By Dan Levine
DUBLIN, California (Reuters) - A former technology consultant jailed in a widening insider trading case says she was approached by federal agents who sought her cooperation in the probe just weeks before her arrest.
Winifred Jiau, the sole female defendant among seven insider trading defendants arrested since November, is also the only one who has been denied bail. A Reuters reporter spoke with her for about 20 minutes on Thursday morning in a visiting room at a sprawling northern California jail.
"My situation is very similar to John Kinnucan, " the 43-year-old Jiau said in the interview, referring to an independent research analyst who also says that he refused to cooperate with FBI agents. Kinnucan has not been arrested or charged with any crimes.
"Initially the FBI just wanted me to be a cooperating witness," Jiau said. She declined to be more specific, but said she was approached by authorities in early December before she was arrested later that month.
Jiau, a very thin woman whose white jail ID bracelet dwarfed her wrist, said she was sharing a cell with another prisoner. The institution serves bologna every day, a food that the dual U.S. and Taiwan citizen said was unfamiliar to her.
"The only thing normal is milk," she said.
U.S. prosecutors in Manhattan allege Jiau peddled information about computer chipmakers Marvell Technology Group Ltd
Jiau is being held at the Santa Rita Jail, a detention center for pre-trial defendants about 35 miles east of San Francisco. She declined to discuss the specific allegations against her, but said she was unprepared for her arrest.
"I have not decided" whether to cooperate with authorities in the ongoing probe, she said.
A spokesman for the FBI was not immediately available to comment. A spokeswoman for the office of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney declined to comment.
Jiau told Reuters she was having trouble finding an attorney to represent her in New York, in part because many law firms had conflicts due to pre-existing clients in the probe.
"I really need a counsel," Jiau said.
Last week a federal magistrate judge granted Jiau $250,000 bail, but she was held in jail because the person who initially agreed to co-sign the bond pulled out.
A different magistrate judge on Monday then refused to grant her bail, saying she could be a flight risk. The judge said she has no ties to the community because she is not married, has no children, and her immediate family reside in Taiwan.
Authorities have arrested seven people since November in a probe linked to expert network firms that connect hedge funds with experts in various business sectors. They are accused of leaking confidential information about companies that gave certain investors an unfair edge in trading.
Authorities have attempted to gain cooperation of other people whose names have surfaced in the probes.
Kinnucan, an analyst based in Portland, Oregon, has said the FBI approached him seeking cooperation. But Kinnucan refused and alerted his firm's contacts.
Agents also sought the cooperation of insider trading defendant Manosha Karunatilaka before his arrest last month, a source familiar with the situation has said. Karunatilaka was a manager at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company North America in Massachusetts.
Primary Global Research, an expert networking firm, has said Jiau worked with the firm from September 2006 until December 2008. The period roughly corresponds with the time-frame in which prosecutors said Jiau's alleged illegal activity took place. Jiau also worked for Vista, a different research firm, before Primary Global, her San Francisco-based lawyer said.
Jiau is scheduled to appear in federal court in San Francisco again on January 12.
The case in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California is U.S. v. Jiau, 10-mj-71093.
(Reporting by Dan Levine; Writing by Martha Graybow and Dan Levine, editing by Dave Zimmerman)
