The US government said that it intended to call Lloyd C Blankfein, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, as a witness in the insider-trading trial of Raj Rajaratnam, the Galleon Group hedge fund manager.
In a letter sent to a federal judge, prosecutors said on Tuesday that they would ask Blankfein to testify about Rajat Gupta, a former Goldman director who this month was accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission of passing along confidential information about the bank to Rajaratnam.
Federal prosecutors asked judge Richard Holwell, who is presiding over the trial, to prohibit the defence from asking Blankfein whether Goldman Sachs bore responsibility for the financial crisis and whether the bank was the subject of any pending government investigation.
In the letter, prosecutors also said that it had ?not notified Blankfein or Goldman Sachs that either is a target (or, for that matter, a subject) of any pending criminal investigation.?
On the issue of the financial crisis, the government argued that whether Goldman played any role in that crisis was wholly irrelevant to testimony about Gupta and any evidence on this topic could prejudice the jury against Blankfein?s testimony.
Regardless of the substance of Blankfein?s testimony, his presence on the witness stand will add to the already intense attention surrounding the prominent trial, which is in its third week in United States District Court in Manhattan.
On Tuesday, the government called to the witness stand Rajiv Goel, a former Intel executive and business school classmate of Rajaratnam. Goel, an Indian-born businessman who has pleaded guilty to insider trading charges, is a main cooperating witness.
Goel testified that he provided assistance to Rajaratnam by feeding him secret business information about Intel, including crucial financial data in advance of a quarterly earnings announcement.