http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45045027/ns/business-us_business/#.Tqgb23LQPUk<snip>
NEW YORK — Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta surrendered to federal authorities Wednesday to face criminal charges related to his hedge fund manager friend Raj Rajaratnam, the central figure in a U.S. crackdown on insider trading.
An FBI spokesman said Gupta, 62, surrendered to agents at his home in Connecticut and he was driven to the New York FBI office, where he was placed under arrest at 8:15 a.m. ET.
The Securities and Exchange Commissioner originally brought civil fraud charges against Gupta in March. The SEC alleged that, at the height of the financial crisis, he passed along privileged financial information that helped enrich Raj Rajaratnam, a former billionaire hedge fund manager who was the prime target of the criminal probe.
Gupta's name played prominently at the criminal trial earlier this year of Rajaratnam, who was convicted after prosecutors used a trove of wiretaps on which he could be heard coaxing a crew of corporate tipsters into giving him an illegal edge on blockbuster trades.