Attorneys for former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman and ex-HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy said Wednesday they see a positive sign in the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to hear the appeal of former Enron CEO Jeff Skilling.

Like Skilling, some of the charges against Siegelman and Scrushy involved charges that make it a crime to deprive the public of "the intangible right to honest services."

Critics have complained that the 28-word "honest services" law is vague and sometimes used by prosecutors when they are unable to prove another crime was committed.

Siegelman attorney Sam Heldman said the Supreme Court's decision to hear three different cases involving "honest services" charges is a sign that the law is "broad and confusing."

"It shows that some members of the court are concerned prosecutors are overreaching in this whole area of the law," Heldman said.

U.S. Justice Department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney declined to comment.

Siegelman and Scrushy are waiting to hear if the U.S. Supreme Court will review appeals of their convictions in a government corruption case. They were convicted of bribery, "honest services" mail fraud and other charges in 2006. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year threw out two charges against Siegelman, but rejected most of his appeal and denied Scrushy's.

The two have also asked U.S. District Judge Mark Fuller in Montgomery to grant them a new trial, citing misconduct by prosecutors, inappropriate communications between jurors and other issues.

Siegelman was accused of appointing Scrushy to an influential hospital regulatory board in exchange for Scrushy arranging $500,000 in contributions to Siegelman's campaign for a statewide lottery. The appeals to the Supreme Court focus heavily on whether prosecutors proved that Siegelman and Scrushy had a "quid pro quo" agreement where they would each receive something of value.

The Supreme Court on Thursday sided with a former Enron Corp. executive in a ruling that makes it unlikely he can be tried a second time on charges related to financial fraud at the one-time energy giant.

The court, in a 6-3 vote, threw out an appeals court ruling that would have allowed a retrial of F. Scott Yeager, a former executive at Enron's failed broadband venture, on charges for which a jury could not reach a verdict at his first trial.

But Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority, did not completely shut the door to another trial.

Yeager sold Enron stock for more than $54 million before the company began a downward spiral that ended in bankruptcy in 2001.

In his first trial in 2005, Yeager faced 125 counts and was acquitted of five, including four counts of wire fraud and one of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud. The jury couldn't reach a verdict on the remaining counts, which alleged insider trading and money laundering.

Yeager was later reindicted on 13 counts of insider trading and money laundering.

The issue for the court is whether a variation on the Constitution's guarantee against double jeopardy applies in this situation: The jury votes not guilty on some charges, but fails to reach a verdict on others that are based upon the same essential facts as the charges that resulted in acquittal.

Prosecutors frequently retry defendants when juries can't reach a verdict. They cannot pursue a defendant when juries return not guilty verdicts. This case was about what happens when there is a combination of those elements.

Enron Corp. shareholders and investors will split about $7 billion from financial institutions accused of participating in the fraud that caused the once-mighty energy company to collapse.

The settlement amount was listed at $7.2 billion, a sum that has been accruing interest since 2002 and includes $688 million plus interest in attorneys fees.

The deal, approved late Monday by U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon, and the attorneys fees are the largest in history in a U.S. securities fraud case.

"We're pleased that the court recognizes the tremendous amount of work, skill and determination required to overcome significant obstacles in this complicated case," said Patrick Coughlin, attorney for the regents of the University of California, the lead plaintiffs.

About 1.5 million individuals and entities will be eligible to share in the distribution under the settlement plan. The attorneys fees will go to San Diego-based Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins LLP, the law firm representing the university.

Besides the University of California, other plaintiffs who will share in the proceeds include pension plans from New York City and Hawaii, various investment firms and the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.

The distribution plan was part of a $40 billion lawsuit filed by shareholders and investors, who claim Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup and others participated in the accounting fraud that led to Enron's downfall.

Calculating shares of the $7.2 billion will be determined by a formula that factors in such things as the stock's purchase price and the type of stock bought.

At its height, Enron's common stock sold for as much as $90 per share, before plummeting to as low as $1 right before the company declared bankruptcy.

Under the plan, investors will get an average of $6.79 per share of common stock and an average of $168.50 per share of preferred stock.

To be eligible for the settlement, investors and shareholders needed to have bought Enron or Enron-related securities between Sept. 9, 1997 and Dec. 2, 2001.

Attorneys for several investors objected to the distribution plan and the attorneys fees.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, who had previously filed court briefs in support of plaintiffs' claims, also objected to the attorneys fees.

"General Abbott continues to object to giving millions of dollars to plaintiff lawyers when that money should go to the hardworking men and women who suffered from Enron's demise," said Jerry Strickland, a spokesman for Abbott's office.

