Andrew Fastow

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Andrew Stuart Fastow (born 22 December 1961) was the chief financial officer of Enron Corporation until the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into his conduct in 2001. Fastow was one of the key figures behind the complex web of off-balance sheet special purpose entities (limited partnerships which Enron controlled) used to conceal their massive losses. He is currently serving a prison sentence for charges related to this conduct.


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[edit] Early life and education

Fastow was born in Washington, DC, the middle child of three sons. His father worked in merchandising for a drug store chain. He grew up in New Providence, New Jersey, where he was student council president and on the tennis team and in the school band during high school. He was the sole student representative on the New Jersey State Board of Education.

Fastow graduated from Tufts University in 1983 with B.A.s in economics and Chinese. While there, he met his future wife, Lea Weingarten, whom he married in 1984. Her family had founded a grocery store chain in Houston and later entered the real estate business.

Fastow and Weingarten both earned MBAs at Northwestern University and worked for Continental Illinois National Bank and Trust Company in Chicago.

[edit] Early career

While at Continental Illinois, Fastow helped pioneer a system of raising capital by selling notes backed by risky loans. The practice spread across the industry "because it provides an obvious advantage for a bank," noted the Chicago Tribune. "It moves assets off the bank's balance sheet while creating revenue." Continental became the largest U.S. bank to fail during the Savings and Loan crisis.

Based on his work at Continental, Fastow was hired in 1990 by Jeffrey Skilling at Enron.

[edit] Legal problems at Enron

On October 31, 2002, Fastow was indicted by a federal grand jury in Houston, Texas on 78 counts including fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy. On January 14, 2004, he pled guilty to two counts of wire and securities fraud, and agreed to serve a ten-year prison sentence. He also agreed to become an informant and cooperate with federal authorities in the prosecutions of other former Enron executives in order to receive a reduced sentence.

On May 6, 2004, his wife, Lea Fastow, a former Enron assistant treasurer, pled guilty to a misdemeanor tax charge and was sentenced to one year in a federal prison in Houston, and an additional year of supervised release. She was released to a halfway house on 11 July 2005.

[edit] Sentencing and Incarceration

Despite entering into a plea agreement to serve 10 years in prison, on 26 September 2006, Fastow was sentenced to six years, followed by two years of probation. U.S. District Judge Ken Hoyt believed Fastow deserved leniency for his cooperation with the prosecution in several civil and criminal trials involving former Enron employees. Hoyt recommended that Fastow's sentence be served at the low-security Federal Correctional Institution in Bastrop, Texas. As of November 2006, Fastow is Inmate #14343-179 at the Federal Detention Center (FDC) in Oakdale, Louisiana.[1]

[edit] Other sources

A number of books have been written about Enron and Andy Fastow. Prominent among these is Conspiracy of Fools by Kurt Eichenwald which essentially features Fastow as the book's antagonist.

The book Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, was also adapted into a film documentary.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

Persondata
NAME Fastow, Andrew Stuart
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION chief financial officer of Enron Corporation
DATE OF BIRTH 22 December 1961
PLACE OF BIRTH Washington, D.C.
DATE OF DEATH living
PLACE OF DEATH
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