FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CRM FRIDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1997 (202) 514-2008 TDD (202) 514-1888 FORMER ADM EXECUTIVE PLEADS GUILTY TO FRAUD Washington, D.C.--- The Department Of Justice announced that Mark E. Whitacre, the former president of the BioProducts Division of the Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM), today entered pleas of guilty to charges of wire fraud, money laundering, conspiracy to defraud the IRS, filing false income tax return, and interstate transportation of stolen property. Whitacre, 40, of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, entered his plea before U.S. District Court Judge Harold Baker in Urbana, Illinois. Whitacre admitted in his pleas that he had fraudulently taken nearly $9 million from ADM when he was an executive with the agricultural products company based in Decatur, Illinois. Whitacre admitted to obtaining the money through an elaborate scheme involving the creation of fictitious companies and invoices, and the extensive use of foreign bank accounts to conceal his thefts, launder the money and defraud the IRS. Whitacre pled to 37 counts of the indictment returned by the grand jury in January 1997. The plea agreement provides that the government will recommend that the court impose a term of imprisonment of 78 - 97 months. In a separate federal price-fixing case pending in Chicago, Whitacre is scheduled to go to trial next May along with co- defendants Michael Andreas and Terry Wilson. The prosecution which resulted in today's pleas of guilty was conducted by the Fraud Section of the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice with the trial team of Nancy J. Jardini, Donald B. Mackay and James J. Nixon. The case was investigated by Special Agent Anthony P. D'Angelo of the Chicago office of the FBI and IRS Criminal Investigative Agent Michael Bandy and Sue Roderick of its Springfield, Illinois' office. ### 97-425