A key government witness in the insider trading trial of a San Francisco hedgefund operator testified Thursday that her crimes destroyed her life, ruiningher reputation and her finances.
Roomy Khan, 53, was pushed by lawyers on both sides to sum up her gloomyexistence over the last decade as her testimony over four days neared its endin the trial of Doug Whitman, founder of Whitman Capital.
"Sir, my life has been destroyed, the way I knew it," Khan said inresponse to questions from Whitman's San Francisco defense lawyer, David L.Anderson. A day earlier, she had cried as she told a prosecutor about herlife's difficulties.
On Thursday, she cited damage from "a public lynching and moneylost," saying her pain was beyond comprehension. Once worth up to $40million, she described struggling to pay the mortgage on her $5 millionAtherton, California, home before moving to Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Khan was testifying for the first time this week at a trial despite cooperatingwith the government for much of the last dozen years. She admitted earlier inthe week that she supplied inside tips to one-time billionaire Raj Rajaratnam15 years ago. Rajaratnam, who is from Sri Lanka, is serving 11 years in prisonafter his conviction in history's biggest insider trading prosecution. Theprobe produced more than two dozen convictions.
She told the jury that she fed inside information to Whitman, one of severalfriends she claimed to call whenever she got reliable tips about upcomingearnings announcements. She said he refused to listen to secrets about mergersand acquisitions.
"No, unless you want to share a jail cell, you don't want to be involvedin something like that," she said he warned her. He has pleaded notguilty.
Anderson tried to damage Khan's credibility, reading statements she made whenshe pleaded guilty in 2001 to wire fraud charges in an earlier cooperation dealwith the government. She had said then that she could not comprehend how shecould engage in such reckless acts and that she would always regret herbehavior.
Yet, she had testified that she resumed cooperating in 2007 after initiallylying to the FBI about feeding inside information to several friends between2004 and 2007. She said she lived a five-minute walk from Whitman's home.
"You returned to committing crimes?" Anderson asked.
"Yes," she answered.
"Now you want the jury to believe you turned over a new leaf?"Anderson asked.
"Objection!" interrupted Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher LaVigne.
"Sustained," Judge Jed Rakoff said.
"No further questions," Anderson said, his question left only for thejury to answer.