Prosecutors had sought an 18-month prison term for Park Dae-Sung, 30 --better known by his Internet alias "Minerva" -- while some mediafreedom groups criticised the decision to charge him.

Parkwas arrested in early January and charged with spreading online rumoursthat the government in late December ordered local banks not to buydollars as part of efforts to stabilise the won.

Prosecutorsclaimed the December posting led to dollar hoarding, forcing thegovernment hurriedly to inject two billion dollars to stabilise thecurrency market.

"Considering all the circumstances, it is hardto conclude that Park was aware the information was misleading when hewrote the postings," said Judge Yoo Young-Hyun of Seoul CentralDistrict Court.

The judge said that even if Park had realised theinformation was false, it cannot be concluded he intended to damage thepublic interest, considering the circumstances at the time or thespecial characteristics of the foreign exchange market.

Parkwrote more than 200 economic commentaries in recent months and gained amajor following after correctly predicting the collapse of USinvestment bank Lehman Brothers last September.

But McMaster said in a filing with the Supreme Court on Monday that hewon't oppose the state Supreme Court taking up the challenge filed lastweek by a Chapin High School student.

McMaster says the timing may not be right to shift the issues raised in the case from a public policy debate to the courtroom.

Law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell recruited the Securities andExchange Commission's former enforcement chief and another formerhigh-level government lawyer to join its white-collar defense group,part of an effort to expand its Washington practice.
Linda Chatman Thomsen, who left the SEC earlier this year, and RaulYanes, former staff secretary to President George W. Bush, are joiningthe law firm as partners.

Both had worked at Davis Polk in New York before joining the government.

The duo will be the first litigators in the 11-person Washington office in years.

FormerSEC Commissioner Annette Nazareth and Robert Colby, a former deputydirector of the SEC's trading and markets division, also recentlyjoined the firm's Washington office to focus on financial regulatoryissues.

Davis Polk clients, including large financialinstitutions, are closely entangled with the government as it haspumped billions of dollars into financial rescue plans. Congress isstudying new regulation of financial markets.

They tapped Lauren Stone's 401(k) retirement savings and saved $1,000by installing Chinese-made drywall throughout their two-story home. Nowthe Stones are among hundreds of Katrina victims facing another, thistime unnatural, disaster.

Sulfur-emittingwallboard from China is wreaking havoc in homes, charring electricalwires, eating away at jewelry, silverware and other valuables, andpossibly even sickening families.

"The bathroom upstairs has acorroded shower-head, the door hinges are rusting out," said50-year-old Thomas Stone, the longtime fire chief of St. BernardParish, outside New Orleans. And then there's the stench, like rotteneggs, that seems to get worse with the heat and humidity.

"It makes me wish there would be another flood to wash it out," said his wife Lauren, 49.

Chinesemanufacturers flooded the U.S. market with more than 500 million poundsof drywall around the same time Katrina was flooding New Orleans, anAssociated Press review of shipping records has found.