It was American International Group accounting change blundersin 2005 that hurt the company's stock, not any misdeeds on hispart, AIG's ousted chairman and chief executive officer, MauriceGreenberg, argues in new court papers.

A filing by his attorneys was made Tuesday in Manhattan's NewYork State Supreme Court–a county level tribunal–where Mr.Greenberg and AIG's former chief financial officer, Howard Smith,are defendants in a civil case brought by the New York AttorneyGeneral's Office alleging market fraud at the insurer.

Meanwhile, today in Delaware, a judge rejected Mr. Greenberg'seffort to file a lawsuit against various AIG board members andexecutives–including Martin Sullivan, who succeeded him as AIG'sCEO.

In the New York case, Mr. Greenberg's arguments were containedin a motion filed by his attorneys with Justice Charles E. Ramos,seeking to compel deposition testimony from three AIG executivesthat he said is needed to make his case.

The executives in question are AIG Deputy Comptroller AnthonyValoroso (formerly director of technical accounting); Jeffrey F.Johnson, AIG technical services senior vice president for toxictorts; and Perry Huntington, AIG senior vice president forenvironmental.

AIG was originally a defendant in the case with Mr. Greenberg,which alleges that improper transactions took place designed toboost the firm's stock price. The insurance company was let out ofthe case after agreeing to a $1.6 billion settlement.

At that point the company had issued a financial restatement,reducing AIG's net income between 2000 and 2004 by $3.92 billion,and trimming shareholder equity as of Dec. 31, 2004, by $2.26billion.

According to Mr. Greenberg's legal memo and motion, he and Mr.Smith are only alleged to have involvement in four of 30 accountingchanges involved in the restatement.

Mr. Greenberg's papers said he wants to depose the three AIGofficials to show that, rather than any of those four itemsaffecting the price of the stock, that any drop or inflation“resulted from elements of the [financial] restatement that wereincluded therein by current AIG management but were unrelated tothe four transactions…”

AIG's restatement and his own ouster by the company followed thethreat of a criminal prosecution by then Attorney General EliotSpitzer, according to Mr. Greenberg's papers.

According to his filing, the restatement reduced billions ofdollars in AIG's net income and shareholder's equity “as a resultof retroactive accounting changes made either erroneously orunnecessarily by AIG.”

The papers contend some AIG management moves were “wrong underapplicable accounting rules,” and some retroactive reductions “werewholly unnecessary.” Items mentioned included asbestos reserveestimate changes and treatment of AIG's life settlementsprogram.

Mr. Greenberg's attorneys last year secured an order from JudgeRamos compelling AIG to turn over an internal report on accountinginfractions.

His lawyer, Nicholas Gravante, said the report was biased anddesigned to throw all the blame for accounting irregularities onMr. Greenberg, while shielding current officers of AIG, and wasused by Mr. Spitzer's office to decide who to charge in thecase.

In the Delaware Court of Chancery, Mr. Greenberg is the targetof a stockholders suit initiated by the Teachers' Retirement Systemof Louisiana, seeking millions of dollars in payments made by AIGto C.V. Starr & Company–the insurance broker that was owned byMr. Greenberg and favored AIG executives.

Currently Mr. Greenberg is chairman and CEO of C.V. Starr andCompany.

Mr. Greenberg had sought to counter-sue Mr. Sullivan, as well asdozens of other AIG executives and board members, arguing they weremore to blame than he was for any wrongdoing involving the tiesbetween the public insurance company and the private Starrbrokerages.

However, Vice Chancellor Leo Strine denied the countersuit.

Mr. Greenberg and his co-defendants–former CFO Smith and EdwardE. Matthews, former AIG senior vice chairman for investments andfinancial services–can make the case that Mr. Sullivan and othersshould pay the largest share of damages, if any, after the maintrial determines whether there was anything wrong in the payment ofmillions in fees and commissions by AIG to Starr, Judge Strinefound.

After Mr. Greenberg's ouster at AIG, the company's board agreedto stop fighting the Teachers' Retirement System of Louisianalawsuit and support it against Mr. Greenberg, Mr. Smith, Mr.Matthews and C.V. Starr in a deal that let Mr. Sullivan and othersconnected to both AIG and Starr out of the suit.