The New York Times reports that Goldman Sachs' President Gary Cohn will likely be interviewed by government lawyers in connection with their fraud charges against Rajat Gupta, the former Goldman Sachs director.

Gupta has been charged with providing material inside information to a hedge fund led by the disgraced Raj Rajaratnam, the head of Galleon, who has been sentenced to 11 years hard time after he was convicted on fraud charges. As it turns out, Cohn and Rajaratnam had a two-hour lunch in July 2008 with Cohn and a Goldman Sachs salesman David Loeb. Loeb was also named as a potential witness during Friday's hearing, but there's nothing odd about that. This might represent some standard client development work for the prime brokerage unit. Cohn was also mentioned in a few taped conversations between Rajaratnam and Gupta.

It is not clear what the government is specifically interested in regarding Cohn. Recall that Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein testified for the prosecution in the trial of Rajaratnam. We have noted before that this case has the potential to draw in several high-profile executives of the gilded bank. We may see some of the big names testify and it might be a way to curry favor with the Manhattan DA. You would also have to think that this is yet another legal distraction for the top executives. Some of them have lawyered up personally in connection with possible charges regarding their testimony before Congress earlier this year.

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