National Whistleblower Day 2017 | Enron Whistleblower Sherron Watkins — Transcript

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1. 0:00there you go well it's wonderful to be
2. 0:03here it does feel like such a warm and
3. 0:06welcoming group of people I have been
4. 0:10speaking about Enron for the last 15
5. 0:14years and I've attended a number of
6. 0:16conferences that our CEO leadership
7. 0:19conferences I learned a new move we're
8. 0:22usually journalists like to speak to me
9. 0:25professors like to speak to me but CEOs
10. 0:27just go running and so the move I
11. 0:30learned here I'll usually was a guinea
12. 0:31pig they'll say hi Sharon at this
13. 0:35conference
14. 0:36you know this body language of just
15. 0:38shoving me along I went through what
16. 0:42typical whistleblowers go through the
17. 0:44isolation the removal of your job
18. 0:48responsibilities the pariah treatment
19. 0:50where friends just don't want to be in
20. 0:52the same room with you
21. 0:53but enrollment imploded too fast to make
22. 0:56my life totally miserable but the one
23. 1:00thing that I want to note is that as I
24. 1:03speak across the globe I almost always
25. 1:09approached at the end of my talk by
26. 1:11someone who has been a whistleblower and
27. 1:14their lives have been destroyed
28. 1:17because they were isolated they were
29. 1:20made really their reputations were
30. 1:24damaged Enron tried to do that to me
31. 1:26they hired people as notable as William
32. 1:29Bennett to speak on the company's behalf
33. 1:31and he was out telling reporters yes
34. 1:34Sharon Watkins she's no kook well that's
35. 1:37sort of like saying introducing someone
36. 1:38by saying they're not an axe murderer I
37. 1:40mean why did he mention something
38. 1:42negative like that in the first place
39. 1:45there's subtle ways to denigrate people
40. 1:48and there's very you know direct ways to
41. 1:50denigrate people the isolation is just
42. 1:55momentous when you've spoken truth to
43. 1:58power I naively thought facts were going
44. 2:01to rule out and I gave a lot of facts to
45. 2:03Ken Lay and Ron CEO and I thought he
46. 2:06would investigate I never thought he was
47. 2:08going to shoot the messenger or try to
48. 2:09fire me when I testified in front of
49. 2:11Congress and they showed me that ving
50. 2:12memo that two days after I met with him
51. 2:15he was getting this report from Vee
52. 2:17about the potential consequences to
53. 2:19discharging employees who raised
54. 2:21accounting concerns I was really shocked
55. 2:24I had thought more of him but it goes to
56. 2:26show you that whistleblowers really are
57. 2:28just trying to right the ship and I need
58. 2:30naively thought he was the right leader
59. 2:32but the point I wanted to make about
60. 2:34today that I applaud so much is the fact
61. 2:37that dodd-frank gives a 10 to 30 percent
62. 2:42bounty provision for people who bring
63. 2:46financial fraud to the SEC that has
64. 2:48attracted now Steve Cohen and the
65. 2:51national whistleblower Center they've
66. 2:52been at this when when money was just
67. 2:54non-existent the Government
68. 2:56Accountability Project they've been at
69. 2:58this when money's non-existent but now
70. 3:01there are about 12 or 15 other law firms
71. 3:03that have opened practices to advocate
72. 3:06and support the whistleblower and from
73. 3:08my own personal experience when I
74. 3:10finally got the right lawyer I mean I
75. 3:13didn't even think I'd done anything
76. 3:14wrong or need a lawyer you know I'm just
77. 3:16delivering truth to power you've got to
78. 3:20have a lawyer it is such a mean nasty
79. 3:23world out there and you've got to have
80. 3:26the the power balance move in your favor
81. 3:29just a little bit and so dodd-frank is
82. 3:32bringing more lawyers to the cause of
83. 3:35the whistleblower to help alleviate that
84. 3:37isolation but today I want to applaud
85. 3:40those that have been there
86. 3:42prior to dodd-frank and Steve Cohen and
87. 3:44his national whistleblower Center and
88. 3:46the Government Accountability Project
89. 3:48should be applauded for all their hard
90. 3:50work for the case of the whistleblower
91. 4:04as many have said today whistleblowers
92. 4:09are the last line of defense you hear a
93. 4:12lot of politicians talking about our
94. 4:14great democracy and the freedom we have
95. 4:17in our elections but what is so magical
96. 4:20about what our founding fathers did is
97. 4:24that they realize that power corrupts
98. 4:27and absolute power corrupts absolutely
99. 4:31so they put in the checks and balances
100. 4:33this executive branch legislative branch
101. 4:35and judicial branch to form these check
102. 4:38these checks and balances to keep no
103. 4:40single one from being all-powerful when
104. 4:43in my life in corporate America we've
105. 4:46got public accounting firms we've got
106. 4:48the SEC we've got the FBI looking at at
107. 4:51white-collar crime those are the
108. 4:53professional watchdogs but when they
109. 4:56fail to catch wrongdoing the last resort
110. 4:59is the whistleblower and quite often
111. 5:02people are like me where you're blowing
112. 5:05the whistle internally so the Supreme
113. 5:07Court isn't mentioned they're going to
114. 5:08be looking at protections for people who
115. 5:10blow the whistle internally all that's
116. 5:13happened with sorbets Oxley and
117. 5:15dodd-frank I just applaud all these
118. 5:17whistleblowers that have been talked to
119. 5:19today that their cases have now set the
120. 5:22President to give protections to other
121. 5:25whistleblowers all that is so important
122. 5:27you don't blow the whistle because of
123. 5:29monetary rewards you don't blow the
124. 5:31whistle because of protections you blow
125. 5:33the whistle because you're optimistic
126. 5:35that the person you're speaking truth to
127. 5:37power to is going to listen and right
128. 5:39the ship but heaven forbid they don't
129. 5:42listen and heaven forbid they try to
130. 5:44shoot the messenger I am very very
131. 5:46thankful for the efforts that exist
132. 5:49today to be the last resort protection
133. 5:52for that truth teller so I I will end my
134. 5:55remarks on that I'm so happy to be here
135. 5:57and happy to see so many people who care
136. 5:59for the causes of the whistleblower
137. 6:01thank you very much
138. 6:10you
139. 6:12[Music]