Martha Stewart

In 1,000 hours, a driver could cruise from Washington to Los Angeles and back about a dozen times. A sports fan could indulge in more than 330 pro-football games on TV. And Martha Stewart could help atone for running afoul of the law as a volunteer for a New York organization that helps disadvantaged women become entrepreneurs. Stewart hopes to join the list of celebrities who have worked off their legal troubles in the company of the sick or disadvantaged. Stewart's attorneys offered a detailed plan for her to serve 1,000 hours, in 20-hour weekly increments, at a center that offers financial advice and loans to low-income women called the Women's Venture Fund.

NEW YORK - Martha Stewart lost her last chance to stave off sentencing on criminal charges yesterday when a federal judge rejected her request for a new trial. Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum, of U.S. District Court in Manhattan, declared that the testimony of a government ink expert who is now accused of perjury could not have affected the jury's March 5 verdict in Stewart's trial. "Overwhelming independent evidence supports the verdict," the judge said. Stewart, 62, faces 10 to 16 months in prison after being convicted of lying to investigators looking into her late 2001 sale of nearly 4,000 shares of ImClone Systems Inc., the biotechnology company that was run by her friend Samuel D. Waksal.

NEW YORK - A federal judge refused yesterday to grant Martha Stewart a new trial, paving the way for the celebrity homemaker to be sentenced next week for lying about a stock sale. Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum, in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, brushed aside claims by Stewart and her former stockbroker that their convictions are tainted by charges that a Secret Service ink expert lied on the witness stand. "Because there is no reasonable likelihood that this perjury could have affected the jury's verdict, and because overwhelming independent evidence supports the verdict, the motions are denied," Cedarbaum wrote.

In The Region Lockheed scuttles $1.66 billion plan to buy Titan Corp. Lockheed Martin Corp. effectively scuttled plans to buy Titan Corp. for $1.66 billion, saying yesterday that it refused to wait for the outcome of a federal probe into alleged overseas bribery. Titan said it didn't expect the Justice Department to finish its probe by today, the deadline the two companies set for Titan to resolve the investigation. Titan asked for an extension but Lockheed refused. The deal ran into trouble shortly after Lockheed said in September that it would buy Titan for $1.8 billion, or $22 a share, in cash and stock.

Lawyers for Martha Stewart filed a motion yesterday for a new trial now that a federal grand jury has indicted a witness on charges of lying during Stewart's trial. This is the second attempt by Stewart and her former stockbroker to win another trial before their sentencing, which is scheduled for July 8. However, legal experts said they believe the latest motion will be denied and the path will be cleared for sentencing, which is likely to include at least 10 months in prison. Stewart and her former Merrill Lynch broker, Peter E. Bacanovic, were convicted in March of making false statements, conspiracy and obstructing a federal investigation into the sale of Stewart's ImClone Systems Inc. stock just before the price plunged.

NEW YORK - A federal judge has delayed the sentencing of Martha Stewart and her former broker Peter E. Bacanovic until July 8, allowing her lawyers time to prepare written legal arguments in an effort to win her a new trial. U.S. District Judge Miriam Cedarbaum was scheduled to sentence Stewart and Bacanovic, her former Merrill Lynch broker, on June 17. The decision to delay the sentencing was granted Friday and confirmed yesterday by the office of U.S. Attorney David N. Kelley and Stewart's defense attorney, Robert G. Morvillo.

On a recent sunny afternoon, Chris Madden frowned at a sisal carpet in her living room where, the day before, a dog had an "accident." Madden, a syndicated columnist to 400 newspapers, host for eight years of HGTV's Interiors by Design, and decorator for such celebrities as Katie Couric and Oprah Winfrey has, of course, styled her rambling house in West-chester County, N.Y., to a fare-thee-well. Yet one of her West Highland terriers, Lola or Winnie, was not showing her mistress the respect she deserves.

NEW YORK - The case against Martha Stewart took a strange new twist yesterday as the government charged an important witness with lying repeatedly at her trial. The witness, Larry F. Stewart, the laboratory director for the Secret Service who served as the prosecutors' expert on ink, was charged with two counts of perjury. Prosecutors have essentially accused him of exaggerating his role in analyzing critical documents used as evidence at the trial and of lying about his knowledge of a technical book his lab colleagues were writing.