It's pretty fitting, given how large the reward for pulling the fraud off was.
There are, of course, a lot of people walking free who have done far worse things. (The Sacklers, for instance, should all be subject to a combination of prison and utter financial ruin. Instead, they are making quaint arguments about how a third of their drug wealth is fair recompense, and how their offshore billions should be protected from bankruptcy.)
Given the enormous scale of the fraud, someone should definitely be going to prison. "But my criminal organization is very large and not everything we did was illegal" is not an excuse.
Similar to the large group of bankers responsible for the housing crash in 2008....
"Well it's a BIG group and it would be REALLY hard to go after all of them so lets just fine them and parade that around as win while the criminals responsible go free"
That sounds more like a get-out-of-jail-for-hundreds-of-millions card. Though if this is the event that makes people realize that wealth inequality leads to all kinds of perversions of justice, perhaps that's a silver lining at least.
As I said in another submission, people sent other people to jail through negligence and deliberate cover ups. People were bankrupted and had money extorted from them. The only remedy for this is jail time for those involved. They should lose liberty, have their name dragged through the mud and gave financial ruin. Make the time fit the crime
Popular sentiment is correct in this case. No one went to jail for reckless behavior that they had good reason to believe was wrong. Instead, they got to keep their bonuses to buy their mansions.
Oh and in one final insult, the settlements with the banks will eventually be paid for out of bank revenues - which of course is generated by the public. I'm sure the bank execs are high fiving each other over that maneuver in the backyards of their private Connecticut uber-mansions.
People like SBF, Holmes etc, fucked over other super rich and often way more powerful people. That's why they are being punished. If they did smth like screw up 5 milion normal citizens for a 1000$ each, they'd still have their billion dollar fraud, but no serious punishment for it.
Financial fraud has some of the stiffest punishments that there are. Every single charge generally carries up to 20+ years. Madoff, for instance, ended up getting 150 years.
Of course Madoff ripped of the elites of society while SBF ripped off commoners and gave to the elites, something like a reverse Robin Hood. Real surprise the Sheriff of Nottingham doesn't seem quite so interested in his misdeeds in our tale.
So they stole 10 billion. It’s always a good deal to invest other people’s money into risky bets then take all the profit. If you lose you stick them with the losses.
A lot of people should go to jail but probably won’t.
The systemic damages done by someone at that level outweighs anything a hardened criminal done. Yes, $500MM in fraud caused magnitudes more misery and suffering to society, as a whole, than one murder. That kind of widespread damage has an untold number of ripple effects, pushing some people at the margins over the edge, breaking up marriages, causing people to drink and/or take narcotics, etc. It's hard to see, but it's like an armed robbery multiplied by 50 million.
In this instance, prison would actually serve as a deterrence.
The only crime here is that they were allowed to collect money in the first place from innocent victims. They should have gotten life and no one would be sorry for them. But then again, so should their clients.
I feel like the punishment should be appropriate to the crime though. Leave jail for the criminally dangerous, those whose freedom would be a physical danger to others. (Murderers, rapists, etc.)
Fraud? If it's money that was gained, then it should be money lost. Fine them into the dirt, but I don't think jail time is appropriate. Making money illegally doesn't make someone a murderer, it just makes then dishonest.
I don't like to harp on things that have become politicized too often, but this particular case stands in such stark contrast to bankers who made off with billions, none of whom to my knowledge are spending the rest of their lives in a common prison.
That's why the howls of injustice, to quote another commenter. $35 in ribs, taken by repeat offender, is apparently a greater crime against society than the repeat offense of fleecing the entire society.
unfortunately people don't just steal large sums of money and sit on it. it's rarely possible to make the victims whole without unwinding a web of (plausibly) good faith transactions involving others. having the perpetrator's transgressions officially recognized and issuing a sentence that may deter others is about as good as it gets.
Eh. On the one hand, I agree. On the other hand, the wealthy have proved that unless prison is a possible punishment, they're willing and eager to repeatedly pay away their crimes.
It's no more difficult than explaining that income, couched in all kinds of fancy lawyering, is still income, here or in Panama. On your W2 or in a unit trust. People understand that. Tax agencies regulate and prosecute that.
Moreover prosecution is a light punishment for what these people did. They literally committed the fraud of the century, and stole massive amounts from the rest of us by it. I would find it difficult to vote to convict anyone who drags these asses into the street for a beating. At least until prosecutors get over having to work for a conviction.
I wasn't one of those people, but they definitely had history on their side. Nothing seems to escape prosecution in the eyes of the public like financial crimes.
There are, of course, a lot of people walking free who have done far worse things. (The Sacklers, for instance, should all be subject to a combination of prison and utter financial ruin. Instead, they are making quaint arguments about how a third of their drug wealth is fair recompense, and how their offshore billions should be protected from bankruptcy.)
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