On the heels of the dramatic testimony that occurred late last week, this Chronicle article reports that Rex Shelby, former senior vice president of engineering and operations for Enron Broadband, yesterday became the first of the five defendants in the ongoing trial to take the stand in his own defense.
All of the five Enron Broadband defendants are expected to testify during the trial, which is a significantly different tactic than the defense team used in the previous Enron-related Nigerian Barge trial, the only other trial that has taken place involving former Enron executives. In that trial, only three of the six defendants testified and one of those — former Enron in house accountant Sheila Kahanek — was acquitted. All of the other five defendants in that case — including the only other Enron defendant (Dan Boyle) — were convicted.
Although not without risk, the defense move of having the defendants testify is sound. Juries in white collar cases almost always expect to hear what the defendants have to say and generally hold it against the defendants if they do not testify (even though they are instructed not to do so). The biggest obstacle that the defendants in the Broadband case have is attempting to explain the elephant in the courtroom — that is, the huge amount of money on Enron stock sales that Mr. Shelby and two of the other defendants made — and attempting to humanize the defendants by having them testify is an essential component of that explanation.