Saturday, February 10, 2007; D02

LEGAL

Former Fannie Mae chief executive Franklin D. Raines gained access to thousands of documents that he says refute charges he overstated company earnings to gain $84.6 million in bonuses. Raines withdrew a request for the U.S. District Court in Washington to find the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight in contempt for not detailing why it withheld papers gathered during a probe of the mortgage finance company.

Bank of America said the Justice Department agreed not to press charges against the bank in exchange for its assistance with a criminal probe of the municipal derivatives business. The bank also agreed to a $14.7 million settlement with the Internal Revenue Service in connection with its role in providing guaranteed investment contacts to some state and local government borrowers.

A group of Adelphia Communications noteholders must post a $1.3 billion bond while a judge considers objections to the company's bankruptcy exit plan, a federal appeals court ruled. The judges who issued the ruling said the noteholders may return to the lower court and ask that the bond requirement be modified.

US Airways Group chief executive Doug Parker was arrested Jan. 31 on suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol, hours after ending his bid for Delta Air Lines. Parker was cited for driving under the influence of alcohol and driving with a blood-alcohol content of more than 0.08 percent, Scottsdale, Ariz., police spokesman Mark Clark said. Both are misdemeanors.

Allied Defense Group of Vienna said it would restate its financial reports for the three- and nine-month periods ended in September. The results were overstated because of a contract accounting error at the company's Belgian subsidiary, according to a company statement. The scope of the adjustment is still being determined, the statement said.

Allied Defense sells ammunition and other security systems to the military.

BearingPoint said PricewaterhouseCoopers didn't stand for reelection as its auditor, ending their client-auditor relationship. BearingPoint hired Ernst & Young as its replacement, the McLean consulting firm said in a regulatory filing. BearingPoint said there hadn't been disagreements with PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The firm also said Standard & Poor's issued a release this week announcing it had withdrawn its credit rating and debt rating for BearingPoint because of a lack of financial information.

Susan S. Bies, who has been a governor at the Federal Reserve since December 2001, announced she would leave at the end of March to spend more time with her family. Bies, who was an executive at First Tennessee National in Memphis before she joined the Fed, said she would not participate in the central bank's meeting to examine interest-rate policy on March 20 and 21.

The Securities and Exchange Commission permanently barred Richard A. Causey, the former Enron chief accountant, from being an officer or director of publicly traded companies. Causey, 47, agreed to the ban to settle a 2004 SEC lawsuit that accused him of fraudulent accounting by manipulating earnings, the agency said.

Causey is serving a 5 1/2 -year prison sentence after pleading guilty to securities fraud.

Lear, an auto parts supplier, said it had agreed to a buyout offer by a group affiliated with the billionaire investor Carl C. Icahn for about $2.8 billion but left the door open for a better offer. At least one major shareholder said he would try to get others who own stock to oppose the deal.

British bus and train operator FirstGroup announced a $2.8 billion deal to acquire Greyhound owner Laidlaw International. If it goes through, the transaction would pair the two largest school bus operators in the United States and Canada. Greyhound is a "less obvious strategic fit" and will be reviewed, FirstGroup said in announcing the Laidlaw purchase.

The House Ways and Means Committee plans to consider legislation containing a tax cut for small businesses of almost $2 billion that omits a Senate-passed penalty on employees who receive tax-deferred compensation in excess of $1 million. A draft bill released by the panel doesn't include the executive pay restrictions, a key element of an $8.3 billion measure passed Feb. 1 by the Senate.

Compiled from reports by Washington Post staff writers, the Associated Press and Bloomberg News.