Lay, Skilling found guilty

In what legal analysts are calling a "slam dunk" for the prosecution, the jury in the trial of Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling found the former Enron executives guilty of charges relating to securities fraud, wire fraud and conspiracy this morning after just more than five days of deliberation.

Jurors found ex-Enron CEO Skilling guilty of a variety of charges related to conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud, defrauding analysts and investors, fraud in filings with the SEC and securities fraud dealing Enron's Raptors financial vehicles. Jurors, however, found Skilling not guilty of most charges related to insider trading in connection with stock sales as the company headed for collapse late in 2001. Lay, Enron's former chairman, was found guilty of all charges against him as well as three charges in a separate bank fraud bench trial conducted after his and Skilling's jury trial.

Houstonist will bring you more details as the afternoon goes on.

As of this morning, there wasn't any real indication that the jury had reached its verdict — the latest news before that announcement dealt with jurors asking Judge Sim Lake for a little help yesterday, sending him a note requesting more copies of the exhibit list and a full transcript of the trial. Though Lake said he would arrange to get copies of the exhibit list — we're not sure if that ever actually happened — the transcript question was unclear because the jury wasn't specific about what it was looking for and entire trial transcripts aren't given to juries. Lake sent word to jurors yesterday asking them to "be more precise" as to what they wanted, but the jury didn't respond before it left for the day. We assume that ended up not being an issue.

Earlier in the week, the jury had told Lake it planned to take Memorial Day off. We're sure jurors will enjoy their Monday cookouts a lot more knowing they don't have to head back to the courthouse the next day — and, of course, thinking about all the potential book deals in their future.