Dealing with the devil

Former Enron chiefs Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were convicted of conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud in one of the biggest business scandals in U.S. history. The verdict put the blame for the demise of what was once the US's seventh-largest company squarely on its top two executives. It came in the sixth day of deliberations following a trial that lasted nearly four months. Lay was also convicted of bank fraud and making false statements to banks in a separate trial related to his personal banking. Lay was convicted on all six counts against him in the trial with Skilling. Skilling was convicted on 19 of the 28 counts against him, including one count of insider trading, and acquitted on the remaining nine. The former corporate titans are now felons facing years in prison after being convicted of running an elaborate fraud that gave the company a glamorous illusion of success.
No doubt these two will waste years in the appeals process. And, in the end, their last days will be spent in Club Fed, playing racketball and taking saunas to ease their guilty consciences well into old age. Bastards!