Lay claims "witch hunt" brought Enron down

[RamboLiberal]

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyid=2006-04-25T175443Z_01_N2573154_RTRUKOC_0_US-ENRON-TRIAL.xml&rpc=22

Enron Corp. was a victim of a "witch hunt" that unfairly criticized the giant energy company's business and drove it toward bankruptcy, former Chairman and Chief Executive Kenneth Lay testified at his criminal trial on Tuesday.

In his second day on the witness stand, Lay told the jury that in October 2001 the Wall Street Journal had reported that Enron had engaged in dubious deals through partnerships operated by Enron's former Chief Financial Officer Andrew Fastow.

"We thought in fact the Wall Street Journal was on a witch hunt," Lay said under questioning from his lawyer George "Mac" Secrest. "We didn't have any information that Andy Fastow had done anything inappropriate."

<snip>

The Wall Street Journal articles were the first to scrutinize the Fastow partnerships, which Enron used to hide billions of dollars in debt while inflating its profits. Those articles and the intense media coverage that followed helped drive the company into its December 2001 bankruptcy, then the largest in U.S. history.

:nopity:

[ladjf]

1. What kind of court proceedings are they having out there?

So far, the accused have been allowed to speak freely for unlimited amounts of time. Of course Lay is going to say that he is innocent. He's been saying that all along. The question is do they have any evidence against him? If so, he and his lawyers should be showing why the evidence is incorrect.
Something isn't going right in this case. We've been waiting years to nail Lay for what appeared to be illegal actions. Now, free speeches.

[gratuitous]

8. I presume this is his direct testimony

Which means that it's Lay's attorney who is eliciting all the sound bites and the "I'm innocent" protestations. I would love to be working at the prosecution table, taking down every last sentence Lay is speaking and assembling the rebuttal material from news stories, videos, company memoranda and everywhere else that puts the lie to Kenny Boy's self-serving verbal meanderings.

Lay's cross-examination should be a hoot and a holler.

[ladjf]

9. Sounds like you know something about court procedure. I'll

be looking forward to the cross examination.

[mrdmk]

30. This is why Kenny Boy dump Enron Stock of how many millions of Dollars

just before going down?:shrug:Even my dog knows better that that!

[Missy M]

2. Oh, poor Ken Lay, it was all the fault of someone else....

and he did nothing wrong. I'm surprised he didn't blame Bill Clinton.

[90-percent]

5. Yeah

Thought this case was a slam dunk. does Kenny Boy know the fix is in or something?

Or is the judge actually a diebold robot?

-85% Jimmy

[TomInTib]

6. Yeah, someone else peed in Kenny-boy's pants.

Always someone else's fault with those guys.

[efhmc]

35. Early days yet.

[dailykoff]

3. I think he's blaming Martha Stewart (n/t)

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. The prisons are occupied exclusively by innocent men. Just ask them.

[underpants]

10. Yeah especially the ones that the WSJ busts

I know that he isn't turning on the WSJ op-ed pages (boy would that be a bit of cannabalism) but it is funny that he faults news reporting on his own misdeeds as a "Witch hunt". Too funny.

[bdamomma]

7. Lay who is George's best friend

is a liar just like george.

[SoCalDem]

11. Sometimes witch hunts find a ....WITCH... (or warlock, as the case may be)

He & the guys cooked up a pretty toxic brew and the hunters found it..and them :)

[Uncle Joe]

17. The only way we can find out for sure, is to dunk Lay under water,

if he drowns, he is not a witch, but if he breathes water, we need to burn the bastard.:evilgrin: Now where the hell did I put my pitchfork?

[aquart]

37. Warlock means oath breaker.

Which makes it ever so appropriate in this case, but a nasty thing to call a witch whose name is derived from the same indoeuropean root that yields economy...as being one responsible for the prosperity and well-being of the community.

[Ratty]

12. Let's play those phone recordings again ...

Witchhunt I tell you! It's so unfair!

"Just cut 'em off. They're so fucked. They should just bring back fucking horses and carriages, fucking lamps, fucking kerosene lamps."

"All the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in California?"

"Yeah, Grandma Millie man.

"Yeah, now she wants her fucking money back for all the power you've charged right up, jammed right up her ass for fucking $250 a megawatt hour."

Ahh those poor Enron boys. I feel so sorry for them.

[pacalo]

20. Yes! Not long before a millionaire Rep. paid for a Davis recall.

And then Ahnold stepped in. (Ahnold, be careful what you wish for in the future.)

[Akoto]

13. Oh, so he's using the right wing mantra ...

"It's that OTHER guy's fault."

[cliss]

14. I believe Ken Lay has always said this -

the media attacked Enron, and brought it down. He simply doesn't feel he did anything wrong. Jeffrey Skilling says the same thing: it was the media, not us.

This is a classic case of "break the law, as long as you don't get caught".

And the truth be told, Ken Lay started Enron about 30 years ago. He started a small energy company in Kansas (?). It's probably always been corrupt, so he correctly feels like, "Why now?"

[pacalo]

21. Maybe the feds need to delve into that Kansas co.'s records, as well.

How many in Kansas were screwed?

