Martha Stewart vows to fight any charges

NEW YORK (AP) -- Martha Stewart plans to fight any charges if a grand jury indicts her in the insider trading scandal that has clouded her graceful-living empire for the past year, her lawyer said.
Stewart's chief attorney Robert Morvillo said Tuesday that if she is indicted, "she intends to declare her innocence and proceed to trial."
The vow came as Stewart's media company said it had been warned that federal prosecutors and securities regulators would pursue charges against her soon.
The home-decorating mogul who built her fortune as a symbol of impeccable taste is under investigation for selling 4,000 shares of biotechnology company ImClone Systems in December 2001 just before the government released a negative decision on an ImClone cancer drug.
On Tuesday, the company said Stewart's attorneys had told the company that federal prosecutors in New York intend to ask a grand jury for an indictment "in the near future."
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan and the Securities and Exchange Commission have been looking into whether Stewart had advance word of the news, which sent ImClone shares tumbling.