Former Cendant chairman gets 12 years, 7 months in prison

1/17/2007

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. Former Cendant Corp. Chairman Walter Forbes was sentenced today to 12 years and seven months in prison and ordered to pay $3.275 billion in restitution for leading the largest accounting fraud of the 1990s.

In October, a jury found Forbes guilty of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and two counts of making false statements in a massive fraud scheme that cost the travel and real estate company and its investors more than $3 billion. He was found not guilty of a fourth count, securities fraud.

The Cendant case was among the first in a series of corporate accounting scandals that sparked outrage from investors in recent years.

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