Kenneth

Interior Secretary Kenneth Salazar reiterated Tuesday that the Obama administration is continuing to develop draft rules for hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in drilling operations, which he said would not slow the natural gas and oil boom.

Elected officials in Cecil Township, PA, voted Monday to have the township solicitor look into mounting a legal challenge to Pennsylvania’s new Marcellus Shale law on the grounds that it usurps local zoning authority.

Memorial services for the enigma that was Kenneth Lay, 64, founder of the bankrupt Enron Corp., were to be held Sunday in Aspen, CO, where he died early last Wednesday, and in Houston this coming Wednesday. Lay, regarded by some as a good friend, devoted to his family and a leading supporter of the Houston community, was seen by others as among the worst of the robber barons, enriching himself while leaving some Enron pension and shareholders penniless. Prevailing legal opinion is that his death before he had a chance to appeal his conviction will wipe his slate clean in the eyes of the law. History will determine the rest.

Kenneth Lay, praised in the 1990s for his brilliance in building Enron Corp. only to be despised by many following his conviction six weeks ago on 10 fraud and conspiracy charges, died early Wednesday of what appeared to be a massive heart attack at his vacation home in Aspen, CO. He was 64.

The Supreme Court last Monday declined to review lower court rulings that vacated the conviction of Enron founder Kenneth Lay for fraud and conspiracy shortly after his death last July.

The Supreme Court Monday declined to review lower court rulings that vacated the conviction of Enron founder Kenneth Lay for fraud and conspiracy shortly after his death last July.

Kenneth D. Schisler, who as chairman of the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) has been increasingly at odds with the General Assembly and new governor, resigned last week. Schisler’s resignation followed the resignation of Patricia A. Smith, Maryland’s top advocate for utility customers, who left her post in mid-January.

U.S. District Judge Sim Lake in Houston Tuesday vacated the conviction of Enron founder Kenneth Lay, who died in July. The decision threw out the jury’s verdict in May that Lay committed fraud and conspiracy in the months before Enron collapsed in late 2001 (see Daily GPI, July 6; May 26).

The convictions last week of Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay and his right hand man, former Enron CEO Jeffery Skilling are the Justice Department’s crowning achievement in a five-year battle against an era of corporate corruption and fraud that the Enron case, more than any other, came to symbolize.