Quattrone conviction: 1 Christian's dissent

Just five years ago, Frank Quattrone, an investment banker based in Silicon Valley, California, was riding the crest of the boom. As the point man in the rapid issuance of initial public offerings of stocks (IPOs) for the many high tech and Internet firms that rose up during the go-go 1990s, Quattrone helped create the temporary fortunes that were being made in what we now know was a stock bubble.

Today, Quattrone awaits sentencing after being convicted in federal court in New York City of “obstruction of justice.” Federal investigators had hoped to pin the entire stock market crash of 2001 on his shoulders, but all they could find was a brief email that he sent to his employees reminding them of company policy about the files they kept. That email, declared federal prosecutors, supposedly hindered a government investigation, and a jury agreed. (Quattrone’s first trial on “obstruction of justice” ended in a mistrial, but prosecutors already said they were determined to try Quattrone multiple times, if necessary.)

Wrote Christopher Westley of Jacksonville State University after the verdict:

What exactly did Quattrone do? He reminded his subordinates of a company policy to destroy documents, an action he doubtlessly carried out several times during his highly successful stint as an investment banker at Credit Suisse First Boston. However, when he sent this message on December 5, 2000, it followed being informed of a federal probe into CSFB's (Credit Suisse First Boston) initial public offering allocation policies.

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This may or may not have been an obstruction of justice. A gray area is bound to result when trying to judge someone's motives. Quattrone claimed that his was a routine email and that he was never led to believe that it would hinder the federal investigation. Prosecutors argue that his email proved that Quattrone had something to hide, even though no devious intentions were shown over the course of two trials.

Bolstering Quattrone’s case was the fact that federal investigators found no evidence of criminal conduct in his stock dealings. To put it another way, Quattrone was tried and convicted of the “crime” of “covering up” actions that were not criminal. If this sounds like something from “Alice in Wonderland,” welcome to the twisted world of federal criminal law.

My guess is that few Christians care about what has happened to Frank Quattrone. First, most Christians tend to be suspicious of anyone who is wealthy, and especially one who has earned that wealth in the finance sector. Because financial dealings can be extremely complex, and people prefer simple explanations about things, it is not surprising that Christians often look upon banking and finance as something to be distrusted or even outright condemned. In other words, they seem to take the following stance: "He made millions of dollars in finance, so he must be a crook. Therefore, I’m glad they got him on something."

It is interesting how Christians who hold to the truths of the Bible are quick to denounce those parts of Scripture that they don't like. For example, while the Bible exhorts (in both the Old and New Testaments) people to treat the poor with justice, it also says not to withhold justice from someone because he is rich. In other words, equal justice is the watchword.

Thus, the real question is this: Did Frank Quattrone receive justice or not? To answer it, let us first examine the law under which he was convicted. "Obstruction of justice" usually involves actions far less onerous than the sound of the "crime." For one, it applies only to individuals being investigated. For example, if a government agent lies during a criminal investigation or withholds evidence that might damage the government's case, nothing happens. The courts already have ruled that government agents are almost completely immune from being charged with criminal conduct if they commit those acts during the course of an investigation.

Furthermore, the government went after Quattrone because most of the IPOs that he helped launch ultimately crashed back to earth after their prices soared quickly after being placed on the market. However, Quattrone did not cause the stock bubble; the bubble occurred because of the loose monetary policies of Alan Greenspan’s Federal Reserve System during the 1990s. In other words, it was the reckless behavior of the Fed that ultimately led to the stock bubble, then the market crash and subsequent recession.

In other words, the government sought a scapegoat for its own failed policies. In the end, it found no criminal wrongdoing, just an email that could not have hindered anything, since the government agents even admitted there were no files – or even missing files – that pointed to criminal activity on the part of Quattrone.

While most Christians will not care that a very wealthy man has been railroaded into federal prison, they should. If a wealthy person in our society cannot receive justice, we should not be fooled into believing that Christians will fare any better when they are in the dock. And as the culture of this country becomes more immoral, sooner or later Christians will be in the crosshairs of the state.

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