News Release

Federal prosecutors claim a former Indiana congressman, Steve Buyer, should compensate almost $1.4 million to cover the legal bills of companies forced to incur the expenses when he was charged on insider trading charges. However, his lawyer, claimed Thursday, July 6, that it is too much to demand from his client that is already suffering financially.

Buyer’s sentencing has been postponed by U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman until July 31. Berman asked the Probation Department to evaluate the $349,846 that prosecutors claim Buyer should forfeit as criminal proceeds and another $1.39 million Buyer would owe for the legal costs for two companies.

Buyer is 64 years old and a Republican from Noblesville. He was convicted March 2023 of making illegal stock trades while he was working as a consultant and lobbyist. He held a congressional career from 1993 to 2011.

Buyer, a lawyer and Persian Gulf War veteran, at one time chaired the House Veteran’s  Affairs committee and served as a House prosecutor at ex-President Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial in 1998.

Buyer was convicted on insider trading involving the April 2018, $26.5 billion merger of T-Mobile and Sprint. The stock purchases he made on a later date in the management consulting company, Navigant, when his client, Guidehouse, was set to acquire it. The deal was publicly disclosed weeks later.

Buyer’s lawyers suggest he should only face house arrest and serve community service community service, while prosecutors are pushing for a three-year prison sentence.

Prosecutors said in a letter sent to the judge that Guidehouse is seeking $395,000 in legal fees while T-Mobile seeks $996,800 to cover theirs. The companies said all the fees were incurred during the government’s criminal investigation and their prosecution.

In another letter, this time by Buyer’s attorney, Henry Asbill, Asbill mentions the requests for forfeiture and legal fees were formed too late. He named the requested legal fees “exorbitant.” He also mentioned that the forfeiture was inflated, and did not account for the money that had already been forfeited.

In a pre-sentence submission from Buyer and his team asserted that Buyer has suffered  intensely from the cost of litigation that he and his wife has had to sell most of their assets, which include their home, condo and two cars, and informed that his wife will have to return to work at the age of 65.

During Buyer’s trial, prosecutors claimed his clients were motivated to share advantageous secrets with him because they wanted his consulting help. Defense lawyers argued that Buyer did stock market research that led him to legal and profitable trades.