978-0078023859 Case13_2

subject Type Homework Help
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subject Authors Daniel Cahoy, Marisa Pagnattaro

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Case 13.2
SKILLING V. UNITED STATES
Supreme Court of the United States
561 U.S. 358; 130 S. Ct. 2896; 2010 U.S. LEXIS 5259 [June 24, 2010]
FACTS:
Founded in 1985, Enron Corporation grew from its headquarters in Houston, Texas, into one of the
world’s leading energy companies.
Skilling launched his career there in 1990 when Kenneth Lay, the company’s founder, hired him to
lead an Enron subsidiary.
Skilling rose through the corporation’s ranks, serving as president and chief operating officer, and
then, beginning in February 2001, as chief executive officer.
Six months later, on August 14, 2001, Skilling resigned from Enron.
Less than 4 months after Skilling’s departure, Enron spiraled into bankruptcy.
The company’s stock, which had traded at $90 per share in August 2000, fell to pennies per share in
late 2001.
The U.S. Department of Justice formed an Enron Task Force comprising of prosecutors and FBI
agents from around the Nation.
The Government’s investigation uncovered an elaborate conspiracy to prop up Enron’s short-run
stock prices by overstating the company’s financial well-being.
In the years following Enron’s bankruptcy, the Government prosecuted dozens of Enron employees
who participated in this scheme.
On July 7, 2004, a grand jury indicted Skilling, Lay, and Richard Causey, Enron’s former chief
accounting officer.
The indictment alleged that the Defendants, “engaged in a wide-ranging scheme to deceive the
investing public.”
PROCEDURE: Defendant was convicted in federal district court of charges that included conspiracy to
commit “honest services” wire fraud under 18 U.S.C.S. Sections 371, 1343, and 1346. The United
States Court of Appeals for the Firth Circuit affirmed.
ISSUE(S): (1) Did pretrial publicity and community prejudices prevent Skilling from obtaining a fair
trial?
(2) Did the jury improperly convict Skilling of conspiracy to commit “honest services” wire
fraud, 18 U.S.C. Sections 371, 1343, and 1346?
RULE: (1) “No hard-and-fast formula dictates the necessary depth or breadth of voir dire. Jury
selection is ‘particularly within the province of the trial judge. When pretrial publicity is at issue,
primary reliance on the judgment of the trial court makes good sense,’ because the judge ‘sits in the
locale where the publicity is said to have had its effect’ and may base her ‘own perception of the depth
and extent of the news stories that might influence a juror.’”
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(2) “The honest services statute involves fraudulent schemes to deprive another through bribes
or kickbacks.”
REASONING:
1. Pretrial publicity and community prejudice did not prevent Skilling from obtaining a fair trial. In
fact, Skilling’s jury acquitted him of 9 insider trading counts. Thus, he did not establish that a
presumption of juror prejudice arose or that actual bias infected the jury that tried him.
misrepresentations.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
It has long been the court’s practice before striking a federal statute as impermissibly vague, to
consider whether the prescription is amenable to a limiting construction.
If the general class of offenses to which the statute is directed is plainly within its terms, the statute

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