HOUSTON (CNNMoney.com) - The lead attorney for Enron founder Kenneth Lay mounted an aggressive attack against key prosecution witness Andrew Fastow, accusing the former financial chief of exaggerating Enron's financial woes and lying about the company's dealings with Goldman Sachs in 2001.

Michael Ramsey presented Fastow with written transcripts of senior management's meetings with Goldman Sachs (Research) executives and asked Fastow to find any reference that Enron had sought their help in finding a strategic alternative, including putting itself for sale, to deal with a financial meltdown. Ramsey said Goldman Sachs had been the one to approach Enron to sell its business, saying that the stock was undervalued and offering analysis on how to deal with the possibility of a hostile takeover.

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"Goldman Sachs approached Enron and not the other way around, isn't that true sir?" Ramsey questioned Fastow.

"That's not my recollection," Fastow responded, adding that Enron hadn't reached a final contract with Goldman Sachs before he was put on leave in October 24, 2001 because senior management hadn't provided all the details regarding the varied businesses that Goldman Sachs needed for a proper analysis.

In his testimony last week, Fastow said he told Lay that the company was facing a $1.2 billion shortfall and highlighted the worsening condition of Enron's international portfolios, as well as $5 billion to $7 billion in imbedded losses that were finally "coming home to roost."

Fastow added that he suggested hiring Goldman Sachs to explore a sale because it was the only investment bank that Enron didn't have a lending relationship with and therefore there was no risk of losing key financial support if they revealed Enron's true financial state. But he said even as Lay and senior management enlisted Goldman Sachs' help, Lay told the media and Enron employees that the company was "fundamentally strong" and had no trading or accounting issues of concern.

Ramsey, in his attempt to discredit Fastow, pointed out that Enron, in fact, did have a relationship with Goldman Sachs, which was its principle broker of commercial paper -- debt issued to a corporation on a short-term basis. He said if the company was truly concerned about sharing its secrets with a bank, it wouldn't have chosen one with which it had such an important relationship.

"Do you have something in writing to indicate that Goldman Sachs was involved in helping (Enron) in a massive restructuring?" Ramsey asked Fastow, as he handed him a transcript of a meeting with Goldman Sachs and asked him to find it in the document.

"In my cursory review, I don't think so," Fastow responded.

"Would you exaggerate, sir, in order to help your perceived position" with the government? Ramsey challenged.

"My job is to tell the truth and not exaggerate it," Fastow responded.

The mood in the courtroom remained tense as Ramsey mocked Fastow's previous testimony that Enron's Indian power plant Dabhol was being overrun with vines and encroached on by the jungle -- indicating that the international operation was in serious trouble and the senior management, including Lay, considered shutting it down altogether and letting it go to rust.

"What senior executive told you that the jungle was encroaching?" Ramsey demanded. "Wouldn't you say it was a massive exaggeration?"

Fastow said he couldn't pinpoint the origin of the comment but that it was said in Lay's office with several members of senior management in attendance. Ramsey continued to hammer him, looking for a specific name before dismissing the comment.

"It's an absurdity on its face," Ramsey said. "You made it up to exaggerate."

"No, sir, I did not," Fastow responded tersely.

Fastow has been under fire since the defense teams for Lay and former chief executive Jeffrey Skilling began cross-examining his testimony for the government last week.

For the defense, undermining Fastow is of the utmost importance. Skilling's lead attorney Daniel Petrocelli was fierce in his questioning of the witness last week, poking holes in his credibility and character by highlighting Fastow's many misdeeds at the company, including his admission that he defrauded his own bosses to steal millions from Enron.

Ramsey, in his questioning of the witness, tried to solidify the picture of Fastow as a conniving liar, whose testimony could not be trusted.

"You were very proficient at looking (Lay) right straight in the face and telling you were loyal and he could count on you, but you knew in your heart you were stealing from the house," Ramsey said. "You were stealing and getting away with it since 1997. You were lying like a dog about it."

"With regard to certain things, I had all those people fooled,'' Fastow admitted.

Petrocelli completed his questioning earlier Monday and attempted to show that Skilling believed the transactions Fastow engineered to inflate profits were legal and that Skilling tried to persuade the ex-financial chief to tell the media Enron was okay.

Petrocelli provided the jury with handwritten notes Fastow took of phone calls he received from Skilling in October 2001 when the media began raising questions regarding the dealings of LJM, the entity that Fastow has admitted creating to hide Enron's financial problems.

The first note indicated that Skilling -- who had resigned as CEO by this time -- was upset that Enron wasn't speaking openly to the media.

"All the transactions were proper and fully disclosed," Skilling told Fastow, according to the handwritten note. Another note from a call four days later indicated that Skilling told Fastow "he was (expletive) brilliant" and "the shareholders should give us medals for doing all of those deals."

Petrocelli asked Fastow if at any point during those calls he told Skilling, "Have you forgotten we committed fraud together? We can't talk" to the public about these transactions.

Fastow responded, "I did not say those things."

On redirect from Enron Task Force prosecutor John Hueston in the afternoon, Fastow said he interpreted Skilling's comments on the phone as a direction to "tow the party line" and stick to the story that all was well at Enron.

Earlier in the day, Petrocelli also attempted to show that the so-called Global Galactic documents -- handwritten lists Fastow created to keep track of side agreements he claimed he made with Skilling -- may have been doctored.

Fastow testified that he couldn't recall when he created the lists and had no e-mails or documentary evidence from his discussions with Skilling. He added that LJM wouldn't have entered any of the risky transactions without a guarantee from Skilling that LJM wouldn't incur any losses.

But Petrocelli raised possibilities that Fastow had forged former chief accounting officer Richard Causey's initials on the documents that were provided to the government.

"Are you 100 percent certain that the initials that appear on each of the pages, these initials were placed by Causey?" Petrocelli asked Fastow.

When Fastow said he had witnessed Causey initialing the pages, Petrocelli went on to ask if there was a chance that Fastow destroyed the original list and later went back and reconstructed the list, placing Causey's initials alongside his own.

"No, sir," Fastow responded.

On redirect, Hueston questioned Fastow on what benefits he could hope to obtain by doctoring the document.

"I have no incentive to add any initials, my incentive is to be truthful," he replied, adding that if he were to lie in his testimony, his 10-year prison sentence could become a life sentence.

Fastow pleaded guilty to two counts of wire and securities fraud in 2004 and agreed to a 10-year prison sentence in return for his testimony against his former bosses.

Combined, Lay and Skilling face more than three dozen fraud and conspiracy charges accusing them of lying to investors about the company's financial state while they enriched themselves by selling millions of dollars in stock.

Enron was once the seventh largest corporation in the U.S. It declared bankruptcy in December 2001, costing thousands of employees their jobs and resulting in millions of dollars in losses for investors.

After four days on the stand, Fastow was officially excused Monday afternoon. The government will call Chris Loehr -- a former analyst-trainee at LJM who has cooperated with the government but has never been charged of a crime -- to the stand Tuesday. Loehr is expected to bolster Fastow's testimony regarding LJM's dubious activities.

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