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Former Gemstar CEO Ordered to Pay $22 Million

May 9, 2006  •  Post A Comment

A federal judge has ordered former Gemstar-TV Guide International Chairman and CEO Henry Yuen to pay more than $22 million in fines to settle charges related to his role in an accounting scandal at the company.

Mr. Yuen was ordered to return nearly $10.6 million and to pay a penalty of the same amount, plus $1.1 million in interest.

Mr. Yuen will appeal the ruling, his lawyer, Stanley Arkin, told the Associated Press.

U.S. District Court Judge Mariana Pfaelzer, who issued the order, ruled in March that Mr. Yuen had committed securities fraud by artificially inflating Gemstar’s advertising and licensing revenue by $225 million between 2000 and 2002. The Securities and Exchange Commission, which announced the judge’s ruling Monday, filed the civil charges against Mr. Yuen last year.

In addition to the fine, Mr. Yuen, who was fired from Gemstar in 2003, was permanently barred from serving as an officer or director of a public company, the SEC said in a statement.

The judge’s ruling against Mr. Yuen marked the end of a years-long probe into the accounting scandal at Gemstar, which is 41 percent controlled by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. Mr. Yuen was the last of several former Gemstar executives to face civil charges from the scandal.