Opinion ID: 175418
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Skilling v. United States

Text: In June 2010, the United States Supreme Court decided Skilling and addressed the issue of whether the jury properly convicted Skilling of conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud. Skilling, 130 S. Ct. at 2907. Jeffrey Skilling, a longtime Enron officer, was Enron’s chief executive officer from February until August 2001, when he resigned. Id. Less than four months after Skilling resigned from Enron, the company declared bankruptcy. Id. The jury convicted Skilling “with conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud; in particular, it alleged that Skilling had sought to ‘depriv[e] Enron and its shareholders of the intangible right of [his] honest services.’” Id. at 2908. The Supreme Court considered the scope and constitutionality of the honest services statute and determined that “[t]o preserve the statute without transgressing constitutional limitations,” § 1346 criminalizes only “fraudulent schemes to deprive another of honest services through bribes or kickbacks.” Skilling, 130 S. Ct. at 2928, 2931. The Supreme Court rejected the Government’s argument that § 1346 should also encompass “undisclosed self-dealing by a public official . . . [such as] the taking of official action by the [official] that furthers his own undisclosed financial interests while purporting to act in the interests of those to whom he owes a fiduciary duty.” Id. at 2932 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Because the Government in Skilling did not allege that Skilling accepted bribes or kickbacks, the Supreme Court determined that Skilling’s honest services fraud conviction was flawed and vacated the Fifth Circuit’s affirmance of Skilling’s conspiracy conviction. Id. at 2934–35.