I’m not a lawyer at all and find Bricker’s approach to be the most sensible. I’ll note that literally the only argument you guys are making is “Bricker is being a stickler, screw that!”
This thread is and has always been about whether or not Wall Street CEOs should be imprisoned. To imprison someone you need to convict them of a crime. To convict them of a crime you need some evidence that a crime was committed and they are the ones who committed it.
All the articles you guys are linking have shown clear evidence of amoral business practices. You’ve not shown any evidence of “someone using fraud to commit a crime.” I can lie to you guys all day long and not be committing a crime.
As a savvy investor I’ve noted the disclaimers Bricker is talking about on every investment I’ve ever purchased. That’s why I personally would be surprised if you can easily convict the corporate level guys. If you can prove they knowingly lied on the prospectus of their investments or lied when they created the MBSes you could have a case that they were violating various securities laws relating to lying to investors and such. I wouldn’t even ask for specific statute in those cases like Bricker has. Generally deliberately lying about the financial health of a publicly traded issue is going to run afoul of at least some laws. But the devil is in the details, which is why I’ve asked for one specific case.
I understand that you guys think you have demonstrated this, you have’t. All that you’ve demonstrated is that banks were wrong about the financial health of issues, but they’re allowed to be wrong. That’s what risk is all about, you’re taking a risk with any investment and just because an entity was demonstrably wrong about how risky an investment was that isn’t intrinsic proof of intentionally lying about how risky the investment was.
I’ll also repeat–it isn’t the job of banks the create MBSes to analyze how risky they are in terms of ratings. It’s their job to report on metrics relating to the credit worthiness of borrowers underlying an MBS for example, and to issue disclaimers and explain risks, but they aren’t actually the entities that create the ratings that institutional and private investors use to actually buy these issues. You would have to prove a bank CEO deliberately ordered underlings to lie about the credit worthiness of borrowers in creating debt issues. Does anyone have any of that?
Any cite without an actual CEO’s name in it and mention of specific debt issuances isn’t proof, it’s just further evidence of bad decision making (which is all any of you have provided firm proof for thus far.)
This points out another fundamental difference between you and I. I would have, had I had the time and inclination to get involved in the debate, provided the code sections, and offered my opinion (if I had one) about the information in the prior cites. You, as is your wont, simply demanded a cite to a specific code section, and then simply hand wave away the rest of the information and research they provided. My way adds more information to the debate, and furthers the discussion. Your way? Well, I think your way leads to multiple pittings, an increase in resentment, and a reputation as … well, whatever you think your reputation is.
You know how long it took? About 10 minutes. You likely could have found it in 20, and then offered it up to the thread. Instead, you decided being antagonistic is the way to go. Good Luck with that.
It would take me days of pouring over information on the internet, another couple weeks going over information unavailable on the internet, checking cites, and going over caselaw and codes to come to a well educated, well supported legal opinion on the charge of just one person. I don’t know many people willing to put in that kind of time to make a point on an internet message board, especially when, after you do all that, you have dozens of people adding “what about this!”. I think expecting people on a message board to do what would take years in the criminal justice system to accomplish is setting the bar a little high. Of course, YMMV, as does your reputation.
I never would have offered up that example in the first place, because I don’t agree it can ever be successfully proven on these facts. Does it really add to the discussion to say, “Well, there’s this charge, but it’s not workable?”
Far from clarifying the debate or adding more information to it, I think you confuse it even more, especially to readers fuzzy on basic concepts of criminal law.
The only reputation you’re assuaging here is your unwillingness to publicize an unpopular opinion: that the big evil bankers have escaped criminal liability. This even-handed bullshit is nothing more than a reluctance to confront politically like-minded posters with an unpalatable truth.
But, hey, on the bright side, they all think you’re the bee’s knees and I’m a reactionary danger to enlightened society. Never mind the facts.
