Ex-baseball star sentenced to 8 months of home detention for insider trading

A federal judge on Monday ordered a retired professional baseball player to spend eight months on home detention for insider trading, ending nearly decade-long criminal saga that included two major trials.

Douglas DeCinces will be credited for one day already served in jail, pay a $10,000 fine and be on probation for two years under the sentence imposed by U.S. District Judge Andrew J. Guilford, who said he initially wanted DeCinces "to incur the humility of serving time in prison" but changed his mind after hearing from him and his supporters.

"Coming in here today, I thought a jail term would be appropriate to help you appreciate the seriousness of this. Hearing everything, thinking this through, hearing you, I decided not to do that," said Guilford, an ardent baseball fan who said he fondly remembers DeCinces' time in Major League Baseball.

The judge accepted Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer L. Waier's recommendation.

Guilford told DeCinces, a former third baseman for the Baltimore Orioles and California Angels, "I have respected you long before we were together in this courtroom."

"There's a lot to respect about you, the judge said. "So I have to test my own conscience. Am I being overly lenient, or am I being overly hard?"

Guilford said he'd "never seen a package of letters like this" and said many are from "folks I admire greatly, not because I'm a baseball fan but because they're great folks."

The judge referred to retired Major League Baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth, who wrote a letter support DeCinces, Edwin C. "Ed" Arnold, a retired sportscaster who's deeply involved in charities and also wrote a letter supporting DeCinces.

"When Ed speaks, I listen," Guilford said.

A jury in 2017 convicted DeCinces of 14 felony counts of tender offer fraud related to the 2009 acquisition of Advanced Medical Optics by Abbott Laboratories. DeCinces testified against Advanced CEO James Mazzo at a second trial in 2018, but jurors hung 10-2 in favor of acquitting Mazzo, and the U.S. attorney's office later dropped the charges after Mazzo entered into a no-fault civil judgment that fined him $1.5 million. United States v. DeCinces, 12-CR00269 (C.D. Cal., filed Nov. 28, 2012).

DeCinces' lawyer, Kenneth B. Julian of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP, noted that DeCinces paid a $2.5 million fine to the Securities Exchange Commission before criminal charges were filed, which more than covered his $1.3 million in ill-gotten gains.

-- Meghann M. Cuniff