SAN JOSE, California (AP):

California's attorney-General filed criminal charges yesterday against former Hewlett-Packard Company chairwoman Patricia Dunn and four others involved in the corporate spying scandal at the computer and printer company.

Attorney-General Bill Lockyer filed the charges in Santa Clara County Superior Court naming Dunn, ousted HP chief ethics officer Kevin Hunsaker, private investigator Ronald DeLia, and outside investigators Joseph DePante of Melbourne, Fla., and Bryan Wagner of Littleton, Colo.

They each face four felony counts: use of false or fraudulent pretences to obtain confidential information from a public utility; unauthorised access to computer data; identity theft; and conspiracy to commit each of those crimes. Each charge carries a fine of up to US$10,000 and three years in prison.

HP CEO Mark Hurd is not among those charged, nor was HP's former General Counsel Ann Baskins, who had some oversight of the company's investigation of media leaks.

The scandal erupted last month when HP disclosed that detectives it hired to root out a series of boardroom leaks secretly obtained detailed phone logs of directors, employees and journalists. The detectives used a potentially criminal form of subterfuge known as pretexting to masquerade as their targets and trick telephone companies into turning over the records.

"I am innocent of these charges," DeLia said in a prepared statement he read to The Associated Press. "I've been a professional private investigator for more than 30 years. I respect the law and I did not break the law in the HP investigation."

He refused to elaborate on his statement or take questions.