A CEO who resisted NSA spying is out of prison. And he feels ‘vindicated’ by Snowden leaks.

Just one major telecommunications company refused to participate in a legally dubious NSA surveillance program in 2001. A few years later, its CEO was indicted by federal prosecutors. He was convicted, served four and a half years of his sentence and was released this month.

Prosecutors claim Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio was guilty of insider trading, and that his prosecution had nothing to do with his refusal to allow spying on his customers without the permission of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. But to this day, Nacchio insists that his prosecution was retaliation for refusing to break the law on the NSA's behalf.

Nacchio was convicted of selling of Qwest stock in early 2001, not long before the company hit financial troubles. However, he claimed in court documents that he was optimistic about the firm's ability to win classified government contracts--something they'd succeeded at in the past. And according to his timeline, in February 2001--some six months before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks-he was approached by the NSA and asked to spy on customers during a meeting he thought was about a different contract. He reportedly refused because his lawyers believed such an action would be illegal and the NSA wouldn't go through the FISA Court. And then, he says, unrelated government contracts started to disappear.

His narrative matches with the warrantless surveillance program reported by USA Today in 2006 which noted Qwest as the lone holdout from the program, hounded by the agency with hints that their refusal "might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government." But Nacchio was prevented from bringing up any of this defense during his jury trial--the evidence needed to support it was deemed classified and the judge in his case refused his requests to use it....

That son of bitch ruined careers and destroyed the retirements of many whose portfolio included stock in the company. He should still be in jail just like Bernie Ebbers.

Heck, when I left I had $17,000 worth of stock in an IRA that I don’t recall signing for.

Looking at what was going on at Worldcom I fully expected the same thing to happen at Qwest.

I closed that IRA before it collapsed.

Many others didn’t, including a real nice gal who wasn’t so far from retiring and she lost the whole thing.

I feel horribly sorry for these people. They didn’t deserve to have their hard work and fruits thereof vaporized, forcing them to continue working well into their retirement years.

What surprises me about Qwest is The CFO at the time didn’t go to jail. He damn sure should have.

He had to be a part of cooking the books as the quarterly’s and annual’s will always have the signature of the CEO and CFO.

Anyone want to know anymore I can detail what the hell these thieves were doing.

They were the proverbial fish rotting from the head and even the local salespeople were submitting fraudulent orders and getting paid on them.

What a mess and the result were some very onerous laws that do absolutely nothing and I believe held the economy back as public companies and financial institutions struggled for years to understand their responsibility for compliance

This asshole was one of many who committed fraud. The crap they where doing at the top such as reporting a twenty year lease as a single year revenue, swapping network capacity that had an equal value and saying that was revenue, restating sales figures to bump a quarter, that is fraud.

And guess what this resulted in. People who should never be in sales committing fraudulent sales orders such as posting a sale for existing revenue, from an existing customer and just renaming the customer. The software didn’t catch this and they got full commission. Hell, many even, and with the full knowledge of their managers, lied about the actual revenue they expected and got paid full commission.

I could go on with more details but suffice to say as someone who prides himself on honesty and started in the telecom business, at Divestiture, these shenanigans affect even honest sales people.

Companies recognize when there is a problem of actual revenue against booked revenue. The result? Losses and they are huge.

Why? Well because they ramp up support staff thinking they are doing a good job. They hire more sales people thinking they have made such remarkable hires before. They obtain loans to expand, acquire network elements (think Nortel here) etc, etc, etc.

Now when the retards figure they are not actually taking in the revenue they thought they were, what happens?

First they start “rationalizing” staff (layoffs, firings and unemployment). Next, they look at consolidating regions (Empty and office space, cancel plans for expanding - broken leases, cancelled orders for expansion)

Then they start looking at the sales people. Everyone gets the message they are being looked at and sales drop. They don’t really drop as they are now getting solid orders with solid revenue. But the thieves who submitting bogus orders start bragging about their performance and taking longer lunches (they are really interviewing) heck they will, absolutely, land a new job with higher salary and better expense accounts. Who wouldn’t want them? They are selling machines and have the awards and the spreadsheets with numbers to back them up. They even have friends who vouch for their performance (they didn’t know fraud was being committed. I never vouched for any one because I can spot a liar a mile away)

So now the cheating thieves have a new job and everyone is amazed at their prescience and foresight to bail on a firm that will be contracting if not going out of business altogether.

Meanwhile, the execs, who lead by example, are trying to right the ship and root some evil cause for what is happening. Problem is they, by example, told people what was the “right thing” to do. So they start making excuses about the economy, their model needing and update and find equivalency in other firms who were doing the same dang thing.

So nobody can directly say what is happening, they can’t very well prosecute the sales people as they have a guilty conscience and think there will be some leniency accorded them, when their time comes.

Right! I call Bullshit!

Now I see the fraud these guys are committing and lest you think I am an armchair prognosticator, so does Wall Street and several financial firms and journals. No problem, the executive says. We are using creative booking but it perfectly legitimate and you will see in time we correct. Heck we are growing, right?

Heck Bernie Ebbers, whom I didn’t like the day I met him, is doing the same thing. They guys at Enron and so on.

By the way they got all their advice from their financial advisors, some of which are no longer in business.

So in all this mess a lot of people get hurt (don’t worry about me. I live below my means and was fine. This is just life as far as I am concerned)

They people who get the hardest from these Bozo’s? People who have retired or are nearing retirement. Their 401k’s are wiped out. Their pensions are vaporized. Their income, derived from 20-30 years of slavish labor, is well... Well it’s gone.

There isn’t going to be any salvation. They live off their savings if they had any and finally. The joy of retirement is replaced with foraging for a new job.

Who is going to hire them? They are in their 50, 60 and 70’s. They take whatever job they can and that is life.

There are few other exec’s on the list form Qwest and I hope they get their just desserts.

I also didn’t appreciate the day they stopped paying commissions, a week after MCI did the same.

Why did they stop. Well Hell, they knew salespeople were submitting fraud and they couldn’t take a chance on paying money that wasn’t fair compensation for real revenue. You will continue your salary until this is sorted out.

Receive my salary? No kidding? Well that is great, except I bring in a lot of revenue for which I am suppose to be paid. I also have financial commitments based on my ability to perform, not receive a salary.

I didn’t stay in sales for a salary. I stayed in sales because it the most honest way of being rewarded for measurable results. You know, like the guy who digs a hole in the ground. At the end of the day I can say I dug that hole and it is deeper than anyone’s.

My response and others was we told you people were doing this and you even said it was approved. You dummies. I got bills to pay and I live off my commission.

I left.

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