Enron traders joked about theft

HOUSTON — Enron Corp. traders openly discussed manipulating the California power market and joked about stealing from grandmothers during the Western energy crisis in 2000-2001, according to transcripts of telephone calls filed with the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

The transcripts, some littered with profanity, were filed by a public-utility district near Seattle. The calls are central to the U.S. justice department's probe of Enron's trading practices.

John Forney, a former top trader in Enron's defunct Western trading operation based in Portland, Ore., is slated to stand trial on charges of wire fraud and conspiracy. Two other former traders, Timothy Belden and Jeffrey Richter, have pleaded guilty to wire fraud and are helping prosecutors.

Energy merchants regularly tape trader conversations to keep a record of transactions.

According to the Snohomish County Public Utility District, which obtained audiotapes of trader conversations from the justice department and transcribed them, traders discussed creating congestion on transmission lines, taking generating units off line to pump up electricity prices and manipulation of the California power market.

In one transcript a trader asks about "all the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers of California." The Enron trader responds, "Yeah, Grandma Millie, man. But she's the one who couldn't figure out how to (expletive) vote on the butterfly ballot."

Conversations that involve Forney, Belden and Richter appear throughout the transcripts.

In one, a trader says to Richter, "So, uh, somebody's figured out how to set congestion?"

Richter: "Well, we ... we can set it if we want. I mean, it's not a hard game to do ..."

Eric Christensen, a lawyer for the utility district, said Enron should be ordered to surrender as much as $2 billion (U.S.) in unjust profits.