Giuliani, Once Foil on Wall Street, Joins Bear Stearns

The former New York City mayor, and before that the Justice Department's U.S. attorney in Manhattan, is joining with the investment arm of Bear Stearns Cos. to launch a $300 million fund. The goal: to back firms whose products and technologies could make American companies more secure against terrorism.

Now he is working with Wall Street. In the new venture with Bear Stearns, Mr. Giuliani and his management-consulting firm, Giuliani Partners LLC, will be able to take stakes in the companies in which the fund invests. In the past six months, he and his firm have been consultants to David Matlin, a so-called distressed-debt investor who has a large stake in MCI debt and is working to gain control of the company formerly called WorldCom Inc. Last year, Merrill Lynch & Co. hired him as an adviser in negotiations with New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, as his office investigated allegations of conflicts of interest in brokerage-firm stock research