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    Law & Disorder

    It's not over yet: The repercussions of Jeffrey Skilling's partial Supreme Court win

    Sarah Rufca
    Jun 24, 2010 | 12:01 pm
    News_Jeff Skilling_Enron
    The Supreme Court will hear arguments today on whether Jeff Skilling’s conviction should be overturned.
    Photo by Wyatt McSpadden

    The Supreme Court has spoken in the appeal of former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling and their decision is ... confusing.

    Written by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the ruling comes in three parts, each signed on by a different coalition of justices with a handful of concurring opinions.

    Ginsburg lays out the questions faced by the court simply:

    In 2001, Enron Corporation, then the seventh highest­ revenue-grossing company in America, crashed into bank­ruptcy. We consider in this opinion two questions arising from the prosecution of Jeffrey Skilling, a longtime Enron executive, for crimes committed before the corporation’s collapse. First, did pretrial publicity and community prejudice prevent Skilling from obtaining a fair trial? Second, did the jury improperly convict Skilling of con­spiracy to commit “honest-services” wire fraud?

    In short, the Supreme Court decided the answer was "no" to the first question of whether Skilling was prevented from getting a fair trial, and "yes" to Skilling's improper conviction on honest services wire fraud.

    Skilling won't be emerging from prison in the immediate future, but the decision vacates a part of his conviction and remands the case to circuit court to sort out the remaining questions, which could result in a reduction of Skilling's current 24-year sentence.

    As evidence that Skilling received a fair trial, the Court points to several factors: The size of the jury pool in Houston, the general lack of incendiary rhetoric in the media or "evidence of the smoking-gun variety" released to the public, the significant time elapsed between the fall of Enron and Skilling's trial four years later, as well as Skilling's acquittal on nine counts of insider trading, a strong indicator that the jury was unbiased.

    Looking specifically at the trial courts actions in selecting a jury though, the justices focused some lively questioning during oral arguments over whether the time for voir dire was sufficient. The brief examined the questionnaire filled out by potential jurors, examination by the judge and counsel and examination of the jury members' connection to Enron, and determined that:

    "In sum, Skilling failed to establish that a presumption of prejudice arose or that actual bias infected the jury that tried him ... Taking account of the full record, rather than incomplete exchanges selectively culled from it, we find no cause to upset the lower courts’ judgment that Skilling’s jury met that measure. We therefore affirm the Fifth Circuit’s ruling that Skilling received a fair trial."

    In this judgment, Justice Sotomayor filed a dissent joined by Breyer and Stevens, opining that she found Skilling's voir dire insufficient to guarantee a fair trial.

    The second question revolved around the "honest services" statute, a precursor to mail fraud and wire fraud laws, and defined as prohibiting "any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises."

    Skilling challenged this as unconstitutionally vague, a claim the Court found had merit. But rather than invalidate the clause as a whole, the Supreme Court construed it to refer solely to acts of bribery or kick-backs, and states that the government did not make any claims that Skilling violated those stricter terms:

    The Government charged Skilling with conspiring to defraud Enron’s shareholders by misrepre­senting the company’s fiscal health, thereby artificially inflating its stock price. It was the Government’s theory at trial that Skilling “profited from the fraudulent scheme . . . through the receipt of salary and bonuses , . . . and through the sale of approximately $200 million in Enron stock, which netted him $89 million.” ... The Government did not, at any time, allege that Skill­ing solicited or accepted side payments from a third party in exchange for making these misrepresentations."

    The Supreme Court thus vacated Skilling's conspiracy conviction, and remanded the case to the Fifth Circuit court to determine whether the other conspiracy counts hold without the honest services statute being in play, and the effect of the ruling on Skilling's other convictions.

    So Enron may be dead, but the Enron case lives on.

    unspecified
    news/city-life

    This Week's Hot Headlines

    Houston billionaire ranks among top U.S. landowners and more popular stories

    CultureMap Staff
    Jun 14, 2025 | 11:01 am
    HMNS Great Outdoors Gala 2022 Russell and Glenda Gordy and Red FJ Cruiser
    Photo by Jenny Antill
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    Editor's note: It's time to look back at the top Houston news of the week, including a look at one of America's top landowners. Plus, the sad closure of a pioneering steakhouse and a popular pizzeria makes plans for Houston. Get the details on our most popular stories below, then head here to plan your weekend.

    1. Houston oil-and-gas billionaire ranks among America's top 100 landowners. About one-fourth of the country’s mega-owners of private land have ties to Texas, either living here, owning land here, or both. The highest-ranked Houston-based landowner is oil-and-gas billionaire Russell Gordy.

    2. Houston's pioneering South American steakhouse will soon shutter in River Oaks. Sad news for inner loopers who are fans of plantain chips, wood-grilled steaks, and Houston’s best tres leches. The River Oaks location of South American steakhouse Churrascos will close Monday, June 16.

    3. Texas Monthly's BBQ Snob dishes on the magazine's new top 50 list. On this episode of “What’s Eric Eating,” Texas Monthly barbecue editor Daniel Vaughn joins CultureMap editor Eric Sandler to discuss the magazine’s new list of the 50 best barbecue joints in Texas.

    4. 'Famous' Bronx-based pizza chain fires up 3 Houston locations. A New York-based pizza chain has big plans for Houston. Called Singas Famous Pizza, the restaurant will soon open three locations in the area.

    Singas PizzaSingas Pizza is coming to Houston.Photo courtesy of Singas

    5. Texas slides down the list of best U.S. state economies for 2025. Texas' robust economy may be showing some cracks. Texas now ranks as the state with the eighth best economy, four spots lower than one year ago, according to a new report.

    most popular storiesbillionairesrankingsreportsclosingstexas monthlybbqpizzaopeningsreal estatehot-headlines
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    most read posts

    Houston's pioneering South American steakhouse will soon shutter in River Oaks

    Texas slides down the list of best U.S. state economies for 2025

    Texas Monthly's BBQ Snob dishes on the magazine's new top 50 list

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