August 2009 of intentionally misleading clients about their investments by telling them that securities they were buying were backed by federally guaranteed student loans when they were actually tied to the housing market. Victims’ losses were more than $1.1bn, according to the government.

In the meantime, Bloomberg also reports that Goldman Sachs has lost a bid to avoid trial in a lawsuit over the 2000 sale of Dragon Systems Inc., a pioneer in voice-recognition software, to a Belgian competitor that collapsed following an accounting scandal.

U.S. District Judge Patti Saris in Boston Thursday declined Goldman Sachs’s request to throw out claims by James and Janet Baker, Dragon System’s founders, that Goldman Sachs failed to provide adequate advice in the sale of their $600m company for stock in Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products NV. Goldman Sachs was paid $5m for advising Dragon.

Ex-Credit Suisse Broker’s Wife Can’t Have Assets, Judge Says

Goldman Loses Bid to Avoid Trial Over Dragon Systems Sale