Fastow, Who Helped Bring Down Enron, Saw Himself as ‘Hero’

<-bsp-person state="{"_id":"0000016f-8afc-d182-a77f-dfff3c3a0000","_type":"00000160-6f41-dae1-adf0-6ff519590003"}">Andrew Fastow, who was at the center of the fraud which brought down Enron Corp., said he now accepts full responsibility for his actions after originally viewing himself as a “hero” while chief financial officer at the energy trading giant.

Enron used off-books partnerships Fastow created to hide billions of dollars in losses and debt, distorting the company’s performance and inflating its share price. When the partnerships were revealed, Enron’s stock nosedived, plunging the company into insolvency in weeks.

Andrew Fastow, center, outside court in Houston in 2006.

Photographer: F. Carter Smith/Bloomberg

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” Fastow told a packed audience at the Pendulum summit, which describes ...