Houston – Enron Corp. founder Ken Lay dropped his famous affable persona as his cross-examination began Wednesday, snarling at a prosecutor who accused him of witness tampering after the ex-chairman and chief executive called several potential witnesses during his fraud and conspiracy trial.
Jurors who had been listening impassively snapped to attention. “Did you have any conversations to get your story straight for trial?” asked prosecutor John Hueston, equally primed for battle.
“Can you elaborate on that, Mr. Hueston?” Lay shot back. “I’m not sure what story you’re talking about.”
The prosecutor noted that Lay called two Goldman Sachs & Co. executives during the trial regarding a September 2001 meeting about Enron.
Former Enron chief financial officer Andrew Fastow – whom Lay has dubbed a traitor, liar and crook – testified that he and Lay met with the executives to discuss restructuring Enron at the same time Lay was telling employees and reporters that the company was sound. Lay says the executives called the meeting to discuss Enron’s vulnerability to a takeover.
Lay said he called the executives in March – the same month Fastow testified – but he said he didn’t try to align their memories of the meeting with his. “I was trying to make sure some facts I had about a meeting we had in the fall of 2001 was right. I was just trying to make sure that all of my facts were as accurate as they could be,” he declared, noting further that Fastow “gave a fake version of that meeting.”
Hueston noted that Goldman Sachs attorneys warned Lay to stop calling the executives directly, a fact to which Lay glumly replied, “Uh, yeah.”
Lay, known in Houston for his avuncular, polite persona and philanthropy, shed any pretenses to his usual diplomacy when faced with the prosecutor who secured his indictment in July 2004. Lay’s visible anger and Hueston’s rapid-fire questioning produced an electricity that had been absent, even during almost eight days of testimony from his far scrappier co-defendant, former chief executive Jeff Skilling.
After a short afternoon break, Lay appeared to calm down. Lay also acknowledged he tried to contact Vince Kaminski, a former top risk analyst for Enron, nine days before Kaminski testified for the prosecution. Kaminski told jurors he got a cold reaction when he told Lay and other executives in October 2001 that Enron needed to “come clean” on questionable financial structures.
