The deterrent effect of the Tuesday conviction of four people in the Jenkens & Gilchrist/BDO Seidman tax shelter fraud case, which has followed a series of guilty pleas in tax shelter cases, cannot be underestimated, say lawyers.

The deterrent effect of the Tuesday conviction of four people in the Jenkens & Gilchrist/BDO Seidman tax shelter fraud case, which has followed a series of guilty pleas in tax shelter cases, cannot be underestimated, say lawyers.

A judge’s order that defendants in a civil insider trading case turn over to the Securities and Exchange Commission wiretaps they obtained in discovery in their criminal case came under fire Thursday at the 2nd Circuit. A lawyer for Raj Rajaratnam and Danielle Chiesi, central figures in a wide-ranging insider trading prosecution that has already netted 11 guilty pleas, asked a three-judge panel to reverse New York federal Judge Jed Rakoff’s February order compelling production of the wiretaps.

Lawyers for former Jack Abramoff associate Kevin Ring have asked a federal judge to delay their client’s retrial to give the U.S. Supreme Court time to rule on three cases that address the federal honest services statute. How the Court comes down will affect what charges Ring would face in a second trial, as well as whether key defense witnesses choose to testify, Ring’s lawyers argued.

The government has been sniffing around hedge funds for years — now, like a dog that’s found where the bone is buried, it has started digging. And the SEC has made clear that it wants blood from the largely unregulated hedge fund industry.