Former Tech Exec to Plead Guilty in Trading Case

A former SanDisk Corp executive is expected to plead guilty later Friday of passing confidential tips to an independent research analyst in the U.S. government's ongoing crackdown on insider trading, according to sources close to the case.

The executive, Don Barnetson, is due in federal court later in the day, said the sources, who declined to be identified because the case was not yet public. The name of his lawyer was not immediately available.

The research analyst, John Kinnucan, of Portland, Oregon-based Broadband Research Corp., was arrested on Thursday. A criminal complaint charging him with conspiracy and securities fraud was unsealed Friday morning.

(Reporting By Jonathan Stempel and Matthew Goldstein; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)