Good.

Skilling and Lay have been found guilty on most counts.

Once the prosecution managed to get the judge to sign off on an "ignorance is no excuse" ruling, it was a foregone conclusion.

For fear of inviting a Gutz/Latham comparison, I wonder what Bethany McLean is wearing today...

A guy I know was one of the government's star witnesses.

Realistic won't post for a week.

White collar crime, my ass.

What these guys did was far more dangerous to society than, for example, a black man robbing a bank with an unloaded gun - i.e. someone who would spend several years in a prison that does not have tennis courts, cable television, and conjugal visits.

I hope these guys do long, hard time getting punked from behind - just like they did to the ENTIRE U.S. economy.

We all seem to accept that although terrible things happen in prison, its a great deterrent, because no one wants to go there to get gang raped. Yet, we only try to deter people who sell drugs with hard time, while we offer white collar criminals great accommodations. Perhaps if we gave white collar criminals "hard time" it would act as a better deterrent.

A couple things:

1) That's how you spell conjugal? Surprising.

2) I agree that this shit is much more dangerous and hurts the U.S. far more than some dude sticking up a 7-11.

3) Many people doubt and even laugh at the idea of prison as a deterent especially since "harder time" doesn't ever seem to correlate with less crime.

They'd better get not get off fucking easy in a white-collar joint. Ship 'em to San Quentin and watch their assholes grow like Barry Bonds' head.

They need to be the poster children for not fucking with the economy and thousands of people.

Skilling and Lay never should've taken the stand. Their egos brought them down, which is something resembling justice in and of itself. (No, there really can't be justice.)

I think I want to be Lou Pai when I grow up.

They need to be the poster children for not fucking with the economy and thousands of people.

Exactly.

I really think people looked at Michael Milken playing tennis in a low security joint, getting out and having all the money he stole waiting for him, and then rehabilitating his image and turning himself into a hero by being charitable.

That was a bad example for the authorities to set for white collar criminals. It sent the message that you should do the crime, do easy and short time, and then spend the rest of your life enjoying the spoils.

How many Wall Streeters would still take the risk if they thought the punishment for getting caught was anal rape without vaseline instead of only getting to use the prison tennis courts for 1 hr per day.

No one really lost big money owing to Milken, though. There was never much insider trading, and the "loss" to innocent customers of his firm was estimated at $318,000, which was easily paid back:

http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,972442,00.html
http://www.polyconomics.com/searchbase/10-09-91.html
http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/416a0b9f2c4ce?in_archive=1

It was mostly about Giuliani wanting to take down Milken so he could be big man on campus. Giuliani operated on the theory that anyone who makes that much money must be crooked somehow. Milken certainly isn't a saint, but he was demonized.

Detroit's finest, Ivan Boesky, is far more the prototypical criminal that got away with a country club jail sentence. He got that because the money loss was at worse unclear. Nothing ever crashed as the result of his insider trading manipulations effects on companies. He also got that because he agreed to play ball with the authorities to try and take down Milken.

A lot of people associated Boesky and Milken with the S&L scandals. The folks who got off light relative to their damage to the public good were the Charles Keatings of the world.

OT....but vinny has 666 posts. thats bad luck until the next post. if he doesnt post before the game we have to kill him if we lose. but be polite about it.

oh and white collar criminals are hilarious.