Should ALL of the Countrywide employees involved in mortgage fraud in any way be investigated and prosecuted, even if they were "just doing what they were told to do" as part of their job?
Or should the lower-level employees be offered amnesty in return for testifying against the managers and executives?
March 10, 2008
HousingPANIC Stupid Question of the Day
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43 comments:
Well...If you worked at a auto strip shop and just removed the parts for resale on the black market, but you NEVER actually stole a vehicle...Are you guilty? I say yes and they should all have different degrees of punishment ranging from Jail time (Tangelo) to trash pickup (office janitor)
The FBI needs to raid the offices before the paper shredders get going
ROUND 'EM UP!!
Give the employees amnesty - then use the evidence to put the executives away - It's executives who created the culture of corruption, who allowed the free holidays to be given for signing up the bad loans.
Put the executives away, and other executives might think twice about the culture they promote within their own companies. (Although, Enron doesn't seem to have prevented Enron x 100).
I've also read anecdotal reports about corrupt practises at other companies - for example, a large retailer (stock code has two letters) which pressures the staff to lodge false product return claims with the suppliers.
The problems are widespread, not just limited to companies like Countrywide.
Sure....and where are we gonna house them all? Or find the money to pay for probation officers, etc.?
What ever happened to ACCOUNTABILITY? Round 'em up - is my vote too.
Only a hand full of whistle blowers should be shown leniency/immunity, otherwise all those complicit in the mortgage fraud that is coutrywide need to be punished (i.e. receoptionists, secretaries and other jobs not involved in the actual origination of loans also should not be swept into the net). All executives, the legal & accounting departments and everyone invovled in the loan origination process need to go to jail!!
Most of the time, an employee have to chose between do what they are told to do or lose their job.
Furthermore, it's likely that many of them did not even realize what they were doing.
So i say that the right thing to do is to forgive low level employee.
If they use the "I was following orders" line then treat them like the Nazis were after WWII.
What did countrywide do? Did they hold a gun to peoples head and make them sign. How about PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY, I know its not a known term around the USA. Housing panic we need to start putting the BLAME on the people who took FREE money they all know they couldn't afford. Stop being communists, government isn't the answer, free markets are. Nobody had to buy a home, they DECIDED their own fate. This housing panic was a dividing line, dumb on one side, smart on the other. Blame the DUMB. What did countrywide do but enable stupid people to fullfull, their potential.
You've got it all wrong. The higher ups will cut a deal and rat on the secretary who will then go to jail.
Justice. The American way!
The first people to cut a deal always get off light. Look at Fastow at Enron. No one, not even Lay himself, was more guilty than Fastow, yet he basically got a slap on the wrist for beating the other guys to sign a deal.
Now that the FBI is involved, I predict someone will cut a deal in the next 2-3 weeks.
NO HANG THE BASTARDS!
but
Bottom line: A debilitating recession seems unlikely
The underwriters at Countryslime better get lawyers. The lower level employees should get a pass as long as they cooperate fully with the FBI. I hope the investigation results are made public, but I doubt we will hear about all of it.
Give amnesty to just the first few who come forward with admissible evidence of another's wrongdoing. Prosecute everyone who does not cooperate 110%.
Watch the rats climb all over each other to sell the others out.
Oh, and just to be sure they're telling the truth, waterboard them.
I say yes and they should all have different degrees of punishment ranging from Jail time (Tangelo) to trash pickup (office janitor)
I agree with your first point but would you really sentence a janitor to pick-up trash? The janitor is the one person who really had nothing to do with this mess and second.. like he gives a crap, he would be picking up trash anyways.
I would say that's a yes!
Anyone who signed off on ANY fabrication ought to be prosecuted.
If we started doing this, there is much money to be made in companies that build prisons.
I'd rather hear the testimony of the underlings. Putting them away won't do anything except fill the jails, but getting them on the stand will help to bag the big fish.
Amnesty for the clerks as long as they are in the country legally.
Evernight I use my Voodo Doll on them....Countrywide ruined my life....See you in HELL CFC!
I agree to an extent, however the bulk of the blame rests on upper-management, since they were the ones receiving vulgar bonuses on top of their vulgar salaries. Upper management were also the ones threatening employees with layoffs if they didn't perform as expected - namely, pushing liar loans.
