Enron F*ckers Guilty (NRR)
funky16corners
7,175 Posts
Bye bye Kenny Boy....May 25, 2006Enron Chiefs Guilty of Fraud and Conspiracy By ALEXEI BARRIONUEVO and VIKAS BAJAJHOUSTON, May 25 ??? Kenneth L. Lay and Jeffrey K. Skilling, the chief executives who guided Enron through its spectacular rise and even more stunning fall, were found guilty today of fraud and conspiracy in a case that led the parade of corporate scandals in recent years that emerged from the get-rich-quick stock market excesses of the 1990's. The conspiracy and fraud convictions each carry a sentence of 5 to 10 years in prison. For a company that once seemed so complex that almost no one could understand its arcane accounting or how it actually made its money, the cases ended up being nearly as simple as could be. Mr. Lay and Mr. Skilling were found guilty of lying ??? lying to investors, to employees and to government regulators ??? in an effort to disguise the crumbling fortunes of their energy empire. For Mr. Lay and Mr. Skilling, the convictions represent a legal judgment about what went wrong with their transformation of a once-sleepy natural gas pipeline company into an energy-trading dynamo that at one point achieved the status of the nation's seventh-largest corporation. For years, Enron's gravity-defying stock price made it a Wall Street darling and an icon of the "New Economy" of the 1990's. But its sudden collapse at the end of 2001 and revelation as little more than a house of cards left Enron and its crooked E as the premier public symbol of corporate ignominy. At Enron, Mr. Skilling was the visionary from the world of management consulting who spearheaded the company's rapid ascent by fastening on new ways to turn commodities like natural gas and electricity into complex, lucrative financial instruments. Mr. Lay, the company's founder, was the public face of Enron. Known for his close ties to President Bush's family, he built Enron into a symbol of civic pride and envy here in its Houston hometown and throughout the financial world. The verdicts represent a long-awaited vindication for federal prosecutors, who had produced mixed results from their four-year investigation into wrongdoing at the company. The investigation resulted in 16 guilty pleas by Enron executives, and convictions in a case involving the bogus sale of Nigerian barges to Merrill Lynch. But the Supreme Court last year overturned the obstruction of justice verdict that killed off accounting firm Arthur Andersen, Enron's outside auditor, blaming flawed instructions to the jurors. And a jury either acquitted or failed to agree on charges in the fraud trial of former managers of Enron's failed broadband division. Five executives are being retried in three separate trials over the next few months. During the 56-day trial, defense lawyers repeatedly criticized prosecutors for bringing criminal charges against Mr. Skilling and Mr. Lay, saying the government had set out to punish the company's top officers regardless of what the facts might be. The lawyers said the government was criminalizing normal business practices and accused prosecutors of pressuring key witnesses to plead guilty to crimes they did not commit. The defense lawyers also complained about a lack of access to witnesses who they contend could have corroborated their clients' versions of events. The Enron trial, more than any other, punctuates the era of corporate excess and corruption defined as well by the failure of WorldCom, the telecommunications giant whose bankruptcy following revelations of accounting fraud even exceeded Enron's in size; the prosecutions of Martha Stewart and Frank Quattrone, the technology industry banker; and executive suite scandals at Tyco, Adelphia Communications and HealthSouth. "Trials like this are ultimately cathartic and they often end up marking the end of eras," said Mitchell Zuckoff, the author of "Ponzi's Scheme," a history of the salesman who was found guilty of defrauding investors after World War I. Just like Mr. Ponzi, Mr. Zuckoff said, the Enron defendants "blazed a path by using accounting tricks, their own charm and complex financial measures to create the appearance of something where there was nothing."Mr. Lay, 64, and Mr. Skilling, 52, are the most prominent executives to be convicted in a recent corporate fraud case. Last year Bernard J. Ebbers, WorldCom's former chief executive, was found guilty of orchestrating a record $11 billion fraud at that company.
Comments
Anyways, I'm glad were not able to pin it all on Fastow.
Sadly I think is where they'll end up. I wish the judge made them pay for their prison stay. I don't see why taxpayers, or anyone else for that matter should give these guys a single cent
exactly. they painted Lay as the face of Enron who was clueless as to what was going on. apparently, the jury wasn't buying it.
Im in it. I appear for a brief 5 second cameo in the office of Fastow's lawyer during a press conference.
u work in fastow's lawyer's firm?
I thought you spent your time defending GW Bush.
The trick for them now is to stay out on appeal until January 2009. That's when Bush is going to pardon them.
Plaese to point yourself out.[/b]
C'mon, sabadabada, don't be scurrred.