Trial, Day 10: Driving EBS like a rental car

During his second day on the witness stand, former Enron Broadband Services head Ken Rice said his company might have had potential to perhaps succeed, maybe, sometime in the future if it had survived Enron's 2001 collapse.

On his first day on the stand, prosecutors focused Rice largely on what was wrong at the company. On Tuesday, Rice said he and Skilling misrepresented the financial health of the failing broadband business to help a stock price-obsessed company boost its image on Wall Street.

But Wednesday, Skilling's lawyer Mark Holscher questioned Rice about what was right at the company, or what could have gone right if it had continued past Enron's late 2001 crash.

Holscher was able to make the point that the broadband business was looking at possible mergers and had a promising contract with Microsoft and thus great potential "under the right circumstances" if it could survive a few years.

Holscher tried yesterday to portray Rice as an executive who was disconnected from his employees and was more interested in racing cars than running Enron Broadband Services. "No, I did not check out of Enron, and I raced sports cars on the weekend," Rice replied. Taking the racing theme and running with it, Rice did admit that "a number of employees told me the wheels had fallen off EBS, and they were disappointed how I was handling it."

Holscher also tried to make Rice look like he pleaded guilty to securities fraud because he was afraid of spending years in prison. Though Rice said prison time was on his mind, especially after former Dynegy executive Jamie Olis was sentenced to 24 years, but he never told people he was innocent after entering his plea.

Rice stays on the stand today.