San Francisco - Former Hewlett-Packard Co Chairman Patricia
Dunn was cleared Wednesday in the corporate spy scandal that rocked
the giant technology company last year when a state court recommended
that all criminal charges against her be dropped.
Three other defendants in the case also are expected to avoid
criminal charges and serve short periods of community service, the
Wall Street Journal reported.
The resolution by Superior Court Judge Ray Cunningham followed a
plea offer by then-California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who
proposed dropping the criminal charges if the defendants agreed to
plead guilty to a a single misdemeanor count of fraudulent wire
communications. Under the deal sanctioned by the judge Dunn and three
others pleaded no contest to that charge.
The case stemmed from an attempt by corporate bosses at HP to find
the source of boardroom leaks by using outside investigators to get
the phone records of directors and reporters they were suspected of
contacting. The investigators used techniques known as pretexting to
trick the phone companies into giving up the private phone records.
'I have always had faith that the truth would win out and justice
would be served - and it has been,' Dunn said in a statement.
However Dunn could still face charges from a US Justice Department
investigation into the affair, though legal experts say that lax
privacy laws will make it hard for prosecutors to win a case.
The scandal which erupted in September led to the resignations of
Dunn as chairman and of board member George Keyworth. Silicon Valley
pioneer Tom Perkins resigned from the company board in protest at the
leak investigation.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur 
USA
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