George D. Reycraft, 79; Won Antitrust Case Against DuPont, GM

George Dewey Reycraft, a leading Wall Street lawyer and former Justice Department trustbuster, died March 1 in Miami of natural causes. He was 79.

Reycraft rose to national prominence in 1959 as the federal government’s chief litigator in a long antitrust fight with DuPont and General Motors. He successfully argued that DuPont’s 43% stake in the automaker constituted a “tendency toward monopoly” in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act, and DuPont was forced to give up its stock.

Joining the Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft law firm, Reycraft won an investors’ suit against accounting firm Arthur Andersen over millions lost in the Bernard Cornfeld mutual fund scandal.

Reycraft, who retired in 1994, also handled an investors’ complaint in 1987 against financier Ivan F. Boesky and his main underwriter, Drexel Burnham Lambert. Boesky later pleaded guilty in an insider trading case.