Founder of Japan's Livedoor fights fraud conviction
By Elaine Lies
TOKYO, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Disgraced Internet entrepreneur Takafumi Horie, who shook up corporate Japan with his flashy lifestyle and brash takeover attempts, appealed on Friday his conviction on securities fraud.
Horie, 35, was sentenced to 2-½ years in prison a year ago for his role in a securities fraud at his former company, Internet company Livedoor -- an unusually harsh punishment for white-collar crime that was seen as a sign of regulators' determination to clamp down on corporate misdeeds.
Japanese executives who plead guilty and show remorse often avoid time in jail, but Horie insisted he was innocent, telling the court he knew nothing of the problems that led to his arrest.
He blamed other executives at his company but acknowledged he should have been more careful about accounting.
Though Horie was not in court, his defiance was conveyed by his lawyers, who implied that the harsh sentence -- which they said was based on "mistakes" -- might have been at least partly due to his flouting of Japanese corporate norms.
"There's a proverb in Japan that the nail that sticks out will be hammered in," said Yoshio Okada.
He said his client may meet that description in Japan's business community but this should not influence legal decisions.
Horie, who was detained for three months following his arrest before being released, is currently out of jail on bail of 500 million yen ($4.7 million). The appeal process will likely take several months.
A dropout from the prestigious University of Tokyo who built a $50,000 start-up into a conglomerate worth $6 billion at its peak, Horie faced charged over Livedoor's 2004 earnings.
Prosecutors charged that Horie pressured aides to inflate profits using gains from the sale of Livedoor stock held in Hong Kong-based investment funds and phony sales to allied firms.
BAD BOY BUSINESSMAN
Opinions were divided of Horie during his heyday, and emotions still run high, with thousands of shareholders suing him over Livedoor's losses following his arrest.
"He lied to us. He needs to reflect on what he's done and apologise," said plaintiff Shinya Sudo, who stood outside the Tokyo High Court with a sign saying, "Horie -- don't run away. Show up in court!"
Horie rocketed to fame in 2004 when he tried and failed to buy a professional baseball team in the western city of Osaka.
The audacious bid and his takeover battle a year later with a larger media group won him fans but annoyed conservative business leaders.
Nicknamed "Horiemon" for his resemblance to Doraemon, a rotund robot cat character with magical powers and no ears, the former tycoon was once touted as a symbol of a new, dynamic Japan where hostile corporate takeovers would be the norm and wealth was for flaunting.
Japan's ruling party chose Horie to run in a 2005 election, but he failed to win a seat.
Livedoor lost $5 billion in market value following his arrest in 2006, which sparked a share sell-off that crashed the Tokyo Stock Exchange's computer system.
The company lost its Tokyo Stock Exchange listing a few months later after its share price sank to just 94 yen. ($1=107.39 Yen) (Editing by Rodney Joyce)