"This court reiterates that there is no way to allocate these proceeds that would not in some way favor or disfavor to some degree some of the class members," Harmon wrote in her order. "On the whole, the court finds that ... the chosen method is fair, adequate and reasonable."

Harmon also said the attorneys fees, which are 9.5 percent of the settlement, are "fair and reasonable."

Several financial institutions have not settled and remain as defendants in the Enron case, including Merrill Lynch & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays Bank PLC. Several former Enron officers also remain as defendants, including former chief executive Jeffrey Skilling, now serving a criminal sentence of more than 24 years in federal prison in Minnesota.

But the lawsuit has been on hold since an appeals court last year ruled shareholders and investors could not sue as a class, which would have allowed them to sue as a group and have more leverage to settle the case out of court.

The U.S. Supreme Court in January refused to hear arguments in the lawsuit. The high court in a similar case gave a measure of protection from securities lawsuits to suppliers, banks, accountants and law firms that do business with corporations engaging in securities fraud.

Because of that ruling, Harmon is still deciding whether the financial institutions that remain as defendants will be dismissed from the lawsuit.

Enron, once the nation's seventh-largest company, entered 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.

Enron founder Kenneth Lay and Skilling were convicted in 2006 for their roles in the company's collapse. Lay's convictions for conspiracy, fraud and other charges were wiped out after he died of heart disease in 2006.

Carren B. Shulman and Russell L. Reid, Jr. have joined the New York officeof Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP as partners in the firm's Financeand Bankruptcy practice group.  Shulmanand Reid most recently practiced with Heller Ehrman in New York, where sheco-chaired the office's Summer Associate program and he chaired the New YorkPro Bono committee and co-chaired the office's recruiting committee.

Shulman focuses her practiceon bankruptcy, commercial litigation, business reorganization and creditors'rights, with an emphasis on representing secured and unsecured creditors intransactions in and out of bankruptcy both domestically and internationally.  She has represented debtors, committees,chapter 11 trustees, trade creditors and secured and unsecured lenders inbankruptcy and has advised corporate trustees in default administration.  Shulman also has significant trial experiencein commercial and employment litigation.

Reid’s practice focuses onthe areas of creditors’ rights, bankruptcy, and corporate reorganization, withparticular emphasis on default administration for corporate trustees. On behalf of debtors, creditors, committees,indenture trustees and loan servicers, he has developed and negotiateddisclosure materials and plans of reorganization, and has prosecuted anddefended litigation involving the automatic stay, cash collateral, claimdetermination, debtor-in-possession financing and plan confirmation.

"With Carren and Russelljoining us, we continue to grow signature practice groups like Finance andBankruptcy and expand national capabilities to better serve client needs onboth coasts.  In the current businessclimate where restructurings and insolvencies are on the upswing, their bankruptcyand commercial litigation expertise is of even greater value to clients,"said Guy Halgren, chairman of the firm. 

Commented Shulman, "Sheppard Mullin has a top-notch Finance andBankruptcy group.  I am impressed by itsreputation as a 'go-to' firm for banking and restructuring clients, and amlooking forward to working with Ed Tillinghast in New York."

New York-based partner Edward H. Tillinghast III leads SheppardMullin's East Coast bankruptcy practice. Tillinghast specializes in corporatereorganizations and restructurings, cross-border insolvencies, creditors’rights litigation, and distressed mergers and acquisitions, advising distressedasset investors on high-yield investments and insolvency-related securitizationopinions.

"I am excited to grow the firm's New York bankruptcy practice withEd, and Carren and I are very pleased to rejoin our former colleague MargaretMann,” Reid said. “Sheppard Mullin offers a strong platform for my practice,which includes the support needed to handle sophisticated bankruptcy andcorporate trust matters." 

Two months ago Margaret M.Mann joined the San Diego office of Sheppard Mullin as partner in the firm'sFinance and Bankruptcy practice group. Mann previously led Heller Ehrman's Restructuring and Insolvencypractice and was the firm’s National Hiring Chair. 

For ten years, Shulman hasrepresented the interests of Goodrich Corporation in litigation and complexcontract negotiations in nearly every airline bankruptcy worldwide.  She represented the largest West Coast powercompany in a multi-billion dollar claim litigation against Enron Corp.  Shulman was special counsel to WorldCom, Inc.in In re WorldCom, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, S.D.N.Y., 2002.  She represented secured lenders indebtor-in-possession financings in In re Indesco, U.S. Bankruptcy Court,S.D.N.Y., 2001; In re Cannondale, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Connecticut,2003; In re Henninger Media Services, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Virginia,2002.

