EX-BROKER PLEADS NOT GUILTY TO CHARGES OF MONEY LAUNDERING

A former broker for Lehman Brothers pleaded not guilty yesterday to charges
that she helped launder $15 million in drug money for a former Mexican
politician.

The broker, Consuelo Marquez, 39, sat quietly at a hearing in Federal
District Court in Manhattan, speaking softly as she entered her plea and
acknowledged to a magistrate judge that she understood her rights.

Ms. Marquez was indicted this week on charges that she conspired with Mario
Villanueva, the former governor of the state of Quintana Roo on Mexico's
Caribbean coast, to hide drug-money payoffs that he received from one of
Mexico's most powerful cocaine organizations, the Southeast Cartel.

The indictment also charges that when Mr. Villanueva became a fugitive in
1999, Ms. Marquez made a concerted effort to move his money from Lehman
Brothers accounts to accounts that were harder to trace.

The judge, Debra Freeman, ordered Ms. Marquez released on $500,000 personal
recognizance bond, which means that she would not have to put up any cash
or property, but that she and other family members signing the bond would
be liable if she fled.

The government had sought stiffer bond terms, asking that she put up
$100,000 in cash or property to secure the bond. A federal prosecutor,
Anirudh Bansal, argued that Ms. Marquez was a flight risk because she had
ties to Mexico and, if convicted, could face a heavy prison term. He also
noted that she had substantial financial assets, including a New York
apartment worth about $1 million.

But Ms. Marquez's lawyer, Robert G. Morvillo, argued that his client had
more incentive to stay in the United States than to flee. She is an
American citizen, he said, who was educated at Barnard College and who has
spent virtually her entire life in New York City, where she has relatives
and is raising a 5-year-old son as a single parent. "There's no way she's
going to run away," Mr. Morvillo said.

Saying that she also needed to marshal her financial assets for her legal
defense, he added that she planned to fight the charges, and had "great
confidence in her ability to prevail at trial."