Federal prosecutors in New York, Alabama, and New Hampshire have threatened to label companies uncooperative if they continue to pay the legal fees of indicted executives. Prosecutors want individuals to pay their own legal fees, even though the fees can easily be upwards of $100,000 in a white collar crime case.

The New Hampshire case involves 5 former executives of Enterasys Networks Inc. They are charged with accounting fraud for inflating 2001 revenue, but the trial has been postponed because prosecutors pressured the company to not pay the legals fees of the defendants. U.S. Attorney William Morse denies that they pressured the company to stop paying legal fees, rather the prosecutors were going to consider the payments when assessing the company’s cooperation with the case.