Reid's experience hasencompassed for a number of years the representation of varied deal parties inthe mortgage backed securities arena. His expertise includes the interpretation and enforcement of pooling andservicing agreements, swap agreements, trust indentures, and other relateddocuments, as well as associated out-of-court restructurings and litigation.  Reid has handled an array of businessdisputes before state and federal trial and appellate courts and regulatoryagencies, as well as before tribunals appointed by the American ArbitrationAssociation and the National Association of Securities Dealers. He has significant experience with other typesof alternative dispute resolution, including mediation and summary jury trials.

Shulman received a B.A., magnacum laude, from State University of New York, Albany in 1988 and a J.D. fromNew York University Law School in 1991.  Reidreceived a B.F.A., Journalism, magna cum laude, from Southern MethodistUniversity in 1983, a B.B.A., cum laude, in 1984 and a J.D. from Universityof Texas School of Law in 1989.

Sheppard Mullin has 40attorneys based in its New York office. The firm's Finance and Bankruptcy practice group includes more than 70attorneys firmwide.

About Sheppard Mullin Richter &Hampton LLP

Sheppard Mullin is a full service AmLaw 100 firm with more than 520attorneys in 10 offices located throughout California and in New York,Washington, D.C. and Shanghai.  Thefirm's California offices are located in Los Angeles, San Francisco, SantaBarbara, Century City, Orange County, Del Mar Heights and San Diego.  Founded in 1927 onthe principle that the firm would succeed only if its attorneys deliveredprompt, high quality and cost-effective legal services, Sheppard Mullinprovides legal counsel to U.S. and international clients.  Companies turn toSheppard Mullin to handle a full range of corporate and technology matters,high stakes litigation and complex real estate, land use and finance transactions.  In theU.S., the firm's clients include more than half of the Fortune 100companies.  For more information,please visit www.sheppardmullin.com.

KENNETH L. LAY

Birth date: April 15, 1942.

Career: Former chairman and CEO. Founded Enron in 1985 when his Houston Natural Gas merged with InterNorth in Omaha, Neb., and became chairman and CEO the next year. Stepped down as CEO in February 2001 when Jeffrey Skilling took over; resumed the role when Skilling abruptly resigned on Aug. 14, 2001. Resigned as chairman and CEO Jan. 23, 2002; resigned from board Feb. 4, 2002. Appeared before Congress in 2002 and invoked the Fifth Amendment. Alleged to have sold more than 4 million shares of stock for $184 million from 1996-2001. Received bonuses of $18.1 million in 1997-2000. Lives in a $7.4 million penthouse near downtown Houston.

JEFFREY K. SKILLING

Birth date: Nov. 25, 1953.

Career: Former CEO and director. Holds an MBA from Harvard and worked for McKinsey & Co. before joining Enron in 1990. Became president and chief operating officer in 1996, then succeeded Lay as CEO in February 2001. Resigned on Aug. 14, 2001, citing personal reasons. Testified twice before Congress in February 2002. Claimed no knowledge of intimate details of Enron's financial dealings. Sold 1.3 million shares of stock for $70.6 million and transferred 2 million shares back to Enron from June 1996 to November 2001. Received $13.2 million in bonuses 1997-2000. He remains a defendant in a lawsuit alleging he knowingly endorsed deceptive and misleading financial statements. An indictment was unsealed Feb. 19 charging him with 35 counts of fraud, conspiracy, filing false statements to auditors and insider trading. He has pleaded not guilty.

ANDREW S. FASTOW

Birth date: Dec. 22, 1961.

Career: Former chief financial officer who pleaded guilty Jan. 14, 2004, to conspiracy in a deal that called for a 10-year sentence and for him to help prosecutors in the investigation. Free on bond. One of Skilling's first hires in 1990. Indicted Oct. 31, 2002, on 78 counts of wire and securities fraud, money laundering, conspiracy and obstruction for running various financial schemes designed to enrich him, his family and friends. Counts later increased to 98. Earned at least $45 million from LJM partnerships, investment vehicles named after his wife and two children. Pushed out of Enron on Oct. 24, 2001, the day after Lay expressed confidence in him to analysts. Alleged to have sold more than 687,000 shares of Enron stock for $33.7 million from June 1996 to November 2001. Pleaded guilty in January 2004 to two counts of conspiracy; agrees to cooperate with prosecutors and serve 10 years in prison when his help is no longer needed.

RICHARD A. CAUSEY

Birth date: Jan. 9, 1960.