I was going to drop this, but this just occurred to me and the curiosity is killing me so I’ve got to ask. You know that Al Capone is probably one of the most notorious gangsters who ever lived right? So I’m guessing that you also know that he was never convicted of any of his “ALLEGED” crimes either - yes?
And yet THOSE crimes should have been so much easier to prove - don’t you think? :rolleyes:
How in the world can you argue that it is vitally important to provide a relevant code section, and then, two posts later, say that doing just that would unduly confuse people? That’s just … well, actually it’s just like you.
How about find a post in this thread where I offered this opinion? Go ahead, I’ll wait.
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Here, I’ll help you out. I didn’t. I did not have, nor do I have now, the time nor the inclination to get into the details of the criminal responsibility of any specific people involved in the financial crises. Once again, you’re making stuff up.
My posts in this thread have nothing to do with your politics or whether you’re a “reactionary danger”. They have to do with your … troubling … debate tactic of demanding a legal cite and dismissing everything else until it is provided, when you could simply provide one yourself with a minimum of effort. Now we’ve kinda devolved into whatever this is you are doing. As I said before, good luck with that.
I am calling the code section you posted NOT relevant, because, while it meets the criteria of criminalizing a securities transaction predicated on fraudulent misrepresentations, it would not suffice to convict the big league bankers under discussion here because the presence of the disclaimers would vitiate the fraud elements of the crime.
What??? I could offer an irrelevant cite myself, and then explain why it wouldn’t work?
Yes. I suppose I could do that.
But don’t you think people would see through that tactic pretty quickly?
You are confusing the difference between providing a relevant code section and presenting the evidence necessary to meet the elements of that code section. A statute outlawing murder isn’t suddenly irrelevant in a murder case because there isn’t enough evidence presented at trial to convict someone.
Now, you could be doing this by mistake, maybe a slip of the brain done by responding too quickly my post. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume it was just a misunderstanding.
You’re actually restating my argument and what I’ve been saying. Or at least one version of it. I’m ambivalent on whether or not crimes have been committed. I think it’s probably a mix of bad business decisions that aren’t criminal, and some cases of outright fraud in furtherance of a crime. Specifically, lower level bank employees saying they were doing due diligence so they could package risky mortgages as less risky than they actually were. They were probably told or pressured to do this by management. I think that is likely to have happened. That’s the “bar stool opinion” of myself, but there’s a big step between that and “CEOs need to be in prison.”
The gap between those two things is filled in with evidence and the criminal justice system, and so far I’ve not seen any specific examples where you guys have filled it in. (Where the executive wasn’t prosecuted and convicted–we can assume the CEOs that have actually been prosecuted and convicted committed crimes.)
But your point about Al Capone is an excellent one. Criminal syndicates like the Italian mafia function in a way that protects the man at the top. Money flows up, criminal liability doesn’t (in theory.) Usually a good syndicate boss will only issues orders in vague terms through one or two extremely trusted underlings. These underlings are themselves heavily “protected” and avoid criminal liability as best they can. Lower level mafiosi are taught and indoctrinated to “take the blame” anytime something happens. If they don’t, the next level of protection for the boss is his 1-2 direct reports who are usually very loyal. (Loyalty is enforced through traditions and violence.)
At the end of the day, that’s why very few mob bosses have ever been convicted of murder, they insulate themselves from those crimes very well. At the time Capone went down, tax law was not nearly so well understood by the mafiosi as ordinary criminal law and they were much less protected. Their money laundering operations were superficial and easily pierced.
I don’t think me or Bricker are saying these Wall Street CEOs did no wrong, or that they don’t deserve blame. I personally am not even saying “they did nothing criminal” I’m saying I’ve yet to see a case where someone can show any evidence a crime was committed where the government has not acted. Same for Al Capone, there’s a reason he wasn’t convicted of murder and it’s precisely because there was no evidence linking him to the murders he ordered. That’s the whole reason the mafia is structured the way it is, to insulate the top guys as much as possible from the crimes done on their command. That doesn’t mean the crime didn’t happen, and no one is claiming that–but it does mean you can’t send them to jail for it.
