"I think most of the second half of the article is irrelevant. Lynch's defence to being accused of fraud is "Whitman was a bad manager after the sale", which, again, is nothing to do with the sale itself."
Lynch's defence is HP's post-acquisition decisions hurt Autonomy revenues and that resulted in a significant portion of the write down. If he can suggest (I don't think he will be able to prove it) that Meg and the board had decided that Autonomy needed to be written off ASAP so that everything could be hung on Leo and Autonomy fraud, it puts a lot of pressure on HP to demonstrate the extent of the fraud vs the writedown.
The way HP's witnesses are shaping up, Lynch declining to go on the stand to avoid looking "as bad as the other side" might actually go in his favour. Although it would really hurt popcorn sales...
