A former chairman of Guinness PLC was arrested.

Ernest Saunders, six months ago a high-flying business executive, was arrested by fraud squad officers in London on Wednesday night and held in a police cell overnight. He was freed in the afternoon until a hearing Tuesday on criminal charges of perverting the course of justice, destroying documents and falsifying papers during the Anglo-Irish brewing giant’s successful takeover of the Scotch whisky firm Distillers Co. last year. Guinness directors fired Saunders in January.