Ken Lay was prosecuted to death for promoting Enron even though he had a reasonable basis for believing that what he was saying about his company was true.

Fast forward a couple of years. Yesterday, the W$J reported (NYTimes here) that General Motors may not be able to avoid bankruptcy because of political problems involved in obtaining a bailout loan package from the federal government. GM is “rapidly burning through cash reserves as car sales plummet and their access to credit tightens. GM has warned it may run out of money within months without outside help.”

From what I can tell, no one is calling for the scalp of GM CEO Rick Wagoner because of confident public statements that he made just a few months ago about his company.

So, the corporate crime lottery continues. A truly civilized society would find a better way.