Skilling v. United States

Skilling v. United States
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 1, 2010 Decided June 24, 2010
Full case name	Jeffrey K. Skilling v. United States
Docket no.	08-1394
Citations	561 U.S. 358 (more) 130 S. Ct. 2896; 177 L. Ed. 2d 619
Case history
Prior	Convictions affirmed, 554 F.3d 529 (5th Cir. 2009), cert. granted, 558 U.S. ___ (2009).
Subsequent	Prison term of Jeffrey Skilling reduced from 24 years and 4 months to 14 years (minus time served)
Holding
Pretrial publicity and community prejudice did not prevent Skilling from obtaining a fair trial. However, the honest services fraud statute, 18 U.S.C. §1346, is properly confined to cover only bribery and kickback schemes, which do not include Skilling's alleged misconduct. So construed, §1346 is not unconstitutionally vague. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices John P. Stevens · Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy · Clarence Thomas Ruth Bader Ginsburg · Stephen Breyer Samuel Alito · Sonia Sotomayor
Case opinions
Majority	Ginsburg, joined by Roberts, Stevens, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, Alito (Part I); Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas (Part II); Roberts, Stevens, Breyer, Alito, Sotomayor (Part III)
Concurrence	Scalia (in part), joined by Thomas; Kennedy (except Part III)
Concurrence	Alito (in part)
Concur/dissent	Sotomayor, joined by Stevens, Breyer
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. V; 18 U.S.C. § 1346

Skilling v. United States, 561 U.S. 358 (2010), is a United States Supreme Court case interpreting the honest services fraud statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1346. The case involves former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling and the honest services fraud statute, which prohibits "a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services". The Court found the statute vague, meaning it was written in a manner that almost anyone could be convicted of the statute by engaging in most legal activities. However, the Court refused to void the statute as unconstitutionally vague. The Court decided to limit the application of the statute only to defendants who hold a fiduciary duty and they participate in bribery and kickback schemes. The Court supported its decision not to rule the statute void for vagueness on its obligation to construe and not condemn Congress' laws. Ultimately, Skilling's sentence was reduced by 10 years as a result.

In light of the court's findings, a similar case, Weyhrauch v. United States, involving former Alaska representative Bruce Weyhrauch,^[1] was returned to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, where federal charges were eventually dropped.^[2][3]

Notes[]

References[]

• Amanda Becker, Lawyers prepare to reopen 'honest services' cases in wake of Supreme Court ruling, Washington Post, August 9, 2010
• Artur Davis, Court could redefine insider trading. MarketWatch, March 11, 2011
• Nicholas J. Wagoner, Honest-Services Fraud: The Supreme Court Defuses the Government's Weapon of Mass Discretion in Skilling v. United States, South Texas Law Review, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Winter 2010), p. 1121
• Thomas P. Cimino, Jr., Junaid A. Zubairi, Rachel C. Adamczyk, Rachel T. Copenhaver, Vedder Price, Supreme Court Limits Scope of “Honest Services” Statute - Skilling v. United States. National Law Review, September 8, 2010
• Justice Department Seeks a Broader Fraud Law to Cover Self-Dealing, New York Times, September 28, 2010
• Wesley Burrell, The Right-to-Honest-Services Doctrine—Enron’s Final Victim: Pure Void-for-Vagueness in Skilling v. United States, 44 Loy. L.A. L. Rev. 1289 (2011). Available at: http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/llr/vol44/iss3/19

External links[]

• Text of Skilling v. United States, 561 U.S. 358 (2010) is available from: Justia  Oyez (oral argument audio)  Supreme Court (slip opinion)