Loyalty's Reward - a Felony Conviction: Recent Prosecutions of High-Status Female Offenders

I. INTRODUCTION Over the past four years, the American public has witnessed a seemingly unending number of corporate and white-collar scandals. Corporate scandals in the business world are not a new phenomenon; indeed, every decade has had its share. Michael Milken, the Wall Street wonder of the eighties, along with his associate, Ivan Boesky, were both dethroned in the "junk bond" scandal. (1) This was followed by the Savings and Loan scandal that sent Charles Keating to jail. (2) The Archer Daniels Midland price-fixing scandal (3) marked the nineties, as did the Whitewater investigation that was closely associated with then President William Clinton and his wife, Hillary Clinton. (4) Nonetheless, the present wave of corporate and white-collar scandals distinguishes itself through the sheer number of companies being investigated. (5) It appears that no industry has been safe from scandal. (6) The investigations prompted by the collapse of Houston's energy giant, Enron, were independently responsible for the indictments of thirty individuals as of May 2004. (7) The present scandals are also interesting because they provide us with an opportunity to observe the prosecutions of several women of high status charged with white-collar crime. (8) Other than Susan McDougal, a defendant in the Whitewater case, (9) and Leona Helmsley, the New York Hotel proprietor, (10) one is hard pressed to recall significant numbers of women publicly associated in the past with white-collar crime or corporate scandal at the level we presently see. Between 2001 and 2004, six high-status women were charged with crimes in connection with corporate criminal cases. (11) The public is familiar with some of them, although not all of their cases have been covered equally in the press. The most thorough press coverage was of the arrest and trial of Martha Stewart, former CEO of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, whose case has been referred to as "mediagenic." (12) Stewart's public persona drove the coverage, despite the fact her criminal acts were neither the most serious, nor the most extensive, of the six. (13) The other five women are Lea Fastow, former assistant treasurer of Enron; (14) Betty Vinson, former account manager for WorldCom; (15) Kathleen Winter, former director at Marsh & McLennan, Inc.; (16) Helen Sharkey, of Dynegy, Inc.; (17) and Paula Rieker, former Vice President, Managing Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Secretary of Enron. (18) Lea Fastow's prosecution received some media attention, although the simultaneous prosecution of her husband, Andrew Fastow, the former CFO of Enron, undoubtedly motivated the coverage. (19) Similarly, Betty Vinson's case came to the attention of the press because her guilty plea helped secure the government's case against the CFO of World Com, Scott Sullivan. Sullivan eventually entered into a cooperation agreement with the government. (20) His cooperation enabled the government to prosecute Bernard Ebbers, the CEO of WorldCom at the time the telecommunications firm collapsed. (21) Relatively little information can be found in the public domain about the other three women, who have all plead guilty, and are presently cooperating with authorities and awaiting sentencing in 2006. During the same period of time these corporate scandals were unfolding, another "mediagenic" case of a high-status woman was investigated and prosecuted. This woman was rap artist Lil' Kim, whose birth name is Kimberly Jones. (22) At first blush, Lil' Kim's case appeared to fit within the parameters of the prosecutions of the other high-status women. She was, for example, charged with a classic white-collar cover-up crime, as was Martha Stewart. (23) She was charged in connection with an investigation into the actions of others. However, for reasons that will be discussed in Part IV of this Article, Lil' Kim's high status was not sufficient to elevate her case to the level of white-collar treatment. …