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Two indicted in $60 million
online investment scheme
SACRAMENTO, CA
Two men have been indicted on federal counts of money laundering and fraud
in Sacramento in connection with an Internet investment scheme that netted
more than $60 million.
Alyn Richard Waage, 56, of
Nisku, a town in the Canadian province of Alberta, and James Michael Webb,
40, of Mountain View were extradited from Costa Rica to Sacramento in
December to face charges related to the Tri-West Investment Club, federal
prosecutors said.
The federal indictment issued
Thursday also seeks the forfeiture of millions of dollars worth of
property in Costa Rica and Mexico, a yacht, a helicopter and more than a
dozen cars. Federal authorities are also seeking millions of dollars in
bank accounts in Latvia, Mexico and Costa Rica.
U.S. Attorney John Vincent
said the men bilked more than 15,000 investors worldwide by using more
recent investor funds to make "dividend" payments to earlier
investors. The club promised to make investments in "prime bank
notes" that didn't exist, said investigators with the U.S. Attorney's
Office and the FBI.
US Airways dumps most fuel
fees
ARLINGTON, Va.US Airways
Group eliminated a $30 fuel surcharge on most round-trip fares after
rivals declined to match the increase, a consumer advocate said.
The seventh-largest U.S.
carrier, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in August, added
the charge in December and removed it Thursday night, spokesman David
Castelveter said. No other U.S. carriers matched the increase, said Terry
Trippler, who monitors ticket prices for his Web site.
U.S. airlines typically drop
fare increases or fees if their rivals don't follow suit because they
don't want to be the only carrier with higher prices in their markets. Jet
fuel prices, which rose 3.1 cents to $92.7 cents a gallon today in New
York Harbor, have risen 22 percent since Dec. 1.
Trippler said that customers
who bought US Airways tickets and paid the fuel surcharge should get a
refund. He also said raising prices is ultimately the right idea because
consumers will benefit in the long run from healthier U.S. airlines.
Stay on DVD decoding programs
tossed
WASHINGTONSupreme Court
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on Friday threw out an emergency stay that
barred a former webmaster from putting DVD decryption programs on the
Internet.
O'Connor had imposed the stay
last week at the urging of a group that licenses software to film studios
to block the illegal copying of DVDs.
New York attorney Jeffrey
Kessler said the association fears that Matthew Pavlovich will repost
programs that help people duplicate movies for free.
Pavlovich's lawyer said
Pavlovich has no plans to do that and argued to O'Connor in filings that
the stay was unnecessary because decryption programs are already available
on hundreds of other Web sites and that they have been printed in
magazines and newspapers.
The DVD industry has been
aggressively trying to stop illegal movie copying, which it says costs the
industry billions of dollars.
O'Connor's decision was the
latest development in a running dispute between the California-based DVD
Copy Control Association and Pavlovich. The association sued Pavlovich in
California when codes that help people copy DVDs were posted on his site
in 1999. He was a college student in Indiana at the time.
A ruling by the California
Supreme Court, in Pavlovich's favor, makes it harder for the movie
industry to pursue people who use the Internet to share copyrighted
material. The court said that because Pavlovich does not live in
California and his Web site was not based here, he cannot be sued in
California courts.
Intuit names new CFO and
senior VP
MOUNTAIN VIEWIntuit, a
provider of financial software, has named Robert Henske as chief financial
officer and senior vice president.
He had been CFO at Synopsys
Inc., which makes electronic-design automation software for the
electronics industry. Both Intuit and Synopsys are based in Mountain View.
Intuit said Henske replaces
former finance chief Greg Santora, who announced his retirement in August.
However, the company said Santora will remain on board for "a short
period of time to ensure a seamless transition."
Synopsys said it named Steven
Shevick as its new chief financial officer and senior vice president of
finance. Shevick was vice president of investor relations and legal.
"Limσn is still a depressed zone, but I would like to tell everyone
that the people of Limσn are awaiting more visitors, and the problems in
the area have been resolved," Pacheco said.
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