Share:
Does crime pay?
Wall Street Crime and Punishment is a weekly series by Benzinga s Phil Hall that chronicles the bankers, brokers and financial ne’er-do-wells whose ambition and greed takes them in the wrong direction.
In the annals of Wall Street miscreancy, few titans of business have experienced a more celebrated rise and ignominious crash than Richard Whitney. In October 1929, he was praised for an act of unprecedented bravery that singlehandedly halted an epic panic but nine years later, he was sitting in a cell in Sing Sing after being convicted of embezzlement.
How did Whitney go from such a glorious point A to a tragic point B? Well, it’s a bit complicated.