Trial delayed for Stanford to get drug treatment

(Bloomberg): Texas financier Allen Stanford won’t go to trial on charges he led a $7 billion investment fraud until after he receives care for a prescription-drug addiction, a federal judge ruled. “Nothing can be done until the medical aspect is cleared up,” US District Judge David Hittner in Houston told defence lawyers and federal prosecutors yesterday after an almost eight- hour hearing on Stanford’s mental competency. Three psychiatrists, one working for the government and two working for the defence, testified that Stanford’s dependency on prescription anti-anxiety medication and the after-effects of a head injury he sustained in a jailhouse beating left him unfit for the trial scheduled to start 24 January.

Stanford, 60, is accused of leading a scheme centred on the sale of certificates of deposit by Antigua-based Stanford International Bank Ltd. Stanford, indicted on 21 criminal counts in June 2009, has denied wrongdoing.

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