Newsgroup: it.economia.borsa
Titolo: Enron

Feds Begin Probe of Enron Downfall
10 Jan 2002, 08:38am ET
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By KAREN GULLO Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Justice Department has begun a criminal investigation
of Enron Corp., the bankrupt energy company whose collapse caused many
employees to lose their life's savings.
An attorney for Enron welcomed the inquiry, the latest in a series of
governmental probes into the company's demise, saying the investigation
would ``bring light to the facts.''
``We want to get to the bottom of this too,'' said Robert Bennett, a
Washington attorney representing the Houston-based company. ``A lot of
decent and honorable people work at Enron and we should wait until the facts
are out.''
The Justice Department is forming a national task force to look into the
company's dealings. The group will be headed by lawyers at the department's
criminal division and include prosecutors in Houston, San Francisco, New
York and several other cities, said a Justice Department official, speaking
on condition of anonymity.
The official declined to say when the investigation began. Enron faces civil
investigations by the Labor Department and the Securities and Exchange
Commission and subpoenas from congressional committees.
All are looking into the energy trading company's collapse, the largest
bankruptcy filing in U.S. history.
The failure hit employees and investors hard. Workers were prohibited from
selling company stock from their Enron-heavy 401(k) retirement accounts as
the company's stock plummeted. Many lost their life's savings.
Enron executives cashed out more than $1 billion in stock when it was near
its peak.
Formed in 1985, Enron had 20,000 employees and was once the world's top
buyer and seller of natural gas and the largest electricity marketer in the
United States. It also marketed coal, pulp, paper, plastics, metals and
fiber-optic bandwidth.
One likely focus of the Justice Department investigation is possible fraud
based on Enron's heavy reliance on off-balance-sheet partnerships which took
on Enron debt. The partnerships masked Enron's financial problems and left
its credit ratings healthy so it could obtain the cash and credit crucial to
running its trading business.
The Houston-based company went bankrupt after its credit collapsed and its
main rival, Dynegy Inc., backed out of an $8.4 billion buyout plan late last
year.
Just a year ago, stock of the nation's largest buyer and seller of natural
gas traded at $85 per share. Today it is less than $1.
Enron Chairman Kenneth L. Lay has close ties to President Bush and his
father, former President Bush. Lay was a top contributor to the younger
Bush's 2000 presidential campaign.
Last week, the president said: ``I think the life savings issue is something
we need to look into. ... The government will be looking into this.''
Lay also gave $25,000 to a leadership committee headed by then-senator and
now Attorney General John Ashcroft, according to the Center for Public
Integrity.
The company played a key role earlier this year when a White House task
force met with business executives and other interests to fashion a national
energy policy. The task force was headed by Vice President Dick Cheney.
The White House has acknowledged that Enron representatives met six times
with Cheney or his aides on energy issues last year, most recently in
mid-October just before the investing public realized the company was
heading for disaster.
The vice president's office said the last Enron meeting with a Cheney aide
was Oct. 10, just six days before the first in a series of public admissions
by the company about its true financial condition that sent it careening
into bankruptcy court.
Enron's financial position wasn't discussed in any of the meetings, vice
presidential counsel David Addington said in a letter.
On Wednesday, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters: ``I'm not
aware of anybody in the White House who discussed Enron's financial
situation.''
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On the Net:
http://www.enron.com
http://usdoj.gov
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