To me your argument is “Al Capone did commit murder, so that proves these Wall Street CEOs did crimes too and just insulated themsevels!” Okay, it doesn’t prove that, but it is a fair analogy. But the whole point is, yes they did insulate themselves from criminal liability. No one is saying that means they didn’t do it, we’re saying that means you can’t send them to prison for it.
Umm, just out of curiousity again dude, since the criminal law virtually always requires mens rea and since state of mind can never be shown directly, what makes the statute Hamlet selected oh so very different from any other statute you might theoretically try to convict a banker under?
edit: ok, other than the fact that the states of mind of both the defendant and ‘victim’ are involved. Is that point you want to make?
If “the sense you describe” is "here in reality and not as Bricker first posited’, then we agree.
I thought I was pretty clear I didn’t intend to spend the amount of time necessary to reach a well researched legal opinion on any of the plethora of people who might have been indicted. If you are so interested, you could start here. I was merely pointing out that “Yeah! Well, give me a code section!” and then dismissing the entirety of the rest of the information provided when they don’t (and when you could have done it rather simply yourself) isn’t the most admirable, or the most effective, rebuttal.
No, my point was, it’s impossible for us to know one way or the other so it’s a pointless exercise. Maybe the evidence is there to be found and maybe it’s not. How am I, with access to some public data, if that, going to know shit from shinola? For me to even make the attempt would be tantamount to admitting I should be involuntarily committed.
However you know what eventually happened where the mob was concerned? The feds got tired of that bullshit game and said, ‘fine, you want to play that game, we’re going to change the rules asshole.’ They got Congress to pass the RICO statute and went back to the mob and said ‘ehhhh. We got your due process right heeeerrreee!!!’
Even if we could not actually convict the bankers, as some here maintain, I think it would be most salutary to try a few Wall Street CEOs for their crimes. Let the government present its case in court, and show what a thin tissue of lies and legal fictions the CEOs’ “innocence” depends on.
What really got me: the top execs at Lehmann Bros. were dumping their own positions in MBSs-while they were urging their underlings to invest in them (one low level manager had his entire 401K in them).
Pretty slick! Now these creeps wander in from their Hamptons palaces for court appearances, whilst delaying the thing indefinitely.
Hell, if the Feds can drive some poor kid to suicide with the threat of years in prison for violating a ToS agreement, I’m sure they can think up something for the bankers who actually did something wrong.
I don’t agree with Shodan much, but I think he’s on to something here. In Iceland, for example, soon as their banking crisis, their legislative branch passed a new law that literally CREATED a new office to go on a witch hunt for those who were responsible for the banking crisis. Hundreds of bankers were arrested and you know what’s even cooler, deltasigma? The Government refunded the money BACK TO THE PEOPLE instead of the banks. This will never, ever happen in the United States.
Whoa there. Of course you can’t just lock people up, even banksters, just on principle (really wanted type principal but I didn’t - you’re welcome ). That whole discussion with Bricker was just 2 lawyers doing their mating dance - totally different thing.
As any lawyer should know, you can’t retroactively punish people. You could certainly develop a RICO type statute targeted at corporate malfeasance, but it could not punish anyone retroactively. I don’t actually think it’s that easy for any of us here to come up with some definitive proof that specific CEOs committed crimes. But that’s why you shouldn’t assert that these CEOs could be sent to prison, because you have no actual proof they could be. There’s a big difference from “could be” and “should be.” Capone should have been sent to prison for murder, but he never was.
The more I’ve thought about this issue, it’s really not even properly a debate, it’s more of a GQ question.
To boil down the OP:
Could we convict major bank and Wall Street figures?
Answer: Yes, but only if the government can find evidence that the figures explicitly committed a crime sufficient to demonstrate it beyond a reasonable doubt.
That’s really the end of the discussion right there. Yes they can, but not without proof beyond the threshold of conviction.
). That whole discussion with Bricker was just 2 lawyers doing their mating dance - totally different thing.