The Real Crimes of Martha Stewart

The Wall Street Journal ^ | Friday, January 23, 2004 | MEGHAN COX GURDON

[presidio9]

"Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, we are here today in the Court of Public Opinion to hear of heinous crimes committed by Martha Stewart, the Dictator of Domesticity. I ask you to set aside any old-fashioned prejudices you may have in favor of self-improvement, and forget any qualms you have about blaming a complete stranger for your own feelings of inferiority.

[wardaddy]

Vuitton has a new designer....Marc Jacobs maybe?

I'm quitting ...folks are going to think I've gone Capote.

I'm doing a Hemut Newton obit thread btw right now....you may think I'm offbase.

My apologies in advance, I do like some of his works.

She likes D&G more now since the babies...she's now a hefty 103 instead of 95...lol....she's such a neurotic about that.

[WaterDragon]

I think Martha's worst crimes are simply that she is an obnoxious person at times, a snob, and is arrogant. Also very, very rich. But I don't remember that the Constitution ever really spoke to these crimes.

[nopardons]

I think your right, but mostly, Vuitton is garbage.

D&G is high priced slut...almost as bad as Versace and more over done.

Naaaaaaaaaaaaaw...you're a man's man and everybody know it.

I saw,on T. V. about Helmut Newton. What a sad thing.

[nopardons]

Then you have NO idea what she's done, which ARE criminal, BTW.

[wardaddy]

Thanks.

[wardaddy]

She likes Carolina Herrera and Jil Sander too, she thinks that is good stuff for her in a few years as middle age creeps in.

What do you think?

She's also amazed Gucci let Tom Ford go.

[CharlesThe Hammer]

Martha's up to her butt in alligators on this one. While the Feds may not have the evidence to nail down an insider trading count on her, they are going to be plenty tough on this "lying" charge regarding the attempt to bolster her share prices. Was it a "witch hunt" when they got Al Capone for income tax evasion instead of violations of the Volstead Act or murder? No, Martha needs to go down because she jeopardized the transparency of the market by her willful wrongdoing. She knew better, but greedily proceeded, thinking she was too damn smart to get caught. OOPS! Now she's no different than any other low-life thief and certainly not a victim.

[nopardons]

Gucci has been crap for years now. Ford didn't help them much. It was a surprise, though, that he got let go.

Since WHEN has Carolina Herrera been " matronly " ? ROTFLMSO here. Oh well, what do I know ?

The kiddo fell in love with a Herrera wedding gown, but went for Amsale, when she heard the price.Not that that Amsale was " cheap ". :-)

But Jil Sander is a bit too old for her now...yes, though fined for me. LOL

[wardaddy]

I like Herrera's style personally the woman and her family history is amazing.

Her family has lived in the oldest continuously lived in abode in the New World and by the same family since the early 1500s in VZ. Incredible.

I agree that Gucci is a bit hype.

Sander is what affluent career women wear to work if they are hip in my humble view. Sander is a sappho is she not and I believe lost control of her company like Halston.

[nopardons]

Yes, Herrera's story ids fascinating and her clothes are magnificednt;though pricey as all get out.

Never wore Sandler, never shall. Not my style. :-)

Gucci used to be good,way back when...but got really dreadful in the early '90s and went downhill from there.

Give me Ferragamo any day and twice on Sunday. LOL

Ralphy's lost it, Calvin Klein lost it long ago and now just sells his name...

[Yeti]

Insider trading (assuming there is no manipulation of stock prices) really is a victimless crime.

Tell that to the sucker who sold too low or bought too high because someone had a secret about a publicly held stock. It's like selling a car for it's full book value when you KNOW about a hidden problem that will make the car collapse after a few miles, or selling a house at full market value when you KNOW there is going to be a hog farm on the adjacent lot next month.

It's fraud.

[nopardons]

Right you are and that's precisely why there are laws against it.

