Okay, the headline for this column was a bit of a stretch, I admit. Martha Stewart is clearly not Jesus. However, I firmly believe that Stewart, the domestic doyenne previously known more for her informal rose arrangements than her insider trading habits, was an unfortunate victim of an overzealous and reactionary government campaign hell-bent on punishing figurehead personalities for trivial non-crimes rather than bear the messier task of managing the corporate scandals of Enron, Tyco, et al.
If there were any justice in the world, Stewart's show would still be on the air, and I'd be at home right now learning the secrets behind a truly flavorful hollandaise sauce.
Take as Exhibit A the fact that Stewart was never formally charged with insider trading, the offense the government originally accused her of.
Stewart nabbed a relatively meager $52,000 profit when she followed her broker's advice to sell her stock in ImClone Systems in December 2001, shortly before news broke that the company's cancer drug Erbitrux had been denied FDA approval.
However, the government never attempted to prove that the company's founder, Sam Waksal, provided Stewart with the confidential details of the company's plight, a clear violation of securities policy.
Rather, the feds charged Stewart and her broker with lying by claiming that the sale was part of a prearranged agreement.
Even then, the most serious charge that the government could bring against her - that her strategy of lying to prosecutors was a ploy to inflate the stock of her own company and deceive investors in Martha Stewart Omnimedia - was dismissed by the judge on the grounds that the prosecution hadn't established sufficient evidence for its claim.
Still, the subtleties of the government's case were largely lost on media pundits (some of whom continued to refer to it as an "insider trading" scandal) and most likely on the jury itself. The relatively brief time (three days) that the jury took to deliberate on this rather complex case should have raised some eyebrows.
As the Wall Street Journal dryly reported when deliberations began last Thursday, "the jury made a couple of mistakes in its questions, asking for materials not in evidence and showing confusion on whether or not an interview with authorities was taped."
But perhaps the jury figured out its collective ass from its elbow and reasonably concluded, despite contradictions in the government's case, that Stewart blatantly lied to prosecutors.
Should fibbing be considered a crime? Probably. But should someone serve three years in prison for panicking, for contradicting oneself in the process of cooperating with the feds? That seems less certain. Most of us have lied under similar circumstances - for example, when we get pulled over by a traffic cop for speeding - with the notable exception that we don't usually face a federal inquiry the morning after.
And while Stewart may very well become a poster child for the government's new efforts to crack down on white-collar crime, it's important to note that unlike the Enron and Tyco scandals, no employee's 401(k) was affected by Stewart's actions, and nobody's pension plan was liquidated.
As Slate.com's Henry Blodget pointed out, the only real victims of Martha's indiscretions, ironically, were taxpayers who paid for the costly prosecution, and the shareholders in Martha Stewart Omnimedia, who lost $250 million following the delivery of the guilty verdicts Friday.
If anything, Martha should be convicted of hubris and denial. Her defense team offered only one witness and failed to distance her name from the sometimes unflattering testimony offered by the lawyers of her stockbroker and co-defendant Peter Bacanovic.
Moreover, while putting Martha on the stand may have been a risky gamble, her decision not to testify was an even riskier one: she rejected the plea bargain offered her in 2002, the penalty for which would have been a $200,000 fine and no jail time.
Then again, Stewart's reputation was all about risks and a steadfast refusal to compromise. She was a hugely successful and gutsy entrepreneur who single-handedly chatted up a small-scale catering business into a multi-million dollar domestic empire. Kings feared her and a nation of middle-aged housewives adored her.
Her name was inseparable from the flawless vision of what she represented: a hearty DIY work ethic coupled with refined, principled taste.
It remains to be seen whether her new incarnation as a martyr will have the same resonance as her old one. If it does, we can all go back to calling her Queen of the Shrews.
Dan Poulson '04 has a mean recipe for hollandaise sauce.
