good morning.
Over the weekend I watched a Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix and she hated it. I was surprised to hear my voice, probably cut from an earlier documentary or news report, doing some of the narration several times near the beginning. (The producers didn’t give me any credit.) The producers of The Greatest Night in Pop paid me a little money to get access to the tapes my friend David Breskin had recorded in the studio. That’s the same thing that ended up being used to carry practically the entire movie.
But I digress. This is a column about Martha. Martha was stripped of her career and company for a crime that, in my opinion, should never have gone to court. At the time, I realized in a panic that the government was going after “American Housewife” with a baseball bat, acting on information from a broker that CEO Sam Waksle was selling his ImClone stock. He claimed that this was because he was trying to cover up the alleged crime. . (I wrote a cover story for BusinessWeek when Martha took her company public.)
James Comey, then the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, led the investigation and prosecuted Martha. Because its jurisdiction covers Wall Street, the person filling that role essentially functions as the federal government’s chief prosecutor for white-collar crimes. It served as a springboard for many ambitious prosecutors, including Rudy Giuliani. (Eliot Spitzer clerked there and took on Wall Street from Albany as New York attorney general.)
Of course, Comey was famously fired as FBI director by then-President Donald Trump in 2017. He also sent an open letter to Congress suggesting that Hillary Clinton could be indicted for sending emails from a private server days before the election that influenced the outcome of the 2016 election. Gave. (She wasn’t.)
Martha Stewart was at the top of her game with a billion-dollar brand that became a role model for multi-platform journalism and commerce. She was the original influencer and an attractive target for those looking to make a name for themselves. Was she suffering from arrogance and a sense of entitlement? perhaps. Should she have gone to jail for her actions and permanently lost her right to run the company? no.
There’s another lesson in seeing how aggressive prosecutors motivated by factors other than impartiality can wreak havoc in the lives of those they pursue. I’ll think about that as I look at the choices the next administration will make. And I hope that no more people will be targeted for who they are and not for what they have done.
Please see the news below for more information.
diane brady
Diane.brady@fortune.com
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top news
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This issue of CEO Daily was edited by Joey Abrams.
