R Foster Winans

Re "High Cost of Media Circuses," Commentary, March 1: R. Foster Winans, no stranger to doing time for insider trading, oddly linked Martha Stewart with the likes of Scott Peterson and Michael Jackson and said, "The 1st Amendment lobby would howl in protest if any version of the British system were considered here. But I would argue that the 1st Amendment right to free speech should never trump the 6th Amendment right to 'a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury.' " While one amendment in the Bill of Rights "trumping" another is not something we like to contemplate, others might argue that the right to free speech was seen to be so important to the writers of the Constitution, having freshly freed themselves from British rule, that they made it the 1st Amendment -- not the 6th. Louis J. Ganim Clifton Park, N.Y. A scoop for the media: The most important story in the world today is the global war on terrorism.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday that Richard W. DeBoe agreed to pay $24,517 to settle federal allegations that he abetted fraud by Peter N. Brant, who pleaded guilty a decade earlier of using unpublished Wall Street Journal columns for insider trading. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ordered the payment in a June 26 judgment that also bars DeBoe from future violations of securities rules, the SEC said in a statement.

An ex-stockbroker convicted of trading on information leaked by former Wall Street Journal reporter R. Foster Winans was sentenced Wednesday to six months in prison, to be served on weekends. U.S. District Judge Charles E. Stewart Jr. also fined Kenneth P. Felis $25,000, gave him five years' probation and ordered him to perform 500 hours of community service during the probationary period. Felis, a former broker at Kidder, Peabody & Co.

The Supreme Court said today it will decide if the Reagan Administration has wide latitude to bar foreigners from making speeches in the United States if they have Communist or anti-American beliefs. The justices will hear arguments this term in an appeal by the government of a ruling by the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Former Wall Street Journal reporter R. Foster Winans has agreed to give up $4,502.84 that he made illicitly by trading stocks on which he was reporting for the newspaper, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday. Winans signed the agreement without admitting or denying the SEC's assertions of fraud, although he has already been convicted on criminal fraud charges stemming from the same case. The agreement, completed Monday, was made public by the agency Tuesday.

Former Wall Street Journal reporter R. Foster Winans testified in his own behalf Monday, claiming that stockbroker Peter N. Brant had suggested the scheme of trading stocks based on information before it appeared under Winans' byline in the paper's widely read "Heard on the Street" column.

Former Wall Street Journal reporter R. Foster Winans described in court Tuesday how a wealthy stockbroker lured him into leaking information about his stock-market column by flaunting a life style of exclusive clubs and restaurants, expensive cars and Long Island weekends. In his second day on the witness stand, Winans, who once wrote the newspaper's much-followed Heard on the Street column, gave his version of how he and Peter N. Brant, a former broker with Kidder, Peabody & Co.

A federal judge, denying defense motions for dismissal of securities fraud, conspiracy and mail- and wire-fraud charges against a former Wall Street Journal reporter and two others, said Friday that he is "persuaded" that the alleged offenses took place and that a "conspiracy existed." Attorneys for R. Foster Winans, who wrote the Journal's influential "Heard on the Street" stock-market column; his roommate, David Carpenter, and Kenneth P. Felis, a former stockbroker for Kidder, Peabody & Co.

A federal prosecutor, seeking to cast further doubt on the integrity of former Wall Street Journal reporter R. Foster Winans, suggested Tuesday that Winans had improperly used information gathered by fellow reporters in his own stories when he worked at the Trentonian newspaper. Cross-examining Winans during his trial for stock fraud and conspiracy, Assistant U.S. Atty.

A former editor for the Wall Street Journal sued the paper Tuesday for $12.64 million, claiming that he was fired and his reputation smeared by a false charge of plagiarism. Jonathan Kandell, the Journal's assistant foreign editor before his dismissal May 2, also demanded the return of original notes and other documents that he contended the paper's editors had kept, knowing that they would support his position.