Enron's Lay and Skilling found GUILTY!

[ISiddiqui]

Not too surprising, but newsworthy at any rate. Lay guilty on ALL counts. Skilling guilty on all counts except 8 counts of insider trading.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/25/news/newsmakers/enron_verdict/index.htm?cnn=yes

[Draft Dodger]

20 to 30 years in prison...is not enough.

[Crapshoot]

Meh - Lay's going to get sentenced on the other case - he's spending the rest of his life in jail. No surprise here.

[condors]

20 to 30 years in prison...is not enough.

+1

[ISiddiqui]

Lay is in his mid 60s. Even 20 years is likely to be a life sentance.

[KWhit]

Outstanding.

[moriarty]

I think they'll probably end up serving 5-8 years after time off for good behavior, etc.

Seriously, I'm rather suprised by the verdicts. Having read Conspiracy of Fools, and Smartest Guys in the room it appeared the only thing you could really pin on them was that they were guilty of lax oversight and controls. Everything they did was approved by the auditors, accountants and the board ... so if I was running the company I would take that as a validation of my ideas. After reading the books, I was rather left with the impression the real illegal activities consisted of Fastow and his team, along with some of the AA auditors.

Having said that, I think their defense was stupid (the company was strong, we just lost investor confidence). There was plenty of evidence the company was not doing well, and the whole Fastow mess was the straw that broke the camels back. It was a tough sell for any jury.

[Kodos]

Bravo!

[SackAttack]

Honestly, given the notoriety Ken Lay and Enron had in the press for quite a while, I think about the only way the prosecutor wouldn't have gotten a conviction is for their star witness to have lied in court and been caught in the act.

And even then I'm not convinced.

People wanted Lay to hang, figuratively speaking, and once he got his day in court I think that was pretty much a foregone conclusion. This was the outcome I expected from the beginning.

Note: I'm not trying to suggest he and Skilling aren't guilty, only that I don't think in this case it really would have mattered if they WERE innocent.

[moriarty]

Honestly, given the notoriety Ken Lay and Enron had in the press for quite a while, I think about the only way the prosecutor wouldn't have gotten a conviction is for their star witness to have lied in court and been caught in the act.
.

Well their star witness (Fastow) was a known and proven liar / criminal. But I guess he was believable enough to the jury, and obviously the prosecution didn't prove he was lying on the stand.

[stevew]

20 to 30 years in prison...is not enough.

Nope. Not even close.

[SackAttack]

Well their star witness (Fastow) was a known and proven liar / criminal. But I guess he was believable enough to the jury, and obviously the prosecution didn't prove he was lying on the stand.

Like I said, I'm not sure it would've mattered. In a case as high-profile as this one, as much attention as the media lavished on Lay and Enron before charges were ever brought, I would be shocked -- SHOCKED -- if any of those jurors entered the courtroom under a pre-supposition of innocence until proven guilty.

It's just a case that smelled to me from the get-go like hell-or-high-water railroading. "They're guilty, and we all know it, so let's get the trial out of the way."

That I actually believe they were guilty's is just kind of a side note.

[Honolulu_Blue]

A funny story.

I was pulling documents of a very large oil company (one of the few left) for a "second request" (a request by the government for documents and data in order to review the possible (anti)competitive effects of a merger) back in January of '02, right when this whole Enron thing broke. The oil company was based in Houston and, of course, up until then Enron was the big Houston corporate success story.

While pulling the documents, I came across a number of guides and powerpoint presenations titled something along the lines of "Better Business: The Enron Way", "Following Enron's Footsteps To A Successful Company" and things of that nature. Needless to say, those became obsolete quite quickly.

[Glengoyne]

Like I said, I'm not sure it would've mattered. In a case as high-profile as this one, as much attention as the media lavished on Lay and Enron before charges were ever brought, I would be shocked -- SHOCKED -- if any of those jurors entered the courtroom under a pre-supposition of innocence until proven guilty.

It's just a case that smelled to me from the get-go like hell-or-high-water railroading. "They're guilty, and we all know it, so let's get the trial out of the way."

That I actually believe they were guilty's is just kind of a side note.

I'll agree with this wholeheartedly, especially when they held the trial in Houston. Not much chance it was going to go down very different. This might be a bad thing though, as that seems like a pretty obvious reason for appeal.

When NPR read some of Lay's testimony on air, I was pretty stunned by his aggressive posture. I figured at that time, he was a goner.