Ted Sihpol, the former Bank of America broker and only person criminally charged in the $1.25 billion fraud at Nations Funds, didn’t exactly bowl over the judge yesterday in his attempt to get his 40-count indictment tossed.
The April 26 proposed trial date seems solid.
More than once, Justice James A. Yates swatted aside arguments by Sihpol’s lawyer, saying the matter appeared to be “an issue for the jury to decide.”
Evan Stewart, Sihpol’s lawyer, claims the indictment brought by Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is faulty because it uses funny math to get to the $1.25 billion fraud total, criminalizes activity that was policed administratively at the time and because Sihpol was never told he was a target of a criminal probe.
A decision on the motion to dismiss the indictments is expected on March 7.