[beckett]

The case against Stewart hinges on the credibility of the ass't to her broker, who claims he told her that the Waksal family was dumping Imclone stock, and then she told him to dump her Imclone stocks as well. You've got to ask yourself, why would this guy le about that? I don't see any reason for him to do so.

Since it was known by all parties that Imclone was awaiting a crucial and imminent FDA ruling, Stewart was well aware of the reason the Waksal family was dumping the stock. She was also well aware that the FDA ruling was not public knowledge. Ipso facto, she knew she was trading stock on inside information.

The fact that prosecutors charged her with cover-up type acts after the fact, rather than inside trading itself, is immaterial. They claim she acted as she did after the fact because she knew she had broken security law, and acts committed to cover up a crime are just as illegal as the original illegal act.

Stewart deserves only a slap on the wrist for the crime. No jail time. She should be free to continue to build her magnigficent business and rehabilitate her reputation. But she should not get off scot free, IMHO.

[CobaltBlue]

As a lawyer, I see people from all walks of life - from people who live on the street to Beltway Bandits who made millions as defense contractors. People with money tend to be smarter, are definitely better organized, and lead less chaotic lives, plus they have better teeth. -g-

I do know some multi-millionaires but you could never tell by the way they live. Comfortable but not flashy in the least. Old money, from Texas, cattle ranching and some oil. And I know a guy who rides to hounds and plays polo and rarely has more than a couple of nickles to rub together.

Here in Northern Virginia, a lot of people have made fortunes, especially in high tech, and they buy houses that show off what they've got, ten thousand square feet stuffed full of things from Sharper Image. There is a glitzy, rococo, gilded style that is particularly popular with people who came here from other countries when their king or shah or whoever was deposed. And then there are the political types, who mostly stay in DC or the closer in suburbs of Maryland, and go for real antiques, paintings of fox hunts and someone else's ancestors. For people like that, I think Martha Stewart is sort of downscale.

I am fascinated by the American dream of rags to riches, the self-made man, the ability to lift yourself up by your bootstraps, reinvent yourself. I think we all are. That's why Martha Stewart is such a fable for the times. If she didn't exist, we'd have to invent her.

[7.62 x 51mm]

That's one of the funniest articles I've read in a while.

That said, obstruction of justice is a serious charge, and if they can prove it, she'll go away for a year or so. If one of us commoners had done that, we'd already be dressed in orange.

Sorry, I have no sympathy for her. Do the crime, do the time. Let the games begin...

[CobaltBlue]

If you want to plead not guilty, you "take the Fifth Amendment," in other words, you refuse to testify. But if you give an alibi, you can be cross examined. In other words, anything you say can be used against you.

Martha could have refused to comment, but instead she lied. If all she said was "no comment, I refuse to comment on advice of counsel," no problem.

[CobaltBlue]

But of course, if she said "no comment, I am taking the Fifth," that's like putting up a big "guilty" sign, isn't it? So, being the perfectionist she is, she thought that lying would be smarter. It's not. At least, that's my understanding of the law.

[presidio9]

Are you opposed to all trials?

I am opposed to trials based on faulty charges. Before you can accuse someone of lying to manipulate a stock, you first have to catch them lying.

[presidio9]

Since you either are, or used to be, a stockbroker, maybe you can enlighten us on this - the allegations in the indictment are that she got the insider information from her broker. Seems to me that the problem with charging her with insider information is proving that she knew it was insider information, since there is no proof that it came from Waksal, directly OR indirectly.

Unless the broker tells the regulators that he revealed insider information to the client, and identified it as such, the client is not in violation. When I was a broker, my recommendation to buy and sell required no justification for most of my clients. Unless the SEC can prove that Stewart had that inside information and instructed Bancovic to act on it, they have zero case. Which is why she was not charged.

Nevertheless, there was a criminal investigation going on, and Waksal is now doing time, and Stewart is now charged with lying about what she did and why.

Waksal's crime was much more serious than Stewart's.