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"It is well established in this circuit that the death of a criminal defendant pending an appeal of his or her case abates, ab initio, the entire criminal proceeding." United States v. Asset, 990 F.2d 208 (5th Cir. 1993). In a recent Fifth Circuit decision, United States v. Estate of Parsons, 367 F.3d 409 (5th Cir. 2004), the court explained that "the appeal does not just disappear, and the case is not merely dismissed. Instead, everything associated with the case is extinguished, leaving the defendant as if he had never been indicted or convicted." In Parsons, the court vacated a...

Ken Lay’s sudden death could make it harder to recover any of his Enron loot, victims of the company’s collapse were warned yesterday. And even if they do get some money back, it could delay matters for a year or more. Federal prosecutors are so far refusing to comment on whether they will still pursue their $43.5 million legal claim against the former Enron chairman. But legal expert Michael Fee, a former federal prosecutor and now a partner at top Boston law firm Ropes & Gray, says the claim may now be moot. The problem? Prosecutors would have been looking...

The government's forfeiture effort ahead of the planned sentencing of Mr. Lay and Mr. Skilling this fall, however, has been thrown into doubt, at least in relation to Mr. Lay's assets since the death of a criminal defendant before his sentencing and the appeal process may void the criminal case against him. "Technically, he was found guilty, but that's extinguished as of today," said Joel M. Androphy, a prominent defense lawyer in Houston. ..... At issue, too, are Mr. Skilling's obligations to his lawyers. Mr. Petrocelli's law firm, O'Melveny & Myers, is awaiting more than $20 million of payments from...

How do you know Ken Lay is really dead?

I am no fan of corrupt businessmen and politicians, but I think we should cut Lay some slack. Why? He served our country. If serving the country shields Kerry and Murtha from attacks, the same should apply with Lay.

HOUSTON — Enron Corp. founder and former CEO Kenneth Lay, who was convicted for his role in one of the largest instances of business fraud in U.S. history, died of coronary artery disease and there was no evidence of foul play, according to a forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy. Mesa County Coroner Robert Kurtzman told reporters in a televised news conference in Grand Junction, Colo., Wednesday that his preliminary examination showed clogged coronary arteries to be the cause of death. Lay died hours earlier on Wednesday while vacationing at a rental home near Aspen. Lay was awaiting an Oct....

Enron and the Clintonites The Clintonites may have been more accommodating than the Bushies. by David Brooks 01/21/2002, Volume 007, Issue 18 ON JULY 5, 1995, Enron Corporation donated $100,000 to the Democratic National Committee. Six days later, Enron executives were on a trade mission with Commerce Secretary Mickey Kantor to Bosnia and Croatia. With Kantor's support, Enron signed a $100 million contract to build a 150-megawatt power plant. Enron, then a growing giant in energy trading, practically had a reserved seat on Clinton administration trade junkets. Commerce Secretary Ron Brown, who egregiously linked political donations to government assistance, accompanied ...

Clinton Enron Nexus Clinton Administration Procured Credit for Enron, Used CIA as Resource for Enron As I see the usual suspects in the media trying to manufacture a scandal over Enron involving the Bush administration based solely on association, I have to laugh. Clinton and his administration were intimately involved with Enron and Enron CEO Ken Lay during the Clinton years. Lay acted as a political ally for Clinton, collaborating with him to try and pass Fast Track (they failed) and on implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. Lay turns out to be an old friend of close Clinton aid Mack ...

by Mark Finkelstein July 5, 2006 Merely because someone has just died doesn't mean you can't use the article announcing his death to take a swipe at President Bush. If you're the Associated Press, that is. In this article, published only minutes after Lay's death, the AP somehow found it pertinent , after only three short paragraphs announcing the death, to report that Lay was "nicknamed 'Kenny Boy' by President Bush." The MSM has gotten more mileage than a Prius coasting downhill out of W's 'heck of a job, Brownie' to then-FEMA Director Michael Brown in the wake of Katrina....

cause of death unknown

HOUSTON - Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were known as visionaries, hands-on executives, corporate titans directing the high-flying ship at Wall Street darling Enron Corp. Add another title: convicted felons. "Certainly we're surprised," a shaken Lay said Thursday after a jury capped a four-month-long fraud and conspiracy trial and in its sixth day of deliberations returned guilty verdicts against him and Skilling. "I think it's more appropriate to say we're shocked. This is not the outcome we expected." Besides all six counts in the main trial, Lay, Enron's founder, also was convicted of four charges of bank fraud and making...

Fiction writers documented the fall of Enron as a scandal to be linked to President Bush. Yet the U.S. Commerce Department has just released over 5,000 pages of documents that detail the Enron scandal during the Clinton years. The Commerce materials outline a long-standing and very close relationship between the Clinton administration and Enron. For example, in March 1999 U.S. Commerce Secretary William Daley's trade delegation to China produced several sweet business deals, including a special little gem for Enron. Enron International China Pipeline, a wholly owned subsidiary of Enron Corp. of Houston, Texas, signed a memorandum of understanding with...

Just on the News - Ken Lay convicted on all counts - Skilling convicted on most of the 28 counts against him. Quick jury verdict.

HOUSTON - Former Enron Corp. chiefs Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were convicted Thursday of conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud in a case born from one of the biggest business scandals in U.S. history. The verdict put the blame for the demise of what was once the nation'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. The former corporate titans...

Breaking on CNN.

HOUSTON - Yet another clash of Enron trial titans is on the horizon, but it may be less explosive than the first. While jurors deliberate the outcome of the fraud and conspiracy trial of Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay and former Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling, Lay is on trial again without a jury on charges stemming from his personal banking. The 64-year-old former chairman spent six days on the witness stand during the conspiracy trial, often combative and contentious with federal prosecutor John Hueston, who secured the indictment against Lay nearly two years ago. Lay is expected to square off...

HOUSTON - The automated signature machine did it. Attorneys for Kenneth Lay suggested bank loan documents containing terms he allegedly violated actually were signed by an automatic signature device in the Enron Corp. founder's office and not by him. Lay went on trial Thursday on one count of bank fraud and three counts of making false statements regarding personal banking issues. The trial, expected to wrap up as early as Tuesday, got under way the day after jurors began deliberating the nearly four-month-long fraud and conspiracy case of Lay and former Enron Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling. Lay is charged with...

HOUSTON (AP) A federal jury has begun deliberations in the fraud and conspiracy trial of former Enron chiefs Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling.

HOUSTON - The government bore down on Enron Corp. as it would the Mafia, intimidating top lieutenants into pointing fingers at their bosses because someone had to pay for crimes that preceded the company's stunning collapse, the lawyer for former Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling said Tuesday. "This was all manufactured after the fact," Daniel Petrocelli declared in an impassioned plea for jurors to acquit his client of all 28 fraud and conspiracy counts against him. "Because it's Enron. After all, somebody has to pay. It's Enron." In a searing closing argument, Petrocelli sought to drive home the defense theme that...

HOUSTON - Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay and former Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling instigated a massive fraud before the company collapsed in one of the biggest corporate scandals in U.S. history, a federal prosecutor said on Monday. Lay and Skilling committed crimes "through accounting tricks, fiction, hocus-pocus, trickery, misleading statements, half-truths, omissions and outright lies," prosecutor Kathryn Ruemmler told jurors and a packed courtroom in closing arguments. "In this courtroom, ladies and gentlemen, the cover stories have been blown. Mr. Lay and Mr. Skilling are still clinging to the cover stories," she said. On a large screen, Ruemmler displayed for...