Career: Former chief accounting officer. Handled Enron audits for Arthur Andersen LLP before joining Enron. When the LJM investments were proposed to Enron's board of directors in 1999, he and chief risk officer Rick Buy were assigned to review all Enron transactions with LJM. Fired Feb. 14, 2002, after release of an in-house report noting his failure to review the deals. Mentioned repeatedly by title in Fastow indictment as having a secret agreement with Fastow that LJMs would never lose money on deals with Enron. Told David Duncan, the top Enron auditor at Arthur Andersen, that Enron didn't like another Andersen auditor's objections to grouping investment vehicles known as Raptors to hide that two of the four that were bleeding cash. Alleged to have sold about 209,000 Enron shares for $13.3 million. Also received bonus payments of more than $1.5 million from 1997-2000 when Enron was inflating profits and hiding debt based largely on the partnerships he was supposed to police. Indictment charging him with conspiracy and fraud unsealed Jan. 22, 2004. Expanded indictment unsealed Feb. 19 to include new charges against Skilling and increased charges against Causey; 35 counts for Skilling, 31 counts for Causey. Has pleaded not guilty.

OTHERS:

Michael Kopper: Former Fastow lieutenant who pleaded guilty Aug. 21, 2002 to federal conspiracy and money laundering charges related to Enron's fall and agreed to give up $12 million in illegal profits. Kopper admitted he ran or helped create several partnerships that earned him and others millions of dollars, including kickbacks he funneled to Fastow, while hiding debt and inflating profits at Enron. Has not yet been sentenced and is cooperating with prosecutors. Declined to testify before Congress.

Lea Fastow: Wife of Andrew Fastow and former assistant treasurer at Enron. Pleaded guilty May 6, 2004, to a federal misdemeanor tax crime for helping her husband hide ill-gotten income from the government. She originally pleaded guilty to a felony tax crime in January, but withdrew that plea in April. She was sentenced to the maximum of a year in prison and ordered to surrender there July 12.

Ben Glisan Jr.: Added to an expanded Fastow indictment unsealed in May 2003. Glisan became Enron treasurer in March 2000, and earned $1 million in May of that year on a March investment of $5,826 in Fastow's Southampton Place partnership. Also negotiated for Enron in some of its transactions with Raptor. Worked with Fastow and Kopper in creating and running LJM2. Fired from Enron in November 2001. Indicted in April 2003 on charges of wire fraud, money laundering and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, falsify books and commit securities and wire fraud. He tried to cut a deal with prosecutors, but ended up pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy in September 2003. He was immediately sentenced to prison for five years and became the first former Enron executive to serve time. He later began cooperating with prosecutors.

Dan Boyle: Also added to an expanded Fastow indictment. Charged with conspiracy to falsify books and commit wire fraud related to Enron's deal to have Merrill Lynch buy three electricity-generating power barges. Boyle's lawyer says he had no authority to sign off on anything. Fastow promised Merrill that Enron would buy back the barges in 2000, which it did, booking a $12 million profit that was really a loan. Trial set to begin Aug. 18.

Enron Corp. shareholders and investors hoping to get their cut of more than $7.2 billion recovered as part of a lawsuit they filed in connection with the company's collapse are going to have to wait a little longer.

A federal judge on Friday delayed a decision on whether to approve a plan to distribute the money, part of a $40 billion lawsuit alleging that financial institutions that worked with Enron participated in the accounting fraud that led to the company's downfall.

U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon also held off on whether to approve $688 million in attorneys' fees being requested by San Diego-based Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins LLP, the law firm for the lead plaintiffs in the case. If approved, the attorneys' fees would be the largest in a securities fraud case.

After a 4 1/2 hour hearing during which attorneys, Enron investors and former Enron employees argued both for and against the distribution plan and the attorney fees, Harmon said she would make decisions on both issues as soon as possible.

Patrick Coughlin, attorney for the regents of the University of California, who are the lead plantiffs, called the plan to distribute the $7.2 billion "fair and reasonable."

"The plan is doing whatever it can to help employees get whatever they can," he said.

In general, the plan is calculating shares of the settlement fund using a formula that factors in such things as when a security was bought or sold, the purchase price paid and the type of stock that was bought.

Enron stock sold for as much as $90 per share before plummeting to as low as $1 right before the company declared bankruptcy. But under the plan, shareholders and investors are set to get only a fraction of what they lost after the once mighty energy giant spiraled into bankruptcy.

To be eligible for the settlement, investors and shareholders needed to have bought Enron or Enron-related securities between Sept. 9, 1997, and Dec. 2, 2001.

