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Executives accused of looting Tyco face retrial today

NEW YORK (AP) ? Two top Tyco International executives accused of looting $600 million of company money to finance lavish lifestyles go on trial for a second time today.

The executives? first trial, which lasted six months, was aborted last year due to a menacing letter and telephone call to a juror. Prosecutors plan to present a leaner, shorter case this time around.

In the retrial, prosecutors are expected to focus less on items like former Tyco head L. Dennis Kozlowski?s $6,000 gold-threaded shower curtain, and more on how he and co-defendant Mark Swartz allegedly looted the company. The defendants each face up to 30 years in prison if convicted of the most serious charges. In the first trial, prosecutors gave jurors a videotaped look at the $2 million birthday party that Kozlowski, Tyco?s former chairman and chief executive officer, threw for his wife on a Mediterranean island, and a video tour through his $18 million Fifth Avenue apartment.

Jurors were told Kozlowski spent some $11 million of Tyco?s money to furnish the apartment. The furnishings included a $2,900 set of hangers, a $4,995 custom-made blue-and-gold bedskirt, and a $2,665 blue velvet pillow.

And those were the little things. The jurors also saw a Persian rug, 20 feet by 16 feet, that cost $191,250, a walnut clock that set Tyco back $113,750, and a pair of French antique stools, bought for $125,000.

The prosecutors? videotapes, which included scenes shot aboard Kozlowski?s yacht, , sometimes made the proceedings seem more like an episode of ?Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous? than a larceny trial. Prosecutors said at the time that the extravagances demonstrated the defendants? greed and showed where some of the money they allegedly stole ended up.