Rearrested executives deny plot to flee U.S....where is the missing executive from all of this?

Rearrested executives deny plot to flee U.S.
1 National Century leader goes AWOL; judge corrals rest
Thursday, April 3, 2008 3:25 AM
By Jodi Andes

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Update

Judge refuses to free defendants
If former executives of National Century Financial Enterprises were convicted, the plan was for them to flee to Aruba, a source told the FBI.Hearing that less than a week after one of the five recently convicted executives disappeared, U.S. District Judge Algenon L. Marbley ordered that the rest be arrested.

All five had been free since their March 13 convictions while they await sentencing in what prosecutors called the largest fraud case in U.S. history involving a privately held company.

Four executives were arrested at their homes yesterday morning: James E. Dierker Jr. in Powell; Roger S. Faulkenberry in Dublin; Donald H. Ayers in Florida; and Randolph H. Speer in Georgia, Deputy U.S. Marshal Brian Babtist said.

An arrest warrant was issued for Rebecca S. Parrett last week after she did not report to court near her home in Carefree, Ariz., prosecutors said.

Marbley had allowed Parrett and Ayers to remain free on house arrest; Dierker, Faulkenberry and Speer were free on less-restrictive personal-recognizance bonds and allowed to work.

On Tuesday, the FBI received information from a "confidential source" that the group had a previous plan to flee to the Caribbean island off the Venezuelan coast, Assistant U.S. Attorney Doug Squires said in a motion filed yesterday in federal court.

The defendants had to turn in their passports before the trial. But Parrett went so far as to "secure personal identity information of another person prior to the jury trial," the motion states.

The source is not named, but it is someone the FBI has found to be credible in the past, Squires wrote in asking that their bonds be revoked.

Defense attorneys were outraged at the allegation.

"This guy has done everything by the book," said Faulkenberry's attorney, Javier Armengau.

He said Faulkenberry calls his office every day and even checked with the court to make sure he could leave his house to drive his daughter to school.

James Ervin Jr., an attorney for Speer, said his client "vehemently maintains his innocence." Ervin said they were shocked by the allegations.

"I don't know anything about it. But I don't believe it," added Leonard Yelsky, attorney for Dierker, a vice president at Victoria's Secret.

The five executives were convicted on a combination of wire-fraud, securities-fraud, money-laundering and conspiracy charges connected to National Century's collapse.

The Dublin-based company provided funding for health-care providers after purchasing their accounts receivables. The company went bankrupt in November 2002, in large part because of unsecured loans it made to the health-care providers, prosecutors showed.

Investors in National Century lost more than $1.9 billion, more than 275 health-care providers filed for bankruptcy in its wake and about 350 local National Century employees lost their jobs.

jandes@dispatch.com