The Chickenshit Club

Why the Justice Department Fails to Prosecute Executives

Jesse Eisinger

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN:
  9781501121371
• eBook ISBN:
  9781501121388
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business Ethics
• Index: Business

Winner of the 2018 Excellence in Financial Journalism Award

From Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Jesse Eisinger, “a fast moving, fly-on-the-wall, disheartening look at the deterioration of the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission…It is a book of superheroes” (San Francisco Review of Books).

Why were no bankers put in prison after the financial crisis of 2008? Why do CEOs seem to commit wrongdoing with impunity? The problem goes beyond banks deemed “Too Big to Fail” to almost every large corporation in America—to pharmaceutical companies and auto manufacturers and beyond. The Chickenshit Club—an inside reference to prosecutors too scared of failure and too daunted by legal impediments to do their jobs—explains why in “an absorbing financial history, a monumental work of journalism…a first-rate study of the federal bureaucracy” (Bloomberg Businessweek).

Jesse Eisinger begins the story in the 1970s, when the government pioneered the notion that top corporate executives, not just seedy crooks, could commit heinous crimes and go to prison. He brings us to trading desks on Wall Street, to corporate boardrooms and the offices of prosecutors and FBI agents. These revealing looks provide context for the evolution of the Justice Department’s approach to pursuing corporate criminals through the early 2000s and into the Justice Department of today, including the prosecutorial fiascos, corporate lobbying, trial losses, and culture shifts that have stripped the government of the will and ability to prosecute top corporate executives.

“Brave and elegant…a fearless reporter…Eisinger’s important and profound book takes no prisoners” (The Washington Post). Exposing one of the most important scandals of our time, The Chickenshit Club provides a clear, detailed explanation as to how our Justice Department has come to avoid, bungle, and mismanage the fight to bring these alleged criminals to justice. “This book is a wakeup call…a chilling read, and a needed one” (NPR.org).

Table of contents

• Cover
• Dedication
• Author’s Note on Sourcing and Methods
• Introduction
• Chapter One: “There is no Christmas”
• Chapter Two: “That Dog don’t Hunt”
• Chapter Three: The Silver Age
• Chapter Four: “Unitedly Yours”
• Chapter Five: The Backlash
• Chapter Six: Paul Pelletier’s White Whale
• Chapter Seven: KPMG Destroys Careers
• Chapter Eight: The Hunt for AIG
• Chapter Nine: No Truth and no Reconciliation
• Chapter Ten: The Law in the city of Results
• Chapter Eleven: Jed Rakoff’s Radicalization
• Chapter Twelve: “The Government Failed”
• Chapter Thirteen: A Tollbooth on the Bankster Turnpike
• Chapter Fourteen: The Process is Polluted
• Chapter Fifteen: Rakoff’s Fall and Rise
• Chapter Sixteen: “Fight for It”
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Notes
• Index
• Copyright