US insider trading case: Indian-origin man charged

Three others charged along with him by prosecutors in New York are Donald Longueuil,who formerly worked as a research analyst,Ason Pflaum,a former research analyst for Barai and Noah Freeman,a portfolio manager at a fund.

Barai and Longueuil,34,have also been charged with obstruction of justice for their efforts to destroy evidence of their involvement in insider trading after reading media reports about the FBIs investigation.

The lengths to which two of these defendants went to cover their tracks sounds like something out of a bad movie, Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement.

The charges are the latest in the US governments biggest insider trading probe. So far,13 people have been arrested or charged in the investigation. Barai is accused of trading on inside information about technology companies after receiving tips from a consultant working for expert network firm Primary Global Research.

Barai Capital was one of the hedge funds raided by US investigators in November. It has since shut down. Prior to starting his own fund,Barai was a portfolio manager at Citigroups 2 billion Tribeca Global Management,which was shut in 2008.

A trial in the case at the centre of the investigation,against former Galleon Group LLC co-founder Raj Rajaratnam,a Sri Lankan,is scheduled to begin on February 28 in New York.