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SEC had charged two managers with hiding a $21 million discount on a 2000 software sale to BellSouth.The Securities And Exchange Commission (SEC) has obtained judgments in federal court in New Jersey against two Lucent Technologies employees for concealing facts about a 2000 deal with BellSouth that led Lucent to over report revenues on the transaction by $21 million.

John Bratten, a sales vice president, and Charles Elliott, a senior manager, were fined $40,000 and $25,000, respectively for their part in the fraudulent accounting. The SEC said Bratten had agreed to give BellSouth a $20 million credit on a $95 million software sale along 2% price discount worth $1 million. But the agency had charged in a civil lawsuit that Bratten never advised financial executives at Murray Hill-based Lucent about those terms.

Elliott was accused of helping Bratten falsify the date on which the deal was made in a letter to BellSouth. Without admitting or denying the allegations, Bratten and Elliott each agreed not to violate the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws and to refrain from falsifying corporate books or records.

As a result of Bratten”s and Elliott”s actions the company violated generally accepted accounting principles by recording the entire $95 million as revenue and operating income, rather than the discounted $74 million. Lucent (NYSE: LU) shares rose $0.02 to $2.78 in afternoon trading.