About 1.5 million individuals are eligible to receive money from the settlement fund.

Coughlin also asked Harmon to approve the $688 million in attorneys' fees, saying the amount is part of an agreement his law firm signed with the regents when it first took the case six years ago to be given 9.5 percent of any settlement.

In justifying the fees, he cited several reasons, including that the 9.5 percent was far lower than the standard 33 percent most lawyers get in similar cases; the complexity of the lawsuit; and the risk involved in taking on a case that offered no guarantee of any settlements.

"This is the largest class (action) settlement ever. There is no case comparable to this result," he said.

But attorneys for several investors objected to the distribution plan and the attorneys' fees.

Avi Garbow, an attorney for former Enron workers who lost money through the company's savings plan and employee stock ownership plan, said the distribution plan was unfair because it doesn't treat all investors and shareholders equally and some will be compensated more than they should be at the expense of others.

Lawrence Schonbrun, who represents another investor, called the attorney fees being requested exorbitant and "an affront to every working person in this country."

The $7.2 billion comes mostly from settlements made with such financial institutions as Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup.

There are still several financial institutions that remain as defendants in the Enron case, including Merrill Lynch & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays Bank PLC. Several former Enron officers also remain, including former chief executive Jeffrey Skilling.

But the lawsuit has been on hold since an appeals court last year ruled shareholders and investors could not sue as a class, which would have allowed them to pool their resources to sue as a group and have more leverage to settle the case out of court.

The U.S. Supreme Court in January refused to hear arguments in the lawsuit. The high court in a similar case gave a measure of protection from securities lawsuits to suppliers, banks, accountants and law firms that do business with corporations engaging in securities fraud.

Attorneys for Merrill Lynch & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays Bank PLC have said they will again ask Harmon to drop their clients from the lawsuit in light of the Supreme Court's ruling in the similar case.

Enron, once the nation's seventh-largest company, entered 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.

Enron founder Kenneth Lay and Skilling were convicted in 2006 for their roles in the company's collapse. Skilling is serving a sentence of more than 24 years. Lay's convictions for conspiracy, fraud and other charges were wiped out after he died of heart disease in 2006.

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that individual participants in the most common type of retirement plan can sue under a pension protection law to recover their losses. The unanimous decision has implications for 50 million workers with $2.7 trillion invested in 401(k) retirement plans. James LaRue of Southlake, Texas, said the value of his stock market holdings plunged $150,000 when administrators at his retirement plan failed to follow his instructions to switch to safer investments.

The issue in the LaRue case was whether the Employee Retirement Income Security Act permits an individual account holder to sue plan administrators for breaching their fiduciary duties.

The language of the law refers to recovering money for the "plan" rather than for an individual, raising the question of whether a participant can sue solely for himself.

Justice John Paul Stevens, in his opinion for the court, said that such lawsuits are allowed. "Fiduciary misconduct need not threaten the solvency of the entire plan to reduce benefits below the amount that participants would otherwise receive," Stevens said.

The decision overturned a ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va.

Unlike people enrolled in traditional pension plans, employees in 401(k) plans, which have exploded in number in the past two decades, choose from a menu of options on where to invest their money. That puts workers squarely in the middle of decision-making about their pensions and inevitably leads to the kind of disputes LaRue has with his plan's administrators.

"Defined contribution plans dominate the retirement plan scene today," unlike when ERISA was enacted in the mid-1970s, Stevens said.

Many traditional pension plans guaranteeing a fixed monthly benefit have either been frozen or terminated, and 401(k) plans are the main source of retirement income, said the Air Line Pilots Association, which represents 60,000 pilots at 41 air carriers.

The Bush administration argued in support of workers. The government said the appeals court ruling barring LaRue's lawsuit would leave 401(k) participants without a meaningful remedy from any federal, state or local court when plan administrators fail to live up to their duties.

Business groups supported LaRue's employer. They argued that ERISA is aimed at encouraging employers to set up pension plans, while guarding against administrative abuses involving the plan as a whole. The law doesn't permit individual lawsuits like LaRue's, the business groups said.

Congress enacted ERISA after some widely publicized failures by companies and labor unions to pay promised pensions. Workers in class-action lawsuits have long relied on the law, most recently in the scandal-ridden collapses of companies like Enron and its 401(k) plan for workers.

The term 401(k) refers to a section of the Internal Revenue Code.

Participants in 401(k) plans do not know how much money they will receive in retirement. Employees invest a certain amount each month and how much they get back depends on how well their chosen investments have performed.