# Martha Stewart convicted! Does she deserve prison? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 6, 2004, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808 "2004-03-06T02:37:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![zev\_steinhardt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/97f17d/32.png) [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2004, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/41 "2004-03-08T20:12:11Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > It cost the US Govt. (us) $1.5 million to prosecute Martha. What a waste! This was a 50,000 dollar scam. Why don’t they prosecute the REAL high-dollar crooks (like ken Lay)? You’re making it sound like the government had the choice of going after Stewart or Lay and chose Stewart. That is a fallacy however. The government may yet go after Lay. And even if they don’t go after Lay, that’s still no reason not to go after Stewart. Heck, she practically begged them to prosecute her. She was offered a way out of this with a fine and/or lesser felony conviction more than once and turned it down, preferring to stick to her story. In any event, the cost of the prosecution should not be a factor in determining whether or not someone gets prosecuted for theft. If someone breaks into my house and steals $100, I want him prosecuted, even if it costs $10,000. That’s _not_ a waste of taxpayer’s money. Zev Steinhardt ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2004, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/42 "2004-03-09T00:53:06Z")
> [@NurseCarmen](#): > > She used to be a stock broker. She knew exactly what she was doing. She’s no better than the Irish Travelers that pull swindles. She sold stock to the average joe knowing they would go down. I only wish the prison would shave her head. Get rid of that damn bang already! DING DING DING we have a winner. NurseCarmen nails it right out of the gate. Martha Stewart is a person God comes to for a loan and she used insider information to dump a bad stock on someone. I went apoplectic when Diane Sawyer tossed her a softball question about the insignificant amount of money this was to Mz. Stewart. HELLO, a person who is fabulously wealthy just screwed over an unsuspecting investor. It could have been someone’s retirement money. The sheer arrogance of both the question and the answer speaks volumes. I hope her prison name is Marie (Antoinette). ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2004, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/43 "2004-03-09T01:07:37Z")
I’ve gone back and forth on this, but: > [@wireless](#): > > “Had she admitted wrongdoing in early 2002, she could have gotten off with a $200,000 fine and no jail time. And NEWSWEEK has learned that the Feds gave Martha another opportunity to avoid prison. Federal prosecutors offered Martha a deal last April to cop to one count of making a false statement, say several sources familiar with the offer. She would have received probation and continued working at her company, they say.” **wireless** wins. Martha decided to roll the dice. She lost. Now she gets to cash in her chips and take the orange jumpsuit. 99 times out of 100, it’s the denial and coverup that bites you in the ass. It’s certainly true here. If she’d just owned up to it at the beginning, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. It’s Martha’s actions that put her here, from the shady trade to the stonewalling to the decision to gamble on a jury being dazzled by her celebrity. She’ll do a year to eighteen months, and justice will be done. ---
**Author:** ![Largo62](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/45deac/32.png) [@Largo62](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Largo62)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2004, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/44 "2004-03-09T01:29:44Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > I went apoplectic when Diane Sawyer tossed her a softball question about the insignificant amount of money this was to Mz. Stewart. What did you expect of Diane Sawyer? I haven’t regarded her as a real journalist since she softballed Kenneth Starr a few years back. I was pissed as hell then, and I haven’t seen anything to raise her status in my eyes since. She should be doing commercials, and leave journalism to people who know how to ask a real question. ---
**Author:** ![Reader99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/df788c/32.png) [@Reader99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reader99)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2004, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/45 "2004-03-09T06:30:57Z")
without expressing a further opinion on the original post, does “insider trading” have a precise legal definition? i understand that it generally refers to making use of information that is not widely available, but information isn’t necessarily secret just because it didn’t appear in the new york times. suppose, for the sake of argument, when the feds first questioned m. stewart she had said “i certainly did sell my imclone stock as soon as my broker called me. i was grateful that he was looking out for me.” the feds say, “don’t you know that’s insider trading?” she says “wait a minute. i’m not an officer, an employee or a contractor of imclone. i never communicated with anybody from inclone. i just followed my broker’s advice.” is she off the hook? suppose her broker, in addition to telling her about the problem at imclone, had told all of his clients the same thing, and they started telling their friends. is the information still an insider secret? suppose the broker had told martha and his other clients that his latest stock analysis indicated that imclone was not suitable for their investment strategy and they should dump it, without revealing why he felt that way. is he off the hook? are they? suppose a nurse (with no financial stake in anything) at the hospital where the imclone drug trials were failing told her girlfriend over lunch, “i’m so depressed, my patients are dying, this new drug isn’t working…”, and the girlfriend is the broker’s secretary. she goes back to the office and tells her boss. is that insider information? what i’m getting at is that there are so many sources of information, and so many different kinds of information with varying degrees of reliability, that i don’t understand how any particular tidbit can be precisely defined as an insider secret. the whole nature of stock investment is essentially a bet that you know more than the next guy. if someone wants to say “i never want to get charged with insider trading. just tell me what it is,” what’s the answer? ---
**Author:** ![pilot141](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e0b2c6/32.png) [@pilot141](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pilot141)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2004, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808/46 "2004-03-09T07:07:22Z")
**Reader99** the thing is in the Martha Stewart case instead of her saying something to the effect of “Oh, my broker told me to sell” she concocted a story about stop points and other BS, and then stuck to it. Just like Watergate, it’s not the crime that causes the downfall…it’s the coverup. Martha Stewart’s greatest crime was arrogance…if she could have stepped back and looked at her situation unemotionally she would have seen that a guilty plea to a minor charge would have been the best way out. But she (for some reason) was convinced that she had done nothing wrong. I could go on an entire rant about how what she did was harmless to the “average Joe”, but I won’t. Martha Stewart finds herself in the unfortunate place of being an “example”. She’s rich, she’s guilty of obstruction of justice…she will pay an exorbitant price. Whether you think Martha Stewart deserves prison time depends on what your view of prison is… If prison is punishment for violating the rules of society, then she deserves it. If prison is to make you change your behavior so you don’t repeat your crime…then she doesn’t deserve it. My guess is she will get a very short prison sentence so the court can say it was “tough” on her, and a VERY large fine. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/martha-stewart-convicted-does-she-deserve-prison/232808.md?page=2)