Lance K. Poulsen was in a holding cell at the courthouse

National Century
Judge lets one convict out of jail
Wednesday, April 16, 2008 11:06 PM
By Jodi Andes

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
An admitted bank robber's story about former National Century executives' plans to escape to Aruba was so detailed that a federal judge said he couldn't risk letting them all go free on bond again.

But James E. Dierker Jr., National Century Financial Enterprise's former marketing director, is different, federal Judge Algenon L. Marbley said.

Dierker wasn't as high-ranking as the other convicts, nor as culpable in the company's fraud, the judge said. And Dierker could prove that he had not talked to the others from the time he left National Century in November 2002 until seeing them again in court.

“I'm also persuaded by the 100 letters sent in (to the court) that show he is tied to the community,” Marbley said after a nine-hour hearing today.

So Dierker will be allowed out. Family, friends and Victoria's Secret co-workers who wrote the letters packed the courtroom and wept and hugged one another at the news.

Meanwhile, former National Century executives Donald H. Ayers, Roger S. Faulkenberry and Randolph Speer will remain in the Franklin County jail. Today, they broke their silence and took the stand for the first time, saying there never was an escape plan.

Company founder Lance K. Poulsen was in a holding cell at the courthouse and could have denied making claims of an escape plan, but he was never called.

Dierker's freedom is temporary.

The Powell man is expected to be incarcerated after sentencing in late spring or early summer.

The whereabouts of another co-defendant, Rebecca S. Parrett, remain unknown. She never showed up in Arizona, where she was allowed to return for house arrest, in late March. That, coupled with claims by Robert Cihy, changed everything for the others, Marbley said.

Cihy, the admitted bank robber and crack-cocaine user, also testified today. In the end, Cihy's testimony proved more credible than Ayers', the judge said.

Cihy said he and Poulsen bonded while they sat in neighboring cells in the Ross County jail. Both were “anti-government,” and Poulsen boasted that Cihy should view him as a hero because National Century's $1.9 billion loss of investors' funds “messed up pension funds of police officers.”

He said Poulsen told him about an escape plan hatched by him and the other defendants, using a cruise ship and getting off in Aruba. Parrett's escape “put a kink in those plans,” Cihy said.

Ayers wasn't as believable because he had lied before, about not having a safe in his home where he had hidden a substantial amount of money, Assistant U.S. Attorney Doug Squires said.

And Ayers also removed $800,000 from a bank account after being convicted, the judge noted. The money was for past and future legal fees, he said.