thanks actually somebody told me to read that book which I am going to order from Amazon. Of course I have heard of it but have never read it.
We had a backdating trial out here and of course being in SV and since most employee options plans here are backdated (employees get the low of the quarter backdated to their start date)- I watched the trial wondering what the outcome would be.
What I discovered is that the USAO (US attorneys office) and SEC had interviewed all the staff at Brocade (which was the company in question) and basically the financial staff at Brocade said they knew the options were backdated and felt the accounting was ok. I'm sure this was true because everybody thought that.
Then in the trial, the prosecutor claimed the CEO and HR VP "hid a scheme" from the rest of the company and nobody knew. It was a flat out lie, amazing to me! I thought lying like that was a "contempt of court" kind of thing. Anyway the defense lawyer called out the prosecutors on this matter of lying to the jury and the prosecutors backed out with a *technicality* saying they are the USAO, and it was the SEC, or "that other agency" that took the depositions of the finance staff about backdating. This whole episode has been written up in various blogs, so it is obvious to many the government lied.
Anyway the judge didn't throw out the case.... and I have to say I had NO IDEA, until this case, how corrupt the criminal defense system is. Maybe they could have gotten a conviction without cheating to "get their man", but when the government acts like this... what do we have in terms of justice.
OK- so how many other white collar cases are like this- I am suspicious of all of them now.
I think in Michaael Milkens time the SEC and DOJ were more on the up and up. This seems to be something recent with the Bush admin?
Sad to say but when you witness this kind of behavior from the government is makes you realize why we have a problem with OJ and Phil Spector type juries.
he prosecutors have argued to the jury, for instance, that officials in Brocade’s finance and accounting department “didn’t know a thing” of Reyes’s backdating and were deceived by him, but they’ve failed to call many of the key finance officials in question, several of whom have given statements to the FBI and SEC, according to Marmaro’s motion, suggesting considerable knowledge
legalpad.blogs.fortune.com |
