The Chronicle leads with a misleading headline today regarding the $23 million that former Enron CEO and COO Jeff Skilling has set aside to pay the cost of his defense in Enron-related matters. The Chronicle article suggests that the $23 million is absurdly high, which it is not. Mr. Skilling is the subject of a 35 count criminal indictment that could lead to effectively a life prison sentence if he is convicted. Moreover, Mr. Skilling is a defendant in dozens of civil cases arising from the ashes of Enron. The review of documents alone relating to his criminal case is a monumental task. And to make matters more complicated, the prosecution in Mr. Skilling’s criminal case is attempting to constrict Mr. Skilling’s ability to pay his defense team.
$23 million may be extraordinarily high defense costs, but Enron is an extraordinary case. This is an example of the Chronicle leading with a story where there really is not one. The Chronicle would be much better served by addressing the Enron Task Force‘s highly troubling “sledgehammer” approach to prosecuting former Enron insiders, in which the prosecution files so many duplicative criminal counts against the defendant that the defendant has to risk what amounts to a life prison sentence in order to defend himself. That approach raises important issues of fairness and due process that the media covering the Enron prosecutions have ignored to date.