Executives

During his more than three decades in real estate David Pogue played many roles, but environmental expert was never one of them. That didn't stop his company, Los Angeles real estate brokerage CB Richard Ellis, from naming him the company guru of all things eco-friendly nearly two years ago. Pogue suddenly found himself in charge of making the firm and its projects more energy efficient and environmentally conscious, an abrupt switch from his previous...

Troubled mortgage financing giant Freddie Mac and its employees were dealt another blow Wednesday when one of the company's top executives was found dead in his Virginia home, an apparent suicide. The death of David Kellermann, 41, the acting chief financial officer, adds more turmoil at Freddie Mac.

Japanese suppliers will pay criminal fines of more than $500 million after being caught in a massive auto parts price-fixing scheme, and four Japanese executives will serve U.S. jail terms as part of a plea deal, the Department of Justice said. Yazaki Corp. will pay a $470-million fine, the second-largest criminal fine obtained for a Sherman Act antitrust violation, the government said, while Denso Corp., agreed to pay a $78-million fine. Regulators said that for as long as 10 years, the companies colluded to divvy up contracts to supply Honda Motor Co. and Toyota Motor Corp.

Four former Charter Communications Inc. executives received sentences Friday ranging from 14 months in prison to two years of probation for their roles in an accounting scandal at the nation's third-largest cable television provider. U.S. District Judge Carol Jackson in St. Louis said the executives, who pleaded guilty to felony counts related to a scheme to dupe investors, let down their company and deceived investors and regulators. St. Louis-based Charter was not accused of wrongdoing.

Toyota Motor Corp. said nine of its U.S. executives planned to retire by the end of the year, sparking speculation that the automaker might be looking to revamp its executive lineup in the midst of an increasingly tough U.S. sales environment. The retiring executives include Senior Vice President Dave Illingworth, who has been with the automaker nearly 30 years.

Gateway Inc., the third-largest U.S. personal computer maker, hired four executives as it tries to return to profitability after losses in eight of the last nine quarters. William Parker will take on the newly created positions of president and general manager of Gateway's retail stores, the company said. Parker was formerly senior vice president for operations at Banana Republic stores, a division of Gap Inc.

As major corporations pay more to relocate executives, they are finding executives less willing to move to Southern California, a new survey said. Seventy-three percent of the human resources directors surveyed at more than 100 Southern California corporations in Russell Reynolds Associates' annual executive recruiting study said it is "somewhat" or "very" difficult to relocate executives here. In 1989, 71% said it was somewhat or very difficult. John S.

Angry employees holding the top executives of the Credit Foncier bank dug in their heels on the third day of a standoff with the French government over job security and the fate of the bank. Several hundred employees occupying the Paris headquarters of the property lender announced they would open the bank for business as usual today but still bar the captive executives from leaving. They allowed bank governor Jerome Meysonnier to hold a news conference inside the bank.

Two former executives at Kmart Corp. were charged Wednesday with a $42.3-million securities fraud allegedly executed to meet their division's financial targets. The indictments are the first from a federal probe of accounting practices at the retailer in the period leading up to its January 2002 bankruptcy filing. Legal experts said the indictments could be a tactic to get lower-level former Kmart managers to give evidence against senior executives.

Business leaders' confidence in the U.S. economy has fallen sharply in the past few months and stands at a five-year low, the Conference Board said. The group's measure of business confidence closed at 47 in the final quarter of 1987, down from 59 in the third quarter. Sharp declines were registered in executives' confidence about current and future economic conditions.