Former AIG top brass to settle class action over accounts

Former AIG bosses Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, Howard Smith, Christian Milton and Michael Castelli have agreed to pay $115m covered by D&O insurance to settle a shareholder lawsuit, Reuters reports.

  • Greenberg was AIG chief executive
  • Howard Smith was chief finance officer
  • Christian Milton was reinsurance executive
  • Michael Castelli was AIG controller

The deal also covers C.V. Starr and Starr International, both companies run by Greenberg.

Class action?

The pay-off depends on the lawsuit being given class action status by a New York judge this week.

The lawsuit was brought by several Ohio pension funds in 2004. They claim they lost money on AIG because of mis-accounting and fraud.

Several other defendants have already settled the same lawsuit, including Berkshire Hathaway's General Re Corp, which had entered into a reinsurance transaction with AIG that improperly boosted its loss reserves, and AIG's auditor PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Manhattan hearing

Dow Jones adds that the judge is Deborah Batts in Manhattan and the two-day hearing starts Thursday.

The lead plaintiffs are the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System, the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio and the Ohio Police & Fire Pension Fund.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is still pursuing a case against Greenberg and Smith.

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