Payments to deceased Enron exec to be returned
Judge rules to return compensation paid to Cliff Baxter
The $1.3m (£687,000) in compensation paid to John Clifford Baxter, the former
Enron vice chairman who committed suicide soon after the company collapsed in
2001, will be returned to Enron for distribution to other creditors.
Judge Arthur Gonzalez of the US Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan ruled that the
payments to Baxter improperly favoured him over other Enron creditors.
Baxter resigned from Enron in 2001, just months before allegations of
accounting fraud brought the company to its knees.
In January 2002, Baxter was found dead in the driver’s seat of a parked car
in a Houston suburb. He had a gunshot wound to his head.
At the time, Enron whistleblower, Sherron Watkins, said: ‘Cliff Baxter
complained mightily to (then-CEO Jeffrey) Skilling and all who would listen
about the inappropriateness of our transactions with LJM.’