Fired auditor says he was just following advice

The Arthur Andersen auditor fired for destroying Enron documents says he was just following the advice of the firm's lawyers.

David Duncan told congressional investigators the lawyers emphasised Andersen's policy of allowing destruction of some documents.

The news comes as Andersen revealed in a newspaper ad that some of the disposed-of documents had been recovered from electronic sources.

The ad, in the form of a letter from chief executive Joe Berardino, said they had been turned over to the government.

The former chief auditor for Andersen's Enron account told investigators that general discussions began at Andersen of what Enron-related documents to discard in September.

"It was unusual" to emphasise the document-destruction policy, David Duncan told the investigators, according to congressional sources familiar with his testimony.

An Andersen spokesman declined to comment.

Committee investigators questioned Duncan for several hours in what Republican and Democratic committee staffers say was a valuable information-gathering session that provided many leads.

"It's now clear to us that key players at Andersen as well as Enron knew of the growing problems months before the company imploded," said Ken Johnson, spokesman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee.