Ebbers Released from Prison
CBJ — Bernie Ebbers, the former CEO of WorldCom has been released from a U.S. prison due to serious health issues.
The 78-year-old Ebbers, who was born in Edmonton, has been in prison serving a 25-year term for a large corporate accounting scandal.
Ebbers was ordered released by a U.S. District Judge. He was not in court with his lawyers saying he has been hospitalized. Court was told he has lost a lot of weight, going from more than 200 pounds to less than 150 pounds as of last week.
WorldCom collapsed and went into bankruptcy in 2002, with many investors cumulatively losing millions of dollars in investment and/or retirement savings.
The collapse followed revelations of an $11 billion US accounting fraud that included pressure by top executives to inflate numbers to make the company seem more profitable.
Ebbers was convicted in 2005 and began serving his sentence in 2006.