Well...If you worked at a auto strip shop and just removed the parts for resale on the black market, but you NEVER actually stole a vehicle...Are you guilty? I say yes and they should all have different degrees of punishment ranging from Jail time (Tangelo) to trash pickup (office janitor)
Yes and No
Should a low level employee who processed a loan app be prosecuted, No. Should their bond traders that sold their cr*p, yes.
Prison is expensive...
Only down to regional managers. They push the other mid-management and lower employees to move the fraud up the chain of command. "We need the commissions" is the usual reply to a mid-manager trying to tell them that an application is fraudulent.
Swell idea QWEEFER. Let's lock up tens of thousands of people at a cost of $60K a year for doing clerical work. After all we have all this money just a burning a hole in our collective pockets.
"just doing what they were told to do" That excuse got Nazi’s the business end of a rope at Nuremberg.
Burn Baby Burn
Regional Sales Managers on up - frog march time. Let the lower levels turn state's evidence.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Defense
Classic case of Nuremberg Defense. Really, if you didn't follow orders you'd lose your job.
follow the money!!!
The ol' "I was just following orders" excuse didn't fly with Nuerenberg and now The Hague. That excuse shouldn't fly with Countrywide Exploding Mortgages. But Angelo Mozillo should take the biggest fall and not sit in a country club jail. Put his orange mug in with the gangbangers in some fed pen.
BTW, how DID Angelo get orange anyways? Any dermatologists in the crowd?
no. the world is a corrupt place and one cannot survive without yielding moral authority. polluters, war profiters, etc... would all be going to jail and the economy would be a dust town.
"Prison is expensive..."
time for a new bubble!
I worked for Wells Fargo and quit after seeing how unethical the lending practices. I could not feel comfortable if I was making a living putting people into massive debt. Most of the borrowers were complete bafoons. Regardless, that does not give us the right to scam them like the banks salespeople have done.
At the bottom, there should be fines, and no further punishment, in return for total cooperation and rattage.
special dispensation for printouts of juicy emails.
I say fry the big fish, plea bargain for the minnows, angelo needs to forefit his millions and serve time.
Nah...the FBI already said that's not interested in trillions of dollars in mortgage fraud that will bring this country down into the toilet. Sptizer's rendezvous with a high class hooker is much more important. Now you know why the shady group wanted the Patriot Act to pass so badly, which allows endless wiretapping of anyone against their interests.
How about PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY, I know its not a known term around the USA.
The notion of personal responsibility only applies to those who had access to a stable home and education. If you keep creating dumb Americans and ignoring them, don't be surprised when they sign any dot lines pushed by any shark, or don't be surprised when they shoot your daughters several times during robberies while they're away in their wonderful College life. Lots of selfish people living in a pink bubble in this country, who're not able to identify the consequences of social class neglect.
>> Most of the time, an employee have to chose between do what they are told to do or lose their job.
So lose the job! What's the fucking problem?!?!
So many of the people that work at CW are good people doing a job. They have families to support just like you and I.
The Mgmt. structure however, is a much different story. They are the ones to target.
Frog March the Tan One and His pals.
They all deserve it. Put them into those FEMA camps.
They answer is yes. People are arrested every day for unknowingly committing or being unknowingly complicit in a crime. It doesn't mean they'll be convicted. Even if employees are arrested or indicted, I'm sure there are methods for some to get out of conviction or serving time by cooperating with FBI/SEC investigators. This is going to take considerable time just for Countrywide's case. But how many similar businesses went under recently and why? It's incredible that so much fraud could have been tolerated and allowed to continue for so long without any media inquiry or official state or federal investigation. Only now in the end, with the store gutted and everything vandalized, do we understand.
Katrina was just one horrific example. The Justice Department is the second collossal f-up example. Hiring incompetent cronies to fill government positions tends to destroy rule of law and decimates economies.
Prosecute yes but we need to realize that with crooks running our government commiting their crimes right on CNN in front of us, what kind of message does BUSHCO send to to the corporations? until we throw the entire Bush Crime Syndicate in the Hague or in front of a FIRING SQUAD, corporate crime will get worse. 'Much more to gain then worry about what possible consequences may arise.
Amnesty -- otherwise only the underlings will take the fall.
Abu Ghraib?
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