Lady Who Traded On Inside Information Obtained From AshleyMadison.Com Paramours Will Not Do Time
Remember Donna Murdoch? Her story is a bit complicated but essentially: Murdoch and her husband were hard up for some money (they owed $1.45 million on a subprime home mortgage, natch). She decided the best way to tackle the debt was to make some money trading on material non-public information. Getting the tips was easy enough– Murdoch got on AshleyMadison.com where she met an Ernst and Young partner named James Gansman who advised companies doing mergers and was more than happy to give them to her. Only problem was, Big D didn’t have the cash to trade on Gansman’s inside info, so she hopped back on to the adultery site and found another guy who could front the money. That guy was 71 year-old Richard Hansen, who gave her a job at Keystone Equities Group (where he was chairman), plus some of his penis on the side.
Both Murdoch and Hansen traded on Gansman’s tips (neither guy knew about the other, by the by) and while all three faced years in prison, only the men are doing time, on account of Murdoch screwing them yet again.
Under sentencing guidelines, Murdoch had faced nearly four years behind bars for 17 counts of securities fraud, making false statements and obstruction of justice. Murdoch was busted in 2008 after regulators noticed suspicious trading activity involving mergers and acquisitions, through which she netted about $392,000. She initially lied to the feds but later decided to come clean and became what prosecutors called a "model cooperating witness," testifying for four grueling days against ex-lover James Gansman, with whom she carried on a lengthy affair after they met on ashleymadison.com.
Murdoch, 49, buried her face in her hands and began blubbering after the judge said she wouldn't be heading off to the pokey.
"Your honor, I will carry the shame of all my wrongdoing for the rest of my life," the heavyset blonde said as her forgiving hubby and three kids watched from the gallery in Manhattan federal court.
After the judge sentenced Murdoch to two years probation she told the insider trader to get her life back on track stat and consider more legal ways to pay back debts, considering her prior modus operandi will probably not work much longer as Murdoch is "no youngster."