[DemoTex]

32. Actually, Lay merged Houston Natural Gas and InterNorth in 1985.

The new company, based in Houston, was called Enron. At first, Enron was primarily a gas transmission company (gas pipelines). Over the years, Lay diversified Enron's business and the rest is history. Prior to 1985, Lay was the president of Transco (Transcontinental Gas Pipeline Corporation) in Houston. That's where I worked for him as a corporate pilot. Prior to Transco, Lay was an executive with Florida Gas (as were Jack Bowen, the Transco CEO, and Linda Lay, Ken's second and current wife).

On edit: InterNorth was based in Omaha, Nebraska. After the merger the Enron headquarters was Houston, Tx.

[acmavm]

36. I worked for an InterNorth Company when all this happened. There are

some pretty goofy stories that come out of that HNG/InterNorth merger but one of the funniest ones was when they were thinking of a name for the new and improved corporate entity, some whizbang came up with Enteron. We had stationary, envelopes, the whole nine yards.
Here is Dictionary.com's definition of enteron.

en·ter·on ( P ) Pronunciation Key (nt-rn)
n.
The alimentary canal; the intestines.

Needless to say, shitloads of paper went into the dumpster.

[DemoTex]

39. I remember that! Enteron!

How appropriate.

[Bridget Burke]

42. A friend "temped" during the merger....

She was appalled that seasoned employees were being fired so young fools could take their places. And she thought some of the financial practices were a bit "informal."

They offered her a permanent job at Enron. She didn't take it.

[stepnw1f]

15. the Dumb Dumb Defense Hello Mr. Victim

in case you didn't already know this, but every criminal claims to be innocent even after the verdict.

[SpiralHawk]

16. Whine, Whine, Whine -- that's all corrupt republicons do

They steal from the citizens of America, and then whine when they get caught.

Cry me a frikking river.

[SKKY]

18. The media brought down Enron???

Oh, and I thought all this time it was the hundreds of phony companies they were paying money to that did it. Boy, I sure am glad Ken cleared that up for me.

[6000eliot]

34. Isn't THAT a familiar story?

[tenshi816]

19. Ever notice that people like Lay -

and Republicans in general for that matter - always blame the media for calling attention to their misdeeds? As if the very act of reportage is the problem, not that they were breaking the law in the first place? If they were as pure as they claimed, then nothing would have come of hard questions being asked about Enron business practices.

Look at all the media coverage of Bill Clinton, because if ever there was a media witch hunt it happened during his administration. Clinton was hounded nonstop for eight years solid by both the Republicans and the media, and the only thing that stuck was Monica's blue dress. There wasn't anything else they could bring him down with, and yet he still never exhibited the kind of whiny behavior we're seeing with Lay and Skilling (or the Preznit or Tom DeLay or...well, any other Republican accused of a crime).

It's not the crime, it's the calling attention to it.

[pacalo]

24. That's why, in Lay's mind, calling it a witch hunt would vindicate him

in the higher echelon of the GOP: 'See, GOP? I haven't done anything wrong -- it's political! It's the Democrats' doing! They're using the same number on me that you used on Clinton to try to take him down!'

[Ilsa]

22. So ENRON wanted the stockholders to hold tight and hope and pray

they weren't left holding the bag with worthless stock after the news came out? Wait a minute. Didn't Lay and Fastow and these bozos dump their shares?

[Ecumenist]

23. Yeah, right, sure it did Kenny boy..

If that's the case, why don't you get those hardworking people who lost everything so that you and your buddies could buy 5000.00 shower curtains? I'm sure in a face to face meeting, they'll be understanding and forgiving when they hear your explanation firsthand and face to face.

It was them damn witches who conjured up the recordings of your traders, the minutes of the those secret meetings, the false statements about the actual profit margins and value of enron, the theft of the hundreds of millions of dollars from me and mine in MY STATE...California and the laughing your consultants did, placing people at risk by purposely restricting energy and raising the price we paid on the electricity that we'd produced through the roof and innumerable other things that I am not recalling at this point. All of this was done against you, because you're a fine, upstanding Christian. It was them witches and the hunt for them that brought you down.:sarcasm:

[Rex]

25. Whatever perp

Criminals will say and do anything to keep from going to jail.

[superconnected]

26. And all this time I thought it was skillings girlfriend.

[lovuian]

27. Why do they bring in the witches ???

They can't keep being the excuses for everything...

[Blue_Tires]

28. hmmm...how strange!

I thought he'd blame the lax atmosphere brought about by the clinton years!:sarcasm:

[sweetheart]

29. Which hunt? The hunt for malfesiance.

Stupid fool...

[rustydog]

31. well yeah, we caught the witches and they get to burn

[madmark]

33. a drop in a corp's stock price from bad press does not normally implode

a corp. Unless of the course the corp.'s business is leveraging its own stock price, which is what Enron did with the off balance sheet partnership arrangements. If the corp was actually generating net profit from its operations, the bad press would be a temporary blip on the valuation of that earnings stream. The problem for Enron was that it was operating at a loss while falsely representing to the markets that it was generating positive earnings. Truth is a bitch Ken. I can only imagine the cross examination fodder being accumulated on this direct.

[leesa]

38. Can these fools never think of anything original...witch hunt..sheesh!

Same old GOP talking points at each and every thug trial.

[0007]

40. Just some bad apples. "A Few bad Apples" ruined Kenny 'Boy"

Give me a break.

[ckramer]

41. Send the Bush pal Kenneth Lay to jail!

Most Americans would love to see that happened!