Crooked ex-Take Two CEO Avoids The Big House
Crooked ex-Take Two CEO Avoids The Big House
August 6, 2007
Although he committed stock option fraud on a massive scale, Ryan Brant has avoided prison time.As reported by Bloomberg News, the disgraced former Take Two CEO copped a plea, cooperated with prosecutors and agreed to pony up $7.3 million to federal and state agencies.
Brant will also serve five years on probation.
It would appear that Brant's cooperation may have helped lead prosecutors to a pair of other Take Two employees. Former General Counsel Kenneth Selterman and ex-Chief Accounting Officer Patti Tay also plead guilty.
Brant, 35, told the judge:
I'm deeply sorry for my role as an executive in the company and my role in the options dating process.
GP: It's disheartening to see a guy who stole millions of dollars avoiding jail. We'll bet the ranch that some of the little fish caught up in last week's mod chip sweep end up doing time.
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Posted 11/08/09 at 01:07am
Austin_Lewis: Health insurance, brought to you by the same kind of bureacrats who couldn't, in timely fashion, investigate the comments of any of the men Obama appointed Czars. Or their past. Or their history of not paying taxes.
Austin_Lewis: Health insurance, brought to you by the same kind of bureacrats who couldn't, in timely fashion, investigate the comments of any of the men Obama appointed Czars. Or their past. Or their history of not paying taxes.
Posted 11/08/09 at 01:06am
Austin_Lewis: Yes, and what a piece of crap it was. Arresting and fining people just because they don't make a personal choice to buy healh insurance, creating over a hundred new bureacracies, and worse.
Austin_Lewis: Yes, and what a piece of crap it was. Arresting and fining people just because they don't make a personal choice to buy healh insurance, creating over a hundred new bureacracies, and worse.
Posted 11/08/09 at 12:24am
ZippyDSMlee: JDKJ:the only trouble is a bunch of witless hacks wrote it....its going to be a train wreck....
ZippyDSMlee: JDKJ:the only trouble is a bunch of witless hacks wrote it....its going to be a train wreck....
Posted 11/07/09 at 11:33pm
JDKJ: BREAKING: In a photo-finish at the wire, House passes health care reform bill. Relatedly, in a fit of pique, Austin Lewis kicks innocent dog.
JDKJ: BREAKING: In a photo-finish at the wire, House passes health care reform bill. Relatedly, in a fit of pique, Austin Lewis kicks innocent dog.
Posted 11/07/09 at 04:27pm
ZippyDSMlee: man I got alot of junk and dup files too >< god I need orginization...and no not the knee capping media mafia kind :P
ZippyDSMlee: man I got alot of junk and dup files too >< god I need orginization...and no not the knee capping media mafia kind :P
Posted 11/07/09 at 04:26pm
ZippyDSMlee: replaced :P
ZippyDSMlee: replaced :P
Posted 11/07/09 at 04:23pm
ZippyDSMlee: beemoh:hey its like 60GB porn,400GB anime 100GB games and crap I have took from all my DVDs, I hate waiting on dvds to install stuff..... oh and 40GB of my porn was in the found.000 folder...mostly corrupted.... least I got names of wut needs to be repa
ZippyDSMlee: beemoh:hey its like 60GB porn,400GB anime 100GB games and crap I have took from all my DVDs, I hate waiting on dvds to install stuff..... oh and 40GB of my porn was in the found.000 folder...mostly corrupted.... least I got names of wut needs to be repa
Posted 11/07/09 at 04:18pm
beemoh: @Zip: ...and you'd have to spend all that time re-downloading that porn?
beemoh: @Zip: ...and you'd have to spend all that time re-downloading that porn?
Posted 11/07/09 at 03:34pm
ZippyDSMlee: ggrrrrr......vista lost one of my hard drives and I had a heart attack thinking I lost 1TB of data....
ZippyDSMlee: ggrrrrr......vista lost one of my hard drives and I had a heart attack thinking I lost 1TB of data....
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:58am
JDKJ: Which could be explained by both (a) and (b).
JDKJ: Which could be explained by both (a) and (b).
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:56am
Austin_Lewis: JDKJ: You forgot C) the fact that, for some reason, every time he did something that would suggest he shouldn't be in the military, let alone an officer, higher ups ignored it or let it slide.
Austin_Lewis: JDKJ: You forgot C) the fact that, for some reason, every time he did something that would suggest he shouldn't be in the military, let alone an officer, higher ups ignored it or let it slide.
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:51am
JDKJ: Part of the problem is, I believe, that (a) the Army had a lot of time and money already invested in him and which they were unwilling to simply write-off and (b) an increasing need for the type of skills and services he provided.
JDKJ: Part of the problem is, I believe, that (a) the Army had a lot of time and money already invested in him and which they were unwilling to simply write-off and (b) an increasing need for the type of skills and services he provided.
