41 Years Ago Today: Sharpstown Stock Scandal Starts

On January 18, 1971, attorneys for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit in federal court in Dallas alleging stock fraud against a number of influential Texans, including Houston banker and real estate developer Frank W. Sharp, former Democratic state attorney general Waggoner Carr, and former state insurance commissioner John Osorio. The suit also named Sharp’s corporations, including the National Bankers Life Insurance Corporation and the Sharpstown State Bank. By the time the events these actions were initiating had played out, the state government would be shaken to its core and a number of promising political careers would be destroyed.

Read more about the Sharpstown Stock Scandal in the "Scandal" section of Texas Confidential: Sex, Scandal, Murder, and Mayhem in the Lone Star State!

10 Years Ago This Month: Lay Resigns as Head of Enron

Ten years ago this month, in January 2002, Kenneth Lay resigned as chairman and chief executive officer of Enron, posts he had held since 1985 following the collapse of the corporation. Lay was ultimately convicted of 10 counts of wire fraud, securities fraud, and making false and misleading statements and was facing decades in prison when he mysteriously died and was buried in a secret location, prompting speculation that he faked his own death and thereby escaped justice.

Lay's exploits are described in "The Enron Scandal," one of the chapters in the "Scandal" section of Texas Confidential: Sex, Scandal, Murder, and Mayhem in the Lone Star State!