Tuesday, April 5, 2011  03:06 AM

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2011/04/05/money-laundering-convictions-tossed-for-two-national-century-executives.html?sid=101

An appeals court has reversed money-laundering convictions of two men convicted in the National Century Financial Enterprises case in 2009.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out those charges against James E. Dierker and Randolph H. Speer in separate decisions published yesterday.

Money-laundering convictions of two other National Century officials, Donald H. Ayers and Roger S. Faulkenberry, were overturned last year when the appeals court found that the charges had not been proved during trial.

Government attorneys told the appeals court that the four cases were so similar that, if one set of money-laundering charges was reversed, all should be. The appeals court agreed.

But the appeals court, as it had for Ayers and Faulkenberry, affirmed the rest of the convictions and orders against Dierker and Speer. Both had appealed their convictions and sentences; Dierker also appealed restitution and forfeiture orders.

Dierker had been convicted of conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and concealment of money laundering. Judge Algenon L. Marbley had sentenced him to concurrent terms of five years in prison for each conviction and ordered him to forfeit $47.6 million and pay $7.9 million in restitution.

Speer was convicted of conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud, securities fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and concealment of money laundering. Marbley sentenced him to 12 years in prison.

When Marbley resentenced Ayers and Faulkenberry, their prison terms remained the same because he ordered that prison time that had been concurrent run consecutively. Resentencing dates for Dierker and Speer have not been set.

National Century, which went bankrupt in 2002, offered financing to small hospitals, clinics and nursing homes. Executives falsified company financial reports, and at least 275 health-care companies collapsed after National Century failed.