Earlier this week, the SEC charged Lucent and nine current and former executives with securities fraud.
The SEC's complaint alleges that Lucent's violations of GAAP were due to the "fraudulent and reckless actions of the defendants and deficient internal controls that led to numerous accounting errors by others."
But the severity of the fine was due to the company's failure to cooperate during the investigation.
According to the SEC, during the probe Lucent provided incomplete document production, and "failed over a period of time to provide timely and full disclosure to the [SEC] staff."
In addition, the SEC noted that the company's chairman and CEO denied the fraud in an interview with Fortune magazine "after Lucent had agreed in principle to settle this case without admitting or denying the allegations."
The wording is in line with recent CW coverage on cooperation issues, which we've repeated in the box above, right.
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