By Joe Palazzolo
- Associated Press
- R. Allen Stanford
Trial Watch:
• The trial of money manager R. Allen Stanford, who is accused of running a $ 7.2 billion Ponzi scheme, is set to begin Monday in Houston. Prosecutors claim the Ponzi scheme swindled thousands of people through the sale of fictitious certificates of deposit by a bank he controlled in Antigua.
Check out this story by the WSJ’s Jean Eaglesham on how a vicious prison attack on Stanford may complicate what the Justice Department had hoped would be an open-and-shut case. (4:09-cr-00342)
Monday, Jan. 23
• The Senate is slated to vote on the nomination John Gerrard to the the bench of the U.S. District Court for District of Nebraska.
Tuesday, Jan. 24
• The SEC and the Securities Investor Protection Corp. are slated to square off in a 2 p.m. hearing in federal district court in Washington. The two have worked in tandem for decades to reimburse the victims of broker theft, but in the December the SEC sued agency to force it to pay investors in R. Allen Stanford’s alleged $ 7 billion Ponzi scheme.
The SIPC says it isn’t obligated to pay in this case, while the SEC has sided with investors who accuse the SIPC of taking a narrow view of the law to protect brokers from higher assessments. Bloomberg has a preview of the hearing here. (1:11-mc-00678)
• The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is slated to hear arguments in a trademark dispute between Yves Saint Laurent and Christian Louboutin over red-soled women’s shoes. Louboutin lost a bid last year to stop YSL from selling shoes with red soles, which it claims violates its trademark. (11-3303)
• The Justice Department will hold a memorial service for John Keeney, who served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Criminal Division, at its Washington headquarters. Over Keeney’s nearly 60-year career as a federal prosecutor, the longest in history, he served under 12 presidents and about two dozen attorneys general. He died in November.
Thursday, Jan. 26
• A raft of judicial nomination hearings are scheduled in the Senate Judiciary Committee: Andrew David Hurwitz to be judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; Kristine Gerhard Baker to be U.S. district judge for the Eastern District of Arkansas; John Lee to be U.S. district judge for the Northern District of Illinois; John Tharp Jr., to be U.S. district judge for the Northern District of Illinois; and George Levi Russell III, to be U.S. district judge for the District of Maryland.
The committee is also slated to vote on the nomination of the Paul Watford to be a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Got something to add? Email us at joe.palazzolo@wsj.com
