Deceit & Greed at Enron

More than Enron employees and shareholders suffered at the collapse of the energy giant, Enron, as is made clear in two NEWSWEEK articles, in the February 18,2002 issue, by Evan Thomas and Daniel McGinn (pp. 24-32). Thomas' article makes it clear that the major fault lay with the top executives, and both their greed in amassing personal fortunes, and their deceit in not letting employees and other interested parties (including financial institutions and investors) know about the company's dire financial straits.

The excuse offered before Congressional investigators by former CEO Jeff Skilling was not even believed by his mother. "Incredulity is a polite word to describe the reaction to….Skilling, who swore last week at a congressional hearing that his company's bookkeeping trickery had caught him by surprise" (Thomas 24)

According to the Thomas article, "There was the pathos of seeing those self-appointed visionaries of the new millennium- who apparently believed that they could rise above the old rules- hauled into that hoariest of rituals, the congressional inquisition." (Thomas 24) It is still unclear whether the courts will consider the actions of Enron's top executives as civil or criminal fraud. It is obvious that these executives spread the wealth among friends and family, as well as consultants, lawyers, politicians and journalists. Thomas compares these handouts to John D. Rockefeller's handing out dimes to poor boys. The article lists Skilling's having installed a woman he was engaged to as secretary to the Enron board at an annual salary of $600,000.