c/o MSNBC.com:

 

HOUSTON - Andrew Fastow, the mastermind behind financial schemes that doomed Enron Corp., was sentenced Tuesday to six years in prison for his role in the energy company?s stunning collapse by a judge who felt he deserved leniency.

 

Fastow, the former chief financial officer who cooperated with prosecutors in other cases related to Enron?s 2001 implosion, had agreed to serve a maximum 10-year term when he pleaded guilty in 2004.

 

But the judge said he deserved a lighter sentence because Fastow has been persecuted after Enron?s failure and that his family has suffered enough.

 

?Prosecution is necessary, but persecution was not,? said U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt. ?These factors call for mercy.?

 

Fastow was taken immediately into custody after the judge rejected his request to turn himself in later. The judge did allow him to hug his wife, then Fastow was taken away in handcuffs.

 

?I know I deserve punishment,? said Fastow, who cried before the sentencing while telling the court he was sorry for what he had done. ?I accept it without bitterness.?

 

Fastow said he was ashamed for what he had done and had tried to make up for it by helping prosecutors and attorneys for investors and employees who had lost money. Three attorneys for people who lost money and one Enron investor spoke at the sentencing.

 

?To all of the victims, I apologize to you,? he said, turning toward the four who spoke. ?I am ashamed of what I did.?

 

Fastow?s attorneys, David Gerger and John Keker, had asked for a lighter sentence, citing Fastow?s admission of guilt and his help in the federal government?s successful prosecution of Enron founder Kenneth Lay and the former chief executive, Jeffrey Skilling.

 

Enron, once the nation?s seventh-largest company, crumbled into bankruptcy proceedings in December 2001 after years of accounting tricks could no longer hide billions in debt or make failing ventures appear profitable. The collapse wiped out thousands of jobs, more than $60 billion in market value and more than $2 billion in pension plans.

 

Fastow was originally indicted on 98 counts, including fraud, insider trading and money laundering. He pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy, admitting to running various schemes to hide Enron debt and inflate profits while enriching himself. He surrendered nearly $30 million in cash and property.

 

At their trial, Fastow testified Lay and Skilling were aware of fraudulent financial structures engineered by Fastow and his staff.

 

Skilling and Lay were convicted in May of conspiracy and fraud. Lay died July 5 of heart disease, and his attorneys have been working to erase his convictions. Skilling is to be sentenced next month.

 

Fastow?s wife, Lea, pleaded guilty in 2004 to a misdemeanor tax crime and served a year in prison for helping him hide ill-gotten gains from his schemes. Her time behind bars was one of the reasons the judge was more lenient.

 

Before the sentencing, Rod Jordan, chairman of the Severed Enron Employee Coalition, said some former Enron workers believe Fastow should be forgiven because unlike Skilling, he admitted his guilt and ?is taking his medicine.?

 

 

c/o MSNBC.com:

 

JACKSON, Miss. - Former WorldCom chief Bernard Ebbers drove through the gates of a federal prison Tuesday to begin a 25-year sentence for his role in the $11 billion accounting fraud that toppled a company he built from a tiny telecommunications firm to an industry giant.

 

Behind the wheel of a Mercedes he had driven from his home, Ebbers pulled the bill of his cap down, shielding his face from reporters and photographers, as he drove into the prison.

 

Ebbers left his upscale, brick-and-stucco home in a gated community in the Jackson suburb of Ridgeland about 9 a.m. EDT and arrived shortly after 2 p.m. at Oakdale.

 

At his home on Monday, he had refused to answer any questions and told an Associated Press reporter to leave.

 

?You?re not even supposed to be on this property,? said Ebbers, 65, who answered the door wearing a light blue golf shirt and blue jeans.

 

Ebbers walked outside, with a cigar in his mouth, to watch the reporter leave his property.

 

Ebbers, a former high school basketball coach, took a small telecommunications firm and transformed it into an industry giant before the Clinton, Miss.-based WorldCom collapsed in bankruptcy in 2002.

 

?My overall sense of it is it?s just a sad day,? said Clinton Mayor Rosemary Aultman, whose city had to deal with the economic fallout of the scandal. ?The collapse of WorldCom was a tragic ending to what had been a fabulous story. So I think the overwhelming emotion continues to be great sadness and disappointment.?

 

U.S. District Judge Barbara Jones of New York told Ebbers during a sentencing hearing in July 2005 that she would recommend Ebbers be assigned to the Yazoo City Federal Correctional Facility ? about 50 miles northwest of Jackson ? to make it easier for his family to visit him. But the recommendation was not followed.

 

?It?s a decision of the (prison) bureau,? said Mike Truman, a U.S. Bureau of Prisons spokesman in Washington.

 

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Ebbers? conviction and sentence last month. His attorney has said they will continue to appeal, but he has few options, said Ron Rychlak, associate dean of the University of Mississippi School of Law.

 

?I understand they?re going to ask the 2nd Circuit to reconsider the case on whole. Three judges heard the case against him originally and he could ask all the judges on the court to hear the case,? Rychlak said. ?It?s pretty rare. The other thing would be to ask the Supreme Court to hear the case. That also is a very rarely granted situation.?

 

Ebbers? attorney, Reid Weingarten, did not immediately respond to a message left at his Washington office on Monday.

 

 

Looking to see what people here think. I believe that Fastow's sentence should have been 10 years, and that Ebbers should have received close to a life sentence. At least Fastow admitted guilt and cooperated with authorities, unlike Lay and Skilling.

Should have pounded them into the ground.