Ex-Enron CEO gets 10 years slashed from sentence

Former CEO of the once energy giant Enron Corp., Jeffrey Skilling, was resentenced to 14 years in prison by a U.S. federal court Friday, 10 years less than his previous sentence, local media reported. U.S. District Judge Simeon Lake shaved 10 years off Skilling's term, accepting a deal struck between prosecutors and Skilling's lawyers that will end years of appeals, the real-time report of the Houston Chronicle said. More than 40 million U.S. dollars of Skilling's fortune, which has been frozen since his conviction in 2006, will be distributed to victims of Enron's collapse under the deal. Enron, once the seventh largest company in the U.S. and headquartered in Houston, Texas, collapsed and filed bankruptcy proceedings in 2001, after years of accounting tricks could no longer hide billions of U.S. dollars in debts or make failing ventures appear profitable. Skilling was convicted of multiple federal felony charges relating to Enron's financial collapse and is currently serving his prison sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution-Englewood in Littleton, Colorado. Enditem