The US Attorney in the Southern District of New York and the Securities and Exchange Commission have cleared former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) of insider trading charges, closing an 18-month investigation concerning HCA, a hospital chain owned by the Frist family.
At issue in the long-running investigation was the sale of all of Frist's remaining HCA shares by July 8, 2005, a few days before a downbeat forecast that sent HCA's stock price tumbling by 9 percent in a single day....
...The timing triggered multiple federal investigations and months of complex legal reviews. Ultimately, Frist -- a devotee of the BlackBerry device -- produced a paper trail that suggested he began the process of selling the stock in late April 2005, months before he knew of HCA's troubles....
...Frist said that subsequent reviews by an outside attorney and a Senate ethics panel delayed the sale until the summer of 2005, the time of company's financial downturn.
It's tough to find evidence to support insider trading charges, and it appears the high legal standards weren't met in this case. It appears that Frist's brother, who was also a sudject of the investigation, will not be charged either.
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