Re d: 5, 300 Wells Fargo employees fired over 2 million phony accounts

["David Farber" <farber () gmail com>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Peter Swire <peter () peterswire net>
Subject: Re: [IP] Re d: 5, 300 Wells Fargo employees fired over 2 million phony accounts
Date: September 13, 2016 at 1:17:12 PM EDT
To: "dave () farber net" <dave () farber net>

Hi Dave:

I share the outrage about outrageous financial practices on Wall Street.  They happened at grotesque scale in the 
mortgage market, especially near the end of the bubble in 2006-2008.

I respect Dan Gillmor and often agree with him.  I don’t agree the lack of criminal convictions should be seen as 
“Obama’s legacy.”

As a lawyer who spent some time in a prosecutor’s office long ago, it is SUPER hard to get convictions beyond a 
reasonable doubt in many financial cases. Here is a NY Times story about the first Wall Street prosecution, in 2009.  
Two Bear, Stearns executives were prosecuted for lying to investors. They did lie —  the Bear, Stearns frauds were 
especially egregious, as documented in the 2010 book “House of Cards.”

What happened?  The jury acquitted. “There was a reasonable doubt on every charge. We just didn’t feel that the case 
had been proven,” said Ryan Goolsby, one of the jurors.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/business/11bear.html <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/business/11bear.html?_r=0>

Prosecutors can win if there is outright theft, or a clear insider trading case.  Based on discussions I have had with 
prosecutors, the broad fraud claims are very, very hard to prove.

Peter





Prof. Peter Swire
Huang Professor of Law and Ethics
Scheller College of Business
Georgia Institute of Technology

Senior Counsel
Alston & Bird LLP

Ph: 240-994-4142
Web: www.peterswire.net <http://www.peterswire.net/>






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