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Ex-housing chief faces new charges

A former Shaw Group employee, her boyfriend and another man were indicted Wednesday by a federal grand jury in Baton Rouge that accused them of insider trading that enabled them to profit from the sale of Baton Rouge-based Shaw to CB&I.

Kelly Liu, 31, a Baton Rouge, is accused of passing along information to Salvador Russo III, 34, of Baton Rouge, and Victory Ho, of Morgan City.

Liu worked in the financial planning and analysis department at Shaw and learned in mid-2012 about the potential merger. The merger was publicly announced on July 30 of that year.

Federal law bars officers, directors and other members of publicly traded companies from using secret company information to profit from stock trades.

Ho and Russo allegedly purchased Shaw stock before the public announcement, when Shaw’s stock rose a great deal.

Ho, who formerly served as chairman of the Morgan City Housing Authority Board, resigned from that position Aug. 22, 2016, after he was one of three people arrested in a narcotics investigation in St. Mary Parish.

Ho was arrested Aug. 18, 2016, by the St. Mary Parish Sheriff’s Office on charges of possession of marijuana, Percocet, Lortab, Norco, Xanax, and drug paraphernalia with intent to distribute, transactions involving drug proceeds, possession of a firearm in the presence of a controlled dangerous substance, violations of the controlled dangerous substance law drug free zone and distribution-manufacturing-sale-possession of synthetic urine.

During that investigation, sheriff’s office narcotics detectives conducted multiple search warrants in the Morgan City area. The search warrants stem from a long-term investigation regarding the sale and possession of illegal narcotics, Sheriff Mark Hebert said in a news release.

The federal government maintains Ho sold his Shaw securities after the announcement, while Russo held on to his. Ho is accused of making $294,000, while Russo made $2,500 in unrealized profits from their alleged insider trading, according to acting U.S. Attorney Corey Amundson.

Other former Shaw employees have been indicted in the federal insider trading probe of the Shaw sale. In February 2015, Scott David Zeringue, a former Shaw Group vice president of construction operations, and his brother-in-law Jesse H. Roberts III were accused of insider trades with alleged frauds totaling
nearly $1 million.

Zeringue, who later pleaded guilty, told Roberts about the move. Roberts, a Ruston dentist, then allegedly told Billy J. Adcox Jr. about the information and Adcox then passed it on to a man only identified as John Doe in his indictment. Roberts and Adcox are still scheduled for trial.

ST. MARY NOW

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