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:48am
JDKJ: And that even if he was begging not to get cut loose, he was apparently a real good candidate for being cut loose, anyway.
JDKJ: And that even if he was begging not to get cut loose, he was apparently a real good candidate for being cut loose, anyway.
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:11am
JDKJ: @chada: And while Kennedy once noted that there's usually more than enough blame for everyone to get a slice, the possibility that the Army was unwilling to cut loose someone who was asking to get cut loose could be a factor.
JDKJ: @chada: And while Kennedy once noted that there's usually more than enough blame for everyone to get a slice, the possibility that the Army was unwilling to cut loose someone who was asking to get cut loose could be a factor.
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:07am
ZippyDSMlee: *noms on his feet*..nomnomnomnom*droooll* ...wuuutttttt uuu looking at?
ZippyDSMlee: *noms on his feet*..nomnomnomnom*droooll* ...wuuutttttt uuu looking at?
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:05am
JDKJ: I'm no psychologist, but I'm told that crazy people have a tendency to do crazy things.
JDKJ: I'm no psychologist, but I'm told that crazy people have a tendency to do crazy things.
Posted 11/07/09 at 10:03am
chadachada321: Whoops, was out of the convo for awhile. I do wonder what type of ammo he used etc, but the real issue is WHY he did it, not HOW
chadachada321: Whoops, was out of the convo for awhile. I do wonder what type of ammo he used etc, but the real issue is WHY he did it, not HOW
Posted 11/07/09 at 09:56am
JDKJ: But if it turns out that they actually did, they'll have Hell to pay.
JDKJ: But if it turns out that they actually did, they'll have Hell to pay.
Posted 11/07/09 at 09:45am
JDKJ: And I'd tend to rule out the possibilty of FN Herstal supplying restricted ammunition to someone merely because they're ordering it from a military base.
JDKJ: And I'd tend to rule out the possibilty of FN Herstal supplying restricted ammunition to someone merely because they're ordering it from a military base.
Posted 11/07/09 at 09:37am
JDKJ: I know you don't leave your gated community and get around much in dark alleys, so you may be surprised to learn that there's this thing called "the black market" where, if you've got enough money, ain't too much of anything which can't be bought.
JDKJ: I know you don't leave your gated community and get around much in dark alleys, so you may be surprised to learn that there's this thing called "the black market" where, if you've got enough money, ain't too much of anything which can't be bought.
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Comments
Do I need to cite reasons in order for my comment to be allowed on here? I am sick of seeing these evil motherfuckers got off easy when ordinary people get completely fucked by their government everyday.
thank you Lou Dobbs! :P
oh fcking Christ HEIL!!HEIL!!HEIL!! to the republican Reich!
oh wait hes not part of the libby scandle..........
gaaa I need glasses >
As for hefty fines, they're only hefty if the guy doesn't have millions, or even just a spare million stashed away somwhere. Even an outright pirate that was caught last May only paid $1,200 in fines, which is a LOT to me but he made $266,000 from his illegal business.
But yeah, I hear you guys loud and clear. The bad man got spanked, and probably adequately and fairly so. Case closed :)
-Probation for 5 years.
-Banned from management positions.
It's a good thing Brant wasn't pirating software too, he may have got the chair.
In all seriousness though, I highly doubt any of last weeks "little fish" (like the guy with one mod chip) will spend more than a weekend in jail. Just enough to drive home the fact that this is a no-no. Not horribly unjust, I think.
Andrew Eisen
As to the mod chip thing, that's a whole different story being handled by a whole different set of people. If anything comes of it, I'm going to be very upset.
well those cases were somewhat huge, if they were sentenced as innocent people would roar against it.
Thanks for the interesting read. Those were also cases that had HUGE mainstream attention, do you think that their outcome was influenced by the amount of coverage? If Ryan Brant was getting railed on national TV would he be in jail as well?
Brant, 35, pleaded guilty in February to falsifying business records. As part of a plea agreement with Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, he avoided prison time by cooperating with an investigation of illegal backdating at the company, the maker of ``Grand Theft Auto'' video games.
``This is a good reminder in an atmosphere where corporate heads are being sent to lengthy prison terms that, if you cooperate and you own up, you will be rewarded for your efforts,'' said former prosecutor Thomas Curran, a white collar defense lawyer at Ganfer & Shore in New York.
More than 200 companies have disclosed internal or federal probes into whether they inflated the value of options awarded to executives by backdating or timing the grants to coincide with days when their stock price was low.
Thanks 4 the spam. Fuck off & die plz kthxbye.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_trial_of_Kenneth_Lay_and_Jeffrey_Skilli...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha_Stewart#Insider_Trading_Charges
Have you ever heard of white and blue collar crime differentiation ?
Sadly we live in a society which hold a highly